Failure, that is what I felt like the final day of my yoga teacher training. Throughout the training we were in small groups of 5 and for the final, we were supposed to do a full 60 minute sequence with each of us taking 15 minutes of it. My schedule did not coordinate with the others and so the decision was made that they would do theirs on Friday and I would do mine the following day on Saturday. Well, when I did mine it was for the instructors only, which messed with my head. I prepared the week of my final teaching into the voice recorder on my computer and then practicing to it to see if I was satisfied with my cadence, voice, cues, etc. I felt pretty good about it and then on the way there, I started feeling panicked so I began to pray on the way there asking God to help me perform well and to remember that it is all in His hands.
As I got to the studio, I could feel my anxiety rearing it’s ugly head and though I kept trying to talk it down… it persisted. Needless to say fear never serves anyone in a positive manner. It only serves to make mess of things and that is precisely what happened. I began teaching to one of the teachers and I suddenly found myself fumbling through and rushing it just to make it end. The feedback I got at the end was polite, but I knew I didn’t do well at all. One of my favorite instructors said I needed to give more alignment cues and I knew it because I literally just called the pose, got anxious and moved onto the next one. The positive feedback was on my poetic nature and presence, but the skill required to actually guide a vinyasa class was pretty much critiqued.
When I left, I sat in my car for a moment and just cried. Passion is a double edged sword. Passion fuels you with desire to move forward in endeavors, yet it can also cause you to be crushed when they don’t go as you would have hoped. Living a wholehearted life requires that we allow these fluctuations and accept them as part of our experience. Yoga philosophy teaches that we should hold things loosely so that, no matter the outcome of our actions, we can be at peace. I think I was holding a bit tightly to the need to do well on Saturday because the fall was pretty harsh and painful. I felt like such a loser and I saw myself mentally kicking my own ass. I poured the pressure on heavily and sucked all of the joy out of it.
I called my fiancé on the way home and just balled. I’ve mentioned that when we lose belief and faith in ourselves (and we all do at times) we need to rely on the belief and faith of another. He attempted to be supportive telling me that he’s sure it wasn’t that bad and that even if it was, it isn’t a huge deal because I’m not expected to perform like someone who has taught for 10-15 years. He knows I have a habit (that I’m trying to break) of always having high expectations (sometimes unrealistic) of myself and then if I don’t live up to those self-imposed hurdles, beating myself up for it. Perfectionist tendencies die hard. As much as I’ve resolved to be kinder and more loving to myself, I still find myself in the pattern sometimes. The difference is I usually catch myself when I’m in it and can pull myself out a little quicker each time.
As I sit and review the situation I realize that a few things caused the failure on Saturday. I’ve been out of my personal practice for a little while now. Having the little one at home constantly because of covid-19 has made it challenging to keep my personal self-care routine and adapting is taking time. Yes, I still have been practicing, but admittedly not as much due to a horrible case of poison ivy that knocked me out of the routine I finally fell into with practicing at home. Saturday really made me realize how much I miss my old routine of going to the studio mid-day and having alone time during the week to practice, read, study, etc. when work is slow. I work full-time from home and have been homeschooling like other working parents during this pandemic so trying to find room for self-care has had to be more intentional and some days I end up sacrificing it as a result of other issues at hand. Another thing I’m still working on… carving boundaries around my space and taking what I need.
During the final, I allowed my ego to take over and make it about “my performance” instead of serving the one person that I was teaching to in that moment. It was a powerful lesson because I realized when we allow ourselves to come from a place of “performing”, we will always fail because we have made it about us. When we come from a place of sharing what we have or giving to benefit others, the message is able to be received more easily by those we intend to teach. It was a good lesson to have reinforced at the start of my teaching journey and I’m a firm believer that the universe always gives us exactly the lesson we need when we need it. I’m simply being groomed to be a more heart-centered teacher. It’s my goal to come from that place when serving. I believe, especially when it comes to teaching spiritual concepts, that you have to live what you teach and this was a blind spot where I realized I am still acting to much out of the ego in some regards.
Even though I had prayed on my way into teach to allow the teaching to come from Him and to allow me to detach from the results as my nerves were raging, I still ended up coming from that place. It’s where my inner work lies. I will say that the set-up of the situation was like an “audition” or performance more than it was an actual teaching scenario… a panel of 3 judges staring at me while one person practiced. It was very nerve-wracking and that won’t be the way it is when I actually teach so I have to cut myself a little bit of a break. However, I’ll take what I can learn from the situation, try not to make excuses, and just focus on what I can do to grow from it. As I’ve stated before, life sometimes gives us “shit” so we can grow out of it… just like crops often require fertilizer to grow healthy and strong, so do we. This was part of the fertilizer that I needed at that moment.
When we step outside of our comfort zone and do something we have never done, we will fall. We will fail. We will be uncomfortable. We will most likely cry, feel anger, fear, frustration, etc. The only thing I’m convinced that makes some successful and others unsuccessful is that successful people can be with these feelings and choose to move forward anyway. Unsuccessful people feel the sting of failure and they back off. They make the excuse that, “I don’t think I really want to do this after-all,” as a way of soothing their bruised egos. I found myself in that space immediately after I fell on my face on Saturday. I was like, “Thank God it’s over. I don’t think I want to teach. I’m sooo good with this,” but if I’m being honest with myself, I’ve wanted this for awhile now. I deeply admire the yoga teachers and spiritual guides who have guided me on my path and I’ve been wanting to do that for others for years now. If I let the feelings stop me, then I won’t reap the fulfillment of doing meaningful work.
When we put our desires out into the universe, the universe will first test us. “Are you sure this is what you want? Let me throw a few curve balls to see how much you want this. Will you stop at the first sign of resistance or will you keep pursuing what you want?” Those who fail to get what they want may just be those who fail to prove to the universe that they indeed do want what they’ve asked for. The Bible reads,
““Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.”
– Matthew 7:7-8
Prayer is not just words. Prayer is how we live. We can read the Bible or other Holy texts, meditate, and pray all day, but most likely will not receive. Yes, the first part is to ask. We must ask God for what we want and set the intention to take action as we are guided to on our path, but the 2nd part of this passage says, “Keep seeking, and you will find,” which usually requires movement. When you play a game of “Hide and seek” as a kid and you are the seeker, you are not just sitting on the couch saying, “I pray that I will find those that are hiding.”As soon as you are done counting, you charge forward looking everywhere you can for those who are hiding from you. It is a game and you have so much fun playing it.
For some reason, when turn into adults we forget how to play this game. We give up before we even get out there and start searching for what we are looking for. Spiritual people often develop the faulty belief that we can just stay in our “bliss bubble” and God will deliver everything we ever wanted. We look in one place with minimal passion and then quit with the thought, “It wasn’t meant to be since it didn’t work out.” Read the ancient tests, that is not how it works. People were molded their whole lives for the large role that they eventually played in the world. The events of their lives are what inevitably qualified them for the role they were tasked with. Life taught them all they needed so that when they got there, they were ready to maintain. Too many of us turn away from life and don’t allow life to teach us. As I grow deeper into my faith, I know that God speaks through the circumstances of our lives. God is life, all life (plants, animals, people, etc.) and there is nothing that He won’t use to get us to pay attention to what He is trying to teach us. It is our only job to pay attention and dig deeply within ourselves to integrate the lessons.
Spiritual teachers do not actually teach, we are just tuned into God and know how to see and integrate the lessons where others miss them. It is a skill that can be taught. We teach the skills necessary to make the most of every lesson that comes from the divine. We don’t get it right every time, but we continue to pursue God and continue the inner work necessary to remove all barriers that prevent us from allowing life in fully and experiencing the beauty of it all. It is up to each one of us to say “Yes” individually. I cannot say “yes” for you, but I can promise you that saying “yes” to God is the best decision you’ll ever make. It was for me!