It seems impossible to describe the change I experienced during my stay in Shivalaya. And how to
choose one unique moment, when this whole time was just a succession of moments. Each one of
which had its importance in building myself.
// Amber is the one offering herbs to the fire from the right-hand-side when looking at the photo //
During the training we are kept busy from dawn to dark : practice, learn, study, eat and sleep.
Without any other matter to focus on or worry for. Our only task was to absorb the seeds of
knowledge our teachers were planting into our body, mind and soul. I was absorbing, minute after
minute, day after day, without choosing what sink and what not, without even knowing the treasure
that was growing inside of me.
I am really happy that our schedule was so full. My rational mind always try to find limit to things,
try to order them. But considering this training, considering yoga, it is vain.
Yoga is to huge to be compartmentalize into boxes. And the very few studying moment were my
mind had the time to analyze, I was diving into a a clouds of “data”. “how could my memory could
ever absorb all of this?”. “how can I do anything correctly if I don’t fully understand it” It was kind
of overwhelming.
The end of the 200h month arrived so fast. And it was time to teach our own hatha yoga class. I was
stressed and unconfident. I knew it was only teaching to my fellows classmates and they will
definitively be understanding but my body had all the fear symptoms : heartbeat racing, hand
shaking and a huge ball blocking my throat.
Then we sat down for the class and suddenly all went quiet. Suddenly all i needed to know was
here. I didnt sorted anything out but my body remembered everything and it was coming out
naturally. It felt good.
This class was a real revelation to me. All of what I needed was printed in my cells. I can’t tell at
what moment it happened but it was there and I didn’t want to stop digging.
It’s been 3 years since i did the 300 Hour Yoga Teacher Training at Shivalaya, other short trainings, thousands hours practicing and
teaching. I still go back to my class notes and regularly find what I need. Something old, I needed to
remember or something new, a new layer of understanding of the same notes. How many times I
have been practicing and just realized “oh!! that is what he/she meant!!!”.
Yoga is huge! I sometimes worry again. Sometimes my old demons come back and whisper to my
ears that “you don’t know enough”, or “how can you teach if you know so little”. But now instead
of anxiety, those little demons of mine just create more hunger for knowledge.
Thanks to Shivalaya I have a good knowledge base to dig-in in those moment. A knowledge base
that open doors to a life time of studies. Also good for me, you don’t have to know everything to
teach. You just have to be willing to share what you actually know.
From Amber, Spain, 2018.
