He Said/She Said:Words from Colleen and Rodney

Rodney:

Maybe your main difficulty is not who you are, but your idea of who you are.

 is not about doing more. It's about freeing yourself from the busy maintenance of the habitual.

Maybe enlightenment is our natural way of being. 

What if you changed your concept of who you think you are, so that your container became as vast as the universe?

You don't become integrated. You give up your illusion that you're not integrated already.

 Colleen:

If it [yoga practice] is not making you kinder, do something else.

                                                                               

Pearls from Colleen and Rodney: 

• What is the cause and effect of your teaching?  How are you addressing the sensitivity? So many infinite cause and effect, pauses  and infinite cause and effect.
• Alignment: alignment and form are dialogue, form a vibration, alignment create a dialogue of vibration, there is no form, formlessness.
• Create a safe space: teach with responsibility yet show heart, in some way hold a secure nurturing space.
• Yogis wonders: no where to go, good to have orientation in life, also sometimes it a good thing to let go of orientation.
• Understand the pose and still teach it.  Which direction the asana is energetically moving? 
• Its easy to be non violent in a non violent situation, how can you be non violent in a violent situation?
• Real absorption: teach the body, feel the body weight, to pranic, toward the direction of calm. Train the body for calm, take a breath, stay back from maximum.  Increase volume of breath doesn't mean taking in.  
• Sequencing: Sequence for the Mind.  Constant presence of Mind, End of suffering.  Be attentive.  Get the opposite question.  Why are we in our body? when don't live in our body? Sequence to be attentive.

                                                           Manna Lu

Submitted by Sasha: 

• "Intuition is not some new age word. Intuition is the practice of relaxing into attention." - Rodney
• "Who am I, and how can I be truly happy?" - Most important questions of yoga from Richard Rosen
• The torso is the perfect container for the absorption of love - how do we get rid of impediments and what takes us away from being naturally attentive? - Rodney

Notes from the Monday 11/16 group talk for sequencing and designing classes:

• Bookend a pose: Do the same pose towards the beginning and end of class.
• Notice everything you can about your students as they walk into the room.
• Use restoratives to balance out the previous active pose.

From Colleen:
Bring a sense of love into the sequence. Conceptualize pranayama as an absorption into love.

From Rodney:
1. Sequence poses for the mind, not just the body. What effect does each pose and sequence have on the mind?
2. Listen to the class with your hands.
3. Design for the skeleton, not just the muscles.