Feeling...Hole

Although I feel like I've been teaching for a while, with having taught private classes and having taken so many trainings, I finally and officially taught my first "Intro to Ashtanga" class the other day to a room full of students.  I was a little anxious leading up to it.  Since Ashtanga is such a unique and specific sequence and is something I trained in years ago, I wanted to make sure I practiced it enough to get the sequence perfect in my head and in my body. 

In the hours leading up to the class, I practiced the entire Primary Series to feel it one more time before teaching - and then I was just excited.  I felt so ready to impart the knowledge I had learned over so many years, from so many different sources, and really make it my own for my students. 

The class was pretty full.  I started out at the front of the class, demonstrating when I needed to, and walked around the room, helping people into poses or just showing them the pose up-close.  Some people had been to an Intro-to-Ashtanga class before, and for some, this was their first time.

75 minutes go by of ujjayi breathing, vinyasa movement, upward and downward dogs, and finally...savasana.  I spoke with a student in the class for a while afterwards who was so excited that I was teaching this particular style of yoga.  I was glowing.

I went home and ate, hung around for a while, then I got out of my clothes to take a shower. I looked down at the pants I just threw in the hamper. My eyes grew big. I picked up the pants.  There was a HUGE HOLE in the back of my cute pink yoga pants.

Like - not just a little hole that had started to unravel at the seam - I'm talking a RIP that started at the seam, and went to the middle of my @$$. 

I was mortified.

I looked down to see what kind of undergarmets I had on. Black. Phew! Pink would've been better. Thoughts raced through my head, "When did this happen?" "Did I sit on something in the car?" "Did all my students see this or did this happen on the way home?"

Shocked, all I could do was get in the shower and laugh. I thought to myself, "I wonder which was worse - this, or when I walked out of a public bathroom with toilet paper hanging out of my pants."

A few days later, I finally emailed a student I knew in the class if she had noticed my "hole" to try and solve the mystery of when the rip actually happened.  She replied, "I did notice it but because you had black on underneath I thought you knew and just wore tights. Hahaha. I thought to myself seems odd she would wear torn pants for her first time teaching but whatever."

Brilliant.  First day on the job and I introduce my students to my gluteus maximus.

A few days later I went to a family party and I noticed my 9-year-old step-niece had a hole in the back of her shirt - I guess she had just ripped it playing outside.  Apparently someone else had pointed it out to her earlier and when I said something, she felt embarassed.  She had known the week prior that I was going to teach a class and I said to her, "Hey remember that yoga class I went to go teach the other day?"  When I told her the story a huge smile of relief came over her cute little face and I realized that my "hole" had served it's purpose.

If yoga and meditation has taught me anything, it's been to go-with-the-flow and not care what other people think.  And if I can inspire a 9-year-old to do the same, well then my job was successful.

Here's to feeling...hole.

Om namah.