I got my book list this week, ordered everything, and I started my homework – a yoga class video with Swami Satchidananda (who brought Integral Yoga to the West and founded Yogaville, aka the Satchidananda Ashram in Virginia, which is the international headquarters for Integral Yoga). I committed to YTT back in April – right after I returned from Meditation Teacher Training – so it’s been a very long wait for me, and with the weather turning a little colder this week too, it’s starting to feel like it’s right around the corner.
I can’t wait for my books to arrive, and to start the first readings. I promise myself this will not be like college, where I diligently read and highlighted and annotated for the first couple of weeks – then skimmed almost everything for the rest of the semester. I am a little concerned about balancing my time between work, family, board, self-care, and yoga, though. In a big way, YTT will be self-care, but I also need to find time for music, hiking, crafting, and even a little Netflix binging here and there. I think I’m going to schedule study appointments for myself each week – then Jeff knows I’ll be busy well in advance, and I won’t find myself waiting too late in the week and realizing I have too many things to do and not enough time.
I’m excited for classes to begin, and to meet the group of people that will be my yoga family for this year, and hopefully beyond. I read an article this week in which the author was remembering a situation in which she’d been stuck on a grounded plane for hours, and some of the passengers were beginning to get vocally uncomfortable and anxious. She talked about the moment that she stopped thinking of “them” and how they were impacting her, and started thinking about “us” and how the situation was affecting us, and how in that moment the situation became more bearable, and her empathy for her fellow passengers increased.
I hope that I love every single person in this class. I hope we all see the values and strengths and differences in one another and find a compassionate, cohesive sense of balance. But if we don’t, I’ll think of them as family. I may not always like everything they say or do, but they are mine. I will care about them. I will act with compassion and in our collective best interest.
But really I just plan to love them all.
Carri Manchester 