Day 4

I walked into class, Day 4, and we started with a full hour of yoga lead by Nikki. It was exerting and an overall great body workout. We shook, we sweat, and it prepped our bodies for what the rest of the weekend was going to entail – which was a lot of yoga.

Later that evening, Carl, a vocal coach, came in and taught us how to use our breath when speaking to our future classes. We dove into technique, inflection, projection, stamina, and tone. He educated us on the Bernoulli Effect; allowing us to visualize how air passes through the vocal chords and how it vibrates them along the way. So many interesting things happen within the human body that I never think twice about on a daily basis. The body is so immaculate – and this is just a tiny chip of an ice cube that’s embedded within the tip of the iceberg.

There are many people in my class who have beautiful thick accents that link them to the places across the world that they’re from, and because the class is taught in English, it poses a challenge for some. Not only are some of my classmates learning how to teach Vinyasa Yoga, they’re also on a journey to learn to speak English fluently as well (#rockstars). With that said, Carl made sure that we all understood one thing:

The desire to communicate trumps anything.

I love that!

Because if you think about it, if you reeeeeally think about it, he’s incredibly right! The voice is the portal for language, yes, but it is not the only portal. Your body, your eyes, the moments that you choose to smile – these are all part of your own, personal language and how you communicate to the world.

Some of the best conversations I’ve ever had took place with words few and far between.

Think about it – you could probably say the same.

When I see my mom, we often have some really great conversations that end in boisterous, loud laughter when no words are spoken at all. We’re not at a comedy show – no one actively tries to get a rise out of us; the cause and effect of our hysteric moments have absolutely nothing to do with words. Something just happens.

Something that she gets.

Something that I get.

And then there’s a quick conversational exchange with our eyes and we both instantly recognize that we know exactly what the other person feels about the exact thing that just happened, whatever that may be. Then the laughter comes bellowing out – even though no words were spoken. And we continue to laugh and laugh, and it intensifies and becomes much stronger than when we started, but we’re still not even speaking.

Laughing with my mom is one of the best conversations I’ve ever had.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that one can teach Vinyasa whilst awkwardly eyeing up their students, and giggling them along into their Warrior 1 – that would be weird and creepy. But what it does mean is that if you want your students to do something, you’ll find a way to get your message across. One of the most important lessons that I gathered from today’s class is that as a teacher, you need to remember that words aren’t your only portal to your students.

Oh, and smile. They can hear it.

:)