Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Diamonds on the Inside...

I don't know what it was, but I woke up this morning with a terrible sense of dread... we'd been up late studying, what felt like unsuccessfully to study dialog, I was tired, sore and just not feelin amazing. Class this morning was no bueno-- for a lot of reasons, it went like 10 minutes over, I wasn't really connecting with the teacher, and pretty much I was just in my head. Before lecture we went to see Katie in the doctor's office (again things are no bueno) and I was kinda spooked to see her. She was laying in bed under a blanket with an IV in her arm and a breathing tube under her nose... they think she might have some sort of stomach infection.. aka parasite i believe, and I know she'll be fine but i was still stuck in my head. Then walking out, I made the bad decision to weigh myself, and couldn't believe I weigh more than before i left... way more... and i know muscle weighs more than fat, blah, blah blah, and a lot of it is probably water weight, but when you're working your ass off you can't help but expect to see some results. So I was upset about that, and then I was thinking about this conversation I had with one of the staff guys yesterday. He gave me some compliment on how I haven't had to sit out any postures.. and I kinda brushed it off and said something about how, i'm not that special, I just have a lot of pride. ... to which he promptly responded with "Pride comes before every fall".... thanks Christian.. so that was going through my head and i was sitting in posture clinic way too close to a freak out.. when I hear another teacher give what is probably the best advice i have ever heard..... someone was stressign out because they missed a line and he without missing a beat, said "hey, relax, this is just yoga school." he said it in such an almost flippant way that it made me laugh. Really, this is not harvard, and lord knows it's not stanford (i wouldn't have gotten in--- that was a joke, mom... kinda) anyhow, it just made me immiediately loosen up, breathe, and realize this is not life or death. Once I did that it was like magic, my confidence came back and I realized I DO still know this stuff. Bonus! So now i'm headed to class and I'm feeling so much better!

Monday, April 28, 2008

Every Picture Tells A Story

pictures from the weekend.. various odds and ends. This weekend was good... i've been missing my fam and friends terribly, and it was nice because Katie's parent's were in town so it felt wonderful to be with a family even if it wasn't my own. Speaking of fam, I'm on Skype with my mom right now and she's tapping into my blogging time before posture clinic! so must cut this short, but much love to everyone and I can't tell you how much I appreciate all the good thoughts and comments you've been sending me. PS- check out the view from the new digs...






Friday, April 25, 2008

All You Need Is Love

after a yoga class that felt like death this afternoon (3 weeks of double days, posture clinics, anatomy classes and lectures adds up) there we were laying in savasanah and Sarah was telling us about how she is a huge Beatles fan. My ears perked up a bit, and she was telling us how she's always listening to them and how she wanted to share a song with us that reminded made her think about the training were going through. My mind started racing and I was thinking... Imagine? A little Help From My Friends? I figured she'd read a few lines, but to my listening pleasure we heard..


"There's nothing you can do that can't be done.
Nothing you can sing that can't be sung.
Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game.
It's easy.

Nothing you can make that can't be made.
No one you can save that can't be saved.
Nothing you can do but you can learn how to be you in time.
It's easy.

All you need is love
All you need is love.
All you need is love, love.
Love is all you need..."


it was a trip, close to 300 of us were laying sweaty on the ground, feeling like death and then everyone started clapping and singing along. It felt like we were in Across the Universe. It was such a moment bigger than us, people started getting all emotional, crying and laughing, it was pretty amazing... and then some guy started puking his guts out and that kinda killed the magic. but for about 2 mintues it was pretty lovely.

(now i can hear the damn neverending mariachi band over the sound of the ocean. cool.)

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Break On Through

Things are kicking into high gear in Acapulco! Energy levels are soaring and you can feel the concentration, nerves and determination that is present. We broke into our groups and began posture clinics this week and it is already intense. Everywhere you look, people are huddled in small groups praciticing their dialog. People are reciting all hours of the night, and getting up as early as 5 to study. ... MY ADVICE FOR ANYONE GOING TO TRAINING: Learn as much as you can before you come!!! I am so fortunate to have come from a studio that prepared me, so I haven't been too stressed out yet. Someone said before I went that every minute you spend studying before training is equal to an hours sleep at training, at the time I didn't really buy it, I just thought, okay okay- i'll study more. But now, I totally get it, and understand.

So far, all the work I did before has really paid off and my posture clinics have gone well. It's interesting becasue they always tell us say that we're "nervous" because really what is being nervous? it's just another emotion and the feelings associated with it are just the feelings of excess energy. All of the staff has been telling us to acknowledge that energy, and channel it into whatever we're doing. Sounds corny.. but i have really been trying to do that and it has been paying off. Yesterday, my delivery went really well, i was feeling super confident but when I came back ot my room to practice more, I got horrible anxious. I started messing up postures that I know and I admit I got a little panicky. But Today I just breathed. before I even stood up to go, I breathed, gave myself a little pep talk, told myself that I KNOW THIS. THIS IS WHAT I WANT TO DO and it went great.

Classes on the other hand, have not been quite so smooth sailing... The first two days were kind of a breeze, and I think everyone was feeling a little over confident. Then posture clinic came along, and our legs were dead from getting stuck demonstrating Awkward Pose over and over again... Then we had the surprise pleasure of having Craig teach. wow... that was ridiculous. During posture clinic I had honestly been thinking, thank god today is not saturday because there's no way I could handle his 2 Minute Awkards... then sure enough he caem strolling, well strutting onto the podium and a sick feeling of dread and panic went through the entire yoga room. He kicked our asses. Seriously, the guy in front of me was curled up in a ball dry heaving onto his mat during the floor series, which then caused me to start convulsing, and thank god I had Erica by my side. She just kept whispering "breathe! breathe!" and I kept it in. (she later confessed, she was frantic to calm me down because she knew that if I lost it, she would too and it would be a whole wave of people puking in the yoga room.) ew.

oh- the other exciting news: we got our rooms moved! kind of sad because I really enjoyed the people on my floor, we had a nice little internet hallway hangout group, and I miss them already. BUt I gotta admit the view over here is beautiful! I feel badly Erica had such a bad alergy to the mold in our room.. ick but the move was kind of a score. This morning we enjoyed a cup of tea on the balcony and watched the ocean before practice. Really... we had spotted a shark, which was a little scary, and we were a little scared there was going to be a jaws re=enactment becasue there was a surfer not too far away, but apparently the sharks are friendly here. (Note to self: ocean is for looking at, pool is for playing in.. here at least)

but anyways, it made me realize how acapulco is the perfec tplace for bikram's teacher training. He always talks about how his series, his yoga is supposed to 100% effort, and then 100% relaxation. Well, technically it feels like 190% effort sometimes, but I'll take the 100% relaxation when I can get it That's what it's like here. There's not distractions here, we don't have to drive anywhere, there's aren't that many people here besides ourselves. It's kind of like our own private litte Ashram. Okay, I need to take a shower before more posture clinic, but till then, NAMASTE!

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

The Ties That Bind

So to start with i did my dialog in front of everyone with Craig critiquing last night & it went really well!! I had a line that I put in the wrong place, but it was minor. i felt really confident, I knew my shit, I was relaxed, I just kept thinking this is the exact same as it was on the podium in Elk Grove, and Craig gave me excellent feedback. Julia kicked some in too, so i felt amazing going to sleep last night.

Now, back to today, so all of visiting teacher are starting to filter in and today was our first day taking classes from non Bikram-staff people. So far the teachers have been awesome! it's so nice to see how many different styles and personalities can still show through with the same dialog. It's crazy how you can do the exact same postures, in the exact same order, with a room the exact same teperature, yet it can feel so different depending on who the teacher is. The afternoon class was a kick. The teacher was from Minnesota and she started class with some song lyrics and I knew immiediately that I would like here. THroughout class she was giving us lyrics from different artists and I loved it, because in class I always have songs floating around in my head. She had a prety good variety of Minnesota artists too, Mason Jennings, Beck, John Denver, and of course she ended Savasanah with a little Bob Dylan. (She went for Forevor Young, I'll admit, I thought she was gonna go with Blowing In The WInd) BUt it was cool because I've never spoke to this woman, never knew she existed until last night, and I felt an immiediate connection with her. That and she cracked me up in standing head to knee when she told us "Lock the knee! Lock the knee! Lock the f***ing knee!" But she had a smile on her face and granted that's something you can only do at teacher training, it still made me smile.

All of the visiting teachers seem so giving and they are here to help us, and to keep learning more for themselves. It's pretty amazing really, they're not getting paid to be here, they have to take time away from their studios, and they do it because they love the yoga and they believe in the community. That's what it's all about. Last night, I was talking to my mom and she asked me if i regretted coming at all, and without a doubt or without a hesitation, my answer was no. When Bikram was talkign about Karma yoga, and Dharma, I fully believed in my heart I was following my Dharma. I truly feel like i am supposed to be a yoga instructor. (granted I need to figure out a sidejob to get a little health insurance still.... ) but anyways, even when I was giving my dialog, I was nervous, but only to an extent because I knew I was supposed to be doing it. I think I felt more excited that anything. I just keep thinking about how I'm really proud of myself. This is a pretty big commitment and a big sacrifice. I mean, I graduated from college, I have a degree, and I'm still following my heart and doing what I want to do. granted it's not easy, I had to take out my first loan, and jsut being here isn't easy, it's hard. But I'm doing it. And that makes me happy.

Sunday, April 20, 2008

yoga reverses the aging process.

i wish i would have had my camera with me last night and today because it has been a blast. Today a big group of us layed by the pool quizzing eachother on anatomy all morning and we spent the afternoon playing Marco Polo, re-enacting Dirty Dancing (where he lits her over his head in the water) having chicken fights and trying to do backflipswith the help of the boys boosts. I seriously felt like i was 8 years old again but it was so much fun! i'm shocked we didn't do relay races or have a belly flop contest. it's really nice how everyone seems to be getting closer and closer every day, and it's so great to have a whole group of people you to help you study or run through dialog postures with. Last night we went to "the club" (after getting kicked outta the pool) and it was a kick. it's below the lobby and we walked down in our flip flops and still dripping from the pool to a pretty nice looking but completely empty dance floor. there were maybe 5 people sitting and drinking at the bar but the rest of the place was completely dead. i can't tell if the people working hated us because no one ordered a drink (and we were definitely not in anything close to club attire) or if they loved us because we were the only people on the dance floor. ithink we provided a great deal of entertainment though as we turned our favorite yoga poses in to dance moves. it's sad how much we all have yoga on the brain. anytime the elevators get crowded someone will undeniably start reciting dialog " okay everyone- suck your stomach in, tightening up, hold it in". ... what's sad is that the yoga jokes should definitely be getting old by now but they're not. I think our maturity level is decreasing rapidly. but for the meantime, i'm okay with it! okay, off to take a hower and more studying before dinner.

ps- my stomach feels amazing! by the time everyone got home from dinner last night it was already better, and today the pains are almost completely gone :) yay!

Saturday, April 19, 2008

change of plans...

i am not going anywhere tonight with my stomach like this. so that means i can upload some photos! sorry, mom no yoga postures in this bunch.. the last thing i am going to do is say "hey Craig, while you're up on that podium can you take a picture of my standing bow? i think it's gonna be a good one!" .. that and to be completely honest, for most of the week, i've been so tight the last thing i've wanted to do is more postures. i was beginning to think my hamstrings were shrinking because they were so tight. regardles... here are some odds and ends pictures of the studio, the hotel, the Hotel Canine Concierges (yes, that's Chunky and Kimmi), studying by the pool, and the delicious fresh coconut water










witha little help from my friends..

This week is finally over. Craig kicked our asses in class today. One of the best, hardest classes I have ever taken. Today so far has been spent lounging by the pool attempting to study for our anatomy test on monday. My stomach is still driving me crazy. Last night i could barely fall asleep because it hurt so badly. Today i had to run from the pool multiple times to back it to the bathroom... again not hot and i wouldn't mention it, but jeeze this is the 5th day. its gettign old.. and painful. but the girl in the room next to me is absolutely amazing and just pulled out her suitcase full of assorted pills, creams, and who knows what so i'm going ot give immodium a try. As shitty (no pun intended) as my stomach situation is -- and it is right now, i honestly wanted to call my mom crying because it hurt so badly earlier-- it really is nice to know how willing to help eachother everyone is. I feel like the group as a whole is really starting to bond and its amazing. Even with the "studying" (how much studying can you do by the pool?) everyone was swapping answers and taking turns quizzing eachother. It's neat because everyone is so unique and comes with a different story of what brought them to training but despite the differences we're all in this together.

More pics to come later, i think we're headed downtown tonight to get dinner, but hope all is well with everyone back home, and know that i am surviving on all of your good energy- yikes, my tummy is rumbling, and unlike winnie the pooh, IT IS NOT time for something sweet... to eat.

Thursday, April 17, 2008

better days.

life is so much better. its thursday, we already had morning class, which means only 4 more yoga classes till the weekend! bikram was feeling exceptionally charitable last night and let us out of lecture around 11:30 and it was a godsend to be in bed before midnight. my sore muscles are a million times better-- my stomach, not so much. (every trip to the bathroom is still action packed- not hot). yesterday mintues before afternoon class was about to start, i made the very wise decision to move my mat to the very back of the room by the door. the girl next to me was making conversation (about poop- what else?) and it turns out she hasn't gone since we've been here!! the past couple days she's been puking like crazy and they're scared her systems getting poisoned by being all stuffed up! holy schnikes...rough! i feel terrible for her, but man, after that i had a major perspective shift, and i feel AMAZING! plus i think my body is starting to shed some water weight so that feels pretty good too. except something tells me i'm going to be coming home with shrunken chesticles. also not cool, but what can ya do. okay, off to lecture. love you all

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

i want to die.

seriously. i feel like hell. i feel like a hangover times ten, that's the closest thing i can equate it to. my head hurts, my stomach hurts, i'm hungry but i'm scared to eat anything, and i'm thirsty but i feel like i'm going to puke. not to mention i feel like i'm half asleep from the late night lectures. i guess this is why no one wants to visit on week two. at least it's wednesday, this week is almost half over. okay, nows the time to start sending some juju!

Monday, April 14, 2008

We are into our second week, and so far so good. despite the fact that i woke up this morning stiff as hell and a lovely shade of pink from all the sun, class went alright.... well, alright meaning i got my ass kicked by an 82 year old lavian lady. Actually it wasn't terrible, but I'm a little nervous Emmy is in town all week teaching and we've all been told horror stories about Bikram's most senior teacher.

We started Anatomy today and I was pretty stoked to get my hot little hands on some crayola crayons for our anatomy coloring book. -- not that I needed them, I came to lecture equipped with a brand new 24 pack of color pencils, AND a sharpener. I have to report so far I have gotten the muscular, nervous, circulatory, and spinal systems all filled in with the correct corresponing colors and not a pigment has gone ouside the lines. See pops, I knew an Art Degree would come in handy! ;) Dr. T is kind of a kick, and he's a welcomed break from Bikram (i'm starting to hear and indian accent in my head). but it's hard to take the guy seriously when he's about 75 years old and takes break to read jokes that he has written down ahead of time. (he prefaces each one with -- "okay Jewish Joke, here we go...." 5 minutes later "now, Blonde Joke......" This might shock ya, but something tells me these jokes of his have been around the block a few times, and they're losing their gusto.

Something that is comedic though, is Bikram's Love Ballads that he played for us during our last savasanah today...... wow... check it out, it's available for purchase on amazon.com .. AND I'M SERIOUS!!




don't get me wrong, he actually has a really pretty voice, and when he's singing his indian songs, i kind of enjoy it.. but if i had to hear "oh my darling, you are everywhere, you are my pulse" one more time i thought i was gonna scream. and in case you are wondering i do believe wilson phillips is making a comeback because it sounds like they are his back up dancers.

if i sound bitter it's only because, after lecture tonight.. which probably won't get out until after 1am, he wants to hold a movie night so we can watch hindi films of all the people whose life he has claimed to save. cool... oh and if you didn't know, this guy DOES NOT SLEEP... seriously, he takes short catnaps throughout the day, but he doesn't sleep at night and apparently sees no reason why we should either. okay, enough of my bitching, life is actually nice here, except i miss everyone.

Sunday, April 13, 2008

more pictures!!!

Here are some pictures from today. Sunday is my new favorite day. I keep thinking, I can get through anything during the week as long as I know I have sundays to myself. Today I slept in till almost 10 which was absolutely glorious. I spent almost all day by the pool and on the beach. Learning dialog is not too bad when you're floating around!







The big excitement of the day was getting my SKYPE set up. It's this internet service that allows you to use your computer to make cheap phone calls. Somehow i was able to call my parent's landline without having to put my credit card down. I just tried again, and it said I have to pay first, my credit card is inside my room and i'm too exhausted to go get it, but i am already a much happier camper. It was so nice to be able to chat with them for a few minutes. I miss the day to day stuff.


I realized I needed some pictures of the rest of the fam too, so here are a few I had on my computer. I wish I would have brought a framed picture or two with me. I have our christmas card sitting out on my nightstand and it makes me smile whenever i see it.







Tomorrow is going to be a long day, so I am off to bed for now! more updates later!

Fam Pics







Here are some pictures from before I left.. I meant to put these on earlier but I'm just now getting around to it

Someone asked Erica if she could practice her dialog while we waited for the van...




our loot from our trip to costco. (you're not supposed to bring outside food into the hotel, so we had to bring suitcases with us on our shopping trip)




Erica, Katie and Me before dinner

Saturday, April 12, 2008

no fiesta, siesta por favor

it's saturday night, i'm in acapulco, i have nothing to do tomorrow and i'm about to go to bed. i gotta be honest, not being able to drink in mexico, (and being too tired and sore to dance) puts quite a damper on the social life.
Here are some odds and ends pictures, since i got an email from my mom complaining about the lack of photos. More to come soon, I promise.








Today was pretty interesting, woke up, got my ass kicked by Craig in class. Honestly, during awkward pose, i hated his guts. I was shooting him looks of death and I wanted to cry my legs hurt so badly, and my arms, and my whole body, but somehow I survived. After class, I took a nice long savasanah, well really I dosed off for 10 minutes or so and woke up realizing I should be thanking the guy for an amazing class. He made me work harder than I wanted to, and way harder than I thought I could. That's a great teacher for ya.

Anyhow, after wobbling back to my room, we had lunch and headed to the pool. Let me give you guys a warning-- if there are pictures of my sunburned ass floating around the internet somewhere it is not my fault! jk... kinda... we were definitely victims of some crazy perve by the pool. It started out innocently enough, some guy (maybe 45ish) came over with sunblock and just sorta sat down on Katie's chair asking her to put sunblock on his back because he couldn't reach. katie's a good person, and couldn't really say no, so she did and he tried to chat us up for a minute and then went back to his chair. Then a cabana boy came over with a pina colada for Katie from the guy. She explained we can't have any alcohol, and the cabana boy came back with a virgin so she waved a thank you to him, and we all thought it was a kind gesture....... so maybe 15 mintues pass, and he comes over with business cards asking us for our email address and yapping about some humanitarian project that he was doing and we could check out the pictures online... needless to say we did not give it out, and he left us after saying something about the natural photos.... at this point we were kinda annoyed but not really skeeved out. until some woman, bless her heart, came over and told us that she had seen him taking pictures of us from underneath his towel!!! i guess he saw her see him, and as soon as she walked over to us, he started quickly gathering his stuff up, and he basically peaced out with this guilty peeping tom expression on his face. We pieced together, with the womans help, that by talking about "Natural Photos" he was basically propositioning us to take nude photos for him!!! What a creeper! She said that she was watching him for awhile trying to figure out what he was doing because he was trying to be so sneaky... ick ick ick.

But not to be worried, we gave her the business card he left us, and she went straight to the hotel manager. okay i gotta go, we're making a run to costco!

Friday, April 11, 2008

it's friday!

so this morning i woke up feeling like hell. i was stiff and sore and i had the sick realization that i still had two months to go. morning class was rough and i walked out thinking holy shit the honeymoon is over. But then as a random and shocking act of kindness Bikram let us out of our afternoon posture clinic an hour early and postponed our afternoon class by a half hour. that meant we got to spend some quality time by the pool which was glorious. the sun was exactly what i needed and afternoon class went really well. right now i'm starving waiting for room service (it's friday- time for a splurge!) and it's kind of funny because we have the night off tonight, we're in acapulco, you would think we'd be itching to get outta this hotel and go out, but that is not in the cards. i took the longest shower, shaved my legs, put on my pjs, im planning on eating and probably passing out. 9 yoga classes in 5 days kicked my ass. i'm so excited all we have tomorrow is 8am class... after that i plan on being on the beach all day.

oh ps- i don't knonw how i havent mentioned it yet, but it cracks me up, all anyone can talk about here is poop. and i'm serious. we've had more lectures about "if you are constipated or have diahrea, it's perfectly normal and okay" a lot of people are having major problems, and i feel super bad for them, but it's a crack up. some poor girl was bawling in the bathroom and when someone asked if she was okay she cried out "No! I haven't pooped in 3 days!!" then in the stall another girl calls out "at least you haven't had the shits for 3 days like me!" so gross, yet it's still comedy. honestly, i heard some guy at the pool saying, "well before class i passed some pretty impressive matter" !?! wow. that's where my life is right now. i was looking at pictures from this time last year and it's funny to compare last years Coors Light flavored adventures by the pool with now. Instead of mixing drinks with jack daniels, i fix my Electrolyte Cocktails all day. Not that I drank that much last spring, but it was such a fun filled semester. Now I am still having fun, but i'm just so much more focused and driven. life is still good, it's just different right now.

Thursday, April 10, 2008

despite the food situation...

which sucks. options are limited. very limited. I just bought a salmon salad, had two bites, threw it out and went up to my room to make a pb &j, but anyhow, despite that, I've gotta admit if i trained in LA i would be hating us right now. conditions are AMAZING!!! the yoga room is obnoxiously nice. It's absolutely huge, brand new carpeting, which means it doesn't smell! and there is a prety big entry way room with plenty of cubbies for our stuff. We have all of our lectures, and so far posture clinics in a huge ampitheater, (after we break down into groups- posture clinics will be held in suites! plus in between morning class and first lecture erika and i have been taking a dip in the swimming pool! today we shared a coconut that was freshly craked open for us. tasted a million times better than Zico coconut waters. my only disappointment is the cabana boy brought us a pina coloda and we declined given the no booze rule. damn, it was pretty hard to give it away, but the guy we gave it to seemed happy. anyhow, i'm off to posture clinic for more Half Moon Pose... sooo monotonous.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Groundhog Day...

Already I feel like I'm trapped in that movie. It's only wednesday and the monotony is crazy.... class, posture clinic, lunch, posture clinic, class, dinner, posture clinic. it's mostly rough because we've been listening to the exact same dialog over and over and over again-- It's taking forevor to get through 290something people's half moon pose. Anyhow, it's after midnight and we just got outta posture clinic. i should probably be pleased he let us out this early, but tonight just seemed to drag. i've got to admit though, bikram is pretty damn entertaining. he reminds me of a 9 year old with a severe case of ADD. I've also started a list entitled "Names Bikram Has Dropped" sadly i only started counting In our last clinic, but so far i've got: Elvis Presley, Barbara Streisad (of course), Shirley Macclaine, Ronald Reagan, and countless others. i love it. actually, at the moment, he is super likeable. granted, my feelings are probably going to change a million times over the course of training, but right now he makes me smile. okay, i'm going to bed. 5 classes down 94 to go!


ps- in every class at some point i think every teacher at Elk Grove's face has popped into my head... that makes me smile too and i don't think that's going to change at all :)

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

still survivin..

today was practice with rajashree, lecture, posture clinic, class with bikram, and we're about to go in for more posture clinic. I did my dialog in front of bikram and it went really well. I didn'e mess up at all and he said "you dialog good, but you sound like barbara streisand." then he went off on a tangent about her (i guess she was one of his many pupils) and then he said, "but you did good job". so i'll take that. classes went well today. I still haven't had to sit down yet, which i'm very happy about, but i swear, i have never sweated so much in my life. it's pretty foul. it's like a constant faucet that just drips down. not attractive. but i feel pretty strong so far... except i know this is all the calm before the storm.... anyhow, i'm off to posture clinic!

Monday, April 7, 2008

day one..

Okay so I cheated, and I"m gonna cut and paste from this email i sent, sorry for the redundance!


Hey everyone, I made it here safely and soundly. The resort is absolutely amazing. It's so gorgeous with palms trees everywhere 5 swimming pools, botanical gardens, golf courses, the works.... Not a bad place to be spending 9 weeks to train for yoga! So far all of the people I have met have been super friendly, and Erica and I already made a trip to the local grocery store to stock up on groceries.... (sidenote: it was on the order of Costco with the free samples... except Costco doesn't give out free samples of Vodka and Cran... WOW that's mexico for ya!)

Anyhow, today was the first day of training and it went very well and good. Bikram lived up to all of my expectations and it blew my mind how many innapropriate (but comical and usually right-on) comments he made. We sat through a few hours of lectures and some testimonials- one of which was from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. He attributed the last 7 years of his career and the fact that he's still able to move around today to the yoga. We also started posture clinic today and about 50 people did half moon pose in front of Bikhram. (i am still bitter I kind of got the shaft-- Craig (more about him later) asked for 5 volunteers, I jumped up eager to get in out of the way, but then he had us demonstrating the posture itself not the dialog. Erica went today though, and she totally rocked it! Bikhram was very impressed and kept asking what studio she came from. Yay for BYEG!! :)

We only had one practice today and it was a long one... we started at 5 and didn't get out until 7:15... keep in mind class is only suposed to be 90 minutes, but Bikram lived up to his reputation of holding postures and talking at length. Kareem practiced with us and it was pretty funny because i looked to my right and about 4 people over i saw his ginormous chest and shoulders sticking out 2 feet above the people next to him. (not to talk smack on the guy or anything but.... He about died after the 3rd posture and left the room! I'm very proud to say I not only stayed in the room, but I didn't have to sit down once. I was shocked to see how many people were dropping like flies all around me. I felt pretty good, it was hot, but not too bad. I sweated more than I can remember, but I could tell he was tryign to take it easy on us. We'll see though, i don't want to jinx myself, but I'm feeling good about things right now.

Saturday, April 5, 2008

PS--

despite the drama, I must mention how, man oh man, do I feel blessed to have such loving and supportive family and friends. I spent the nicest day with my family today, and as much as I am goign to miss everyone, it feel so good knowing they will be here for me when I get back. Also, it feels so right knowing I am going to come home to teach at BYEG. I can't articulate how much support I feel everytime I walk into that studio. Yesterday, for my last class before training Carrie had me teach the first set of Awkward pose and it shocked me how comfortable I felt up there. I was nervous, of course, but then I started and I looked out at everyoen in class and it felt like everyone was rooting for me. I almost started laughing because I was so happy because I knew that this is what I am supposed to be doing. Even when the flight mixup happened, I honestly thought, okay worst case scenerio, I get to training a day late. It was like, there was no option of not going to training. I didn't freak out and think "this is a sign I'm not supposed to go" i just thought, okay I'll take it as it comes and trust that it will work. and it did. For now, I'm going to take a little napsky, but I'll update soon!

Airport Mini-Drama

sooo... I arrived at the Sac airport around 10:00pm and when I attempted to check in for my flight at 11:59pm, I was told that I had missed my flight by 12 hours!!!! What a nightmare... Long story short, after an hour of nervously waiting and doing my best not to completely freak out, everything was resolved. Turns out it was a mistake with the airline (that affected more passengers than me) and it was not my time keeping. Regardless, I am all checked in and waiting by my gate. (and I am resisting the urge to go get a tasty and alcoholic beverage to calm my nerves-- something tells me sticking to water and green tea is a good decision before training)

ps- on a much more upbeat note-- Bruce last night--- AMAZING, FANTASTIC, GLORIOUS!!!

seriously it was without a doubt, the best concert I have ever been to in my life. He came out to Spirits in the Night, and it was unbelievable. Standout songs were Badlands, Because the Night, Murder Incorporated, of course Born to Run, and Rosalita. It was an absolute blast. The best send off I could have imagined.

Friday, April 4, 2008

oops.

okay so my blogging skills just might be lacking. but i am not giving up!

so let me bring you up to speed... i am leaving for training tomorrow, and I couldn't be more exctatic. I feel like I am finally read to go, I've said my goodbyes, I've seen everyone I wanted to see, I have a better than decent grasp on my dialog, and I feel good about my practice. I even remembered to confirm all of my travel arrangements and request all isle seats for my flights. bonus! (however two layovers- not bonus) so basically all i have left to do is pack... yuck. and what I'm actually super stoked about is.... dun dun dun...


I'M GOING TO SEE BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN TONIGHT!!! could I be any more excited? no way jose. For me, this is like the ultimate send off. I've been prepping myself by checking his setlists for almost every concert this tour and I've been watching bootlegged dvd's of his shows going all the way back to the 70's... oh man I am ready!