day 3 intensive yoga teacher training - tulum mexico

I've been getting up at 5:00 in the morning to study ayurveda(the studying part hasn't been so succesful). Today I wake at 4:00 feeling good and ready to get up. So happy I did, as I had time for a yoga practice. Made a huge difference. I'm now trying to re-work, re-figure my day. I thought I'd be able to find time for a practice later in the day. Not so much. Now thinking of practicing in the morning and studying later in the day. Sometime.

We start our practice at 6:30, but instead of starting with asana be begin with a walking meditation on the beach. We use a light ujjayi breath throughout the walk and use our mantra we've been working with prior to our arrival and during meditation. We also pick items up from the beach and begin to make an altar on a table in a sitting area for use for lecture/discussion. The walking meditation starts a beautiful tone for the day. It was needed.

Today our focus is on standing balancing postures. We have 7 of them. So our group practice focused on sun salutes, standing poses, now we have balancing postures we've added to the mix. I love this prcoess that we use. I'm seeing that in this intensive format it's realllllly great. We keep building on and going back to what we've learned.

We do the usual...exlore cueing, teaching, assisting, and adjusting these poses individually. The group is getting to continue to build on their practice teaching as they are now doing sun salutes, standing poses, and balancing poses.

At lunch Jacob (the manager here) tells us that a Category One hurricane will be hitting Cancun tomorrow. We should feel the affects tonight. Okey. Dokey.

We talk about the importance of a home practice. Why we practice yoga, how it makes it feel, how important it is for our teaching and all come to the conclusion that it should be an important component of our day. 15 mintues daily is better than an hour once a week. Everyone commits to practicing 21 days straight for at least 15 minutes. I will be that annoying person that emails them to see how it's going. I do love plans. And I do love when we get into new healthy habits and patterns. A sucker for that.

Everyone in the group plans to teach when they go home. We brainstorm for about five minutes possible places to teach. There are so many options. If one wants to teach, there are places to teach. Each person shares the capacity in which they plan to teach. It's inspiring to hear. Yoga changes lives. These students will change lives. It give me goosebumps thinking about it now.

Tracy come in to teach more anatomy goodness. Three more hours on the lower extremities. Students are really connecting the anatomy with the postures. Learning so much! It's good.

The category one hurricane is now a category two. I'm feeling a little concerned about our third story treehouse only a stones throw (actually a toss) from the sea.

And I leave to go have a massage!!! Yes, a massage! At Maya Tulum. With Antonia for the first time. I love her. Truly. Madly. Deeply. :) I'm seeing the importance of Self care. And I must make time for it. Drifting back up the beach after my massage I feel such peace. And also see and feel like the calm before the storm. Amazing how quickly the water rises. Mother Nature, mmmmm mmmmmm.

Ten more hours of intense work today. These yogi's are warriors. Literally.

Tracy and I have dinner. She had already talked to our folks at Zulum and we were going to sleep in another cabana. Turns out we didn't have to . Hurricane Paula has already passed up. She spared Tulum and the yogis. Thankfully so.