Sh!t I say in class....

Inhale....exhale....stretch...keep breathing....be mindful.... Yada. Yada. Yada.

We Yoga teachers all have the same basic vocabulary. It's part of the brainwashing process I like to refer to as 'Yoga School'. The magic happens when the words are strung together, during asana (postures), with inflection and personality. Most classes the same spiel is used and it can get very boring when you are saying pretty much the same thing over and over and over. I often wonder if my students get tired of this dribble but then I remember that it's me, not them, who has to listen to me speak at every class...

Sometimes though, true pearls fall out of mouth and I amaze myself. Those are moments I treasure during class and I'll silently tease myself that "I haven't heard that one before!" Then I wonder if I'll remember to use the new phrase again next time I'm leading that certain asana. Many times I don't.

A lot of the language is actually taught in Yoga school but a great deal of it comes out through the asana itself. It is during the times of holding a posture when I intuitively vocalize a stream of consciousness that is generated through the energy of the asana. I have studied Sanskrit and I am a firm believer in the science of it. I strongly feel that it should be used in Yoga class because much of the energy of the posture is actually in the name itself. There are a lot of teachers who don't use the Sanskrit names of postures and feel they don't need to. That's fine for a lot of people but I'm a traditionalist.

I love Sanskrit. It is a mathematical language; genius in it's development and powerful in it's vibrational frequencies. It is beautiful to look at in written form. Chanting the names of the divine in Sanskrit leads to pure bliss. Don't believe that? Check out a Krishna Das kirtan then get back to me. In fact, I can't count the times I have had a new student come up to me at the end of class and ask, "What IS that music you are playing??? I loved it!" Take one look in their glassy eyes and you'll see the power kirtan.

There are days in class when the language won't flow the way I want it. I'll be so tongue tied between English and Sanskrit that I won't know my right hand from my left leg. I can laugh at myself and it's always funnier when the students catch me before I can catch my own flub. Sometimes I get so blissed out that I'll lead them, accidentally, into a physically impossible pose. I'll realize what I've said when I see the looks on their faces trying to figure out what I just asked them to do. My regular students know my shtick, if you will, but the newbies get caught off guard when I make these gaffes. I'll catch myself and the whole class will have a laugh.

My first Yoga teacher, in all the years I studied with her, made only one verbal flub that I ever heard. This made me put so much pressure on myself when I became a teacher. I was so focused on clear speech during class that the first time I got tongue tied I almost cried. Finally I realized that I just needed to be myself regardless of the flubs and the students would just have to come to terms with my humanness.

Every now and then something slips out that isn't a flub that turns into 'Yoga Twister' but just comes out not how I intended. When you are talking about the human body this is pretty easy to do. It's during those awkward moments that I never know how to get myself out of it but just keep going and hope no one holds it against me. Such as the time during an intense asana that I announced to the students, "Now's a good time to explore your body.".....

Yikes.....

Breathe in. Breathe out. Move on.

She Wore Blue Velvet

I love to Polka! And I’m proud of it!

By now, if you have been reading along, you know that I’m very proud of my Polish heritage. My father was a first generation Polish American. It is family lore that my Babci (grandmother) came to America, alone on a ship, when she was 13 years old. I have always admired the strength that must have taken. She met my Dziadek (grandfather) when she got here. They married and had 9 boys, the youngest of which was my father.

He went to a Polish Catholic school, St. Mary’s of Czsetochowa in Middletown, CT. It is still in existence to this day although the Polish heritage is dying out. My father spoke fluent Polish but he never taught us any. He wanted us to only speak English considering the ridicule he received growing up. Our parents wanted us to be ‘American’. This makes me so sad that so much of my heritage has been lost in order to be more ‘American’, whatever that means.

Before both of my sisters were married, Sundays were family dinner days. I remember vividly all of us sitting in the dining room, trying to eat my mother’s horrific pot roast, and listening to the Polish radio station. My father would put it on, sing or whistle along, and listen to the dj speaking his language. I would ask him what they were talking about and sometimes to tease me he would answer my question in Polish.

The thing about this memory that always makes me smile is the fact that, even if we were driving in the car on a Sunday, my father had a knack for turning on the radio and finding a Polish station. Even in other states. This became a running family joke. I’m sure this drove my Sicilian mother insane….

At every wedding or dinner dance to which my parents dragged me, I would dance the Polka with my father. Including when I was in high school and we would go to the Father-Daughter Dances. He would count out loud, “1, 2, 3…1, 2, 3…1, 2, 3…” until I found the beat. So it was only natural that at my wedding I would dance the Polka with my father. We only danced two dances together that night, ‘The Beer Barrel Polka’ (not my favorite) and ‘Daddy’s Little Girl’. It was the last time we ever danced together.

When you are Polish in America you are required to love Bobby Vinton, the Polish Prince. He’s a famous singer known for ‘She Wore Blue Velvet’, ‘Mr. Lonely’, ‘Santa Must Be Polish’, and ‘My Melody of Love’. I love Bobby Vinton. I can sing along and do with fervor. For many years, no matter where my husband and I went on vacation, it seemed that Bobby Vinton had been in concert there the week before. This became our running joke until one year when we planned an anniversary getaway in Atlantic City the same weekend when Bobby was performing.

So my husband, being a good sport, got us tickets. We had dinner, got dressed up and headed to the old convention center on the boardwalk where they used to crown Miss America. And there we were, the youngest couple in a the place. Me, standing up singing my heart out, and my poor Asian husband, surrounded by 2,000 Poles. He really is a good sport and I know he suffered through this concert because it meant so much to me. Although, he did admit that he knew almost every song…

On occasion you may find me driving down the road listening to the Polish station out of Bridgeport. The dj speaks English but the beat remains the same, 1, 2, 3…1, 2, 3…1, 2, 3… There are a few lyrics I understand. Thanks to Bobby Vinton I understand the most important ones.

"Moja droga jacie kocham...means that I love you so!
Kocham ciebie calem serce, love you with all my heart!"

Fuck Yoga

Yeah, I said it. FUCK YOGA.

Actually this was a website I saw the other day. This made me laugh out loud! This guy, angry at his ex-wife's obsession with Yoga, started making t-shirts and other items that just say 'Fuck Yoga'. He's making tons of money off of this.

Part of me, when reading his story said, "Fuck YOU!". I thought to myself that his wife was most likely obsessed with Yoga because this guy is probably a total ass. But then part of me said, "Yeah! Fuck Yoga!" At least, "Fuck what we have done to Yoga in the West."

We were in New York City on Thanksgiving morning and as we were driving towards the Lincoln Tunnel we passed several swanky, modern Yoga studios. They looked so amazing from the outside. Sleek. Provocative. The posters of contorted yoginis in expensive Yoga clothes adorning the walls, both inside and out. Part of me wants so badly to go into one of these places one day. Take some classes and really see what it is all about. Part of me is so curious: Do I have the chops to teach in a place like this?

But then again, would I really want to?

My students are primarily average sized, middle-aged and show up in exercise clothes they bought at WalMart. I love them. They are real. They don't expect Yoga to turn them into something they are not. Most of them know that enlightenment hardly ever comes without the work. They know that any class, even in the basement of the library or the community room at a church, can be just as good as an over-priced, pimped out studio in Manhattan.

But my fears of inadequacy remain... Am I good enough to hold my own in one of these places?

My practice has changed so much since I began teaching 5 and a half years ago. I've slowed down with injury, illness and basic fatigue. I was told by a local, haughty teacher that my teaching style is rudimentary. Well, considering the fact that the most increasing number of chiropractic patients are Yoga students, maybe we need more rudimentary teachers and classes. You can't stand on your head before you can stand up.

There are even 'Yoga Competitions' now. I mean, really? Fuck that! Yoga is about being in your body and learning to not compete with the person next to you. "Eyes on your own mat, students."

I like to think that if I ever had the chance to teach in one of these places that the same kind of students that come to my class now would come then. The real folks in real bodies. The ones who can laugh at me when I don't know my right foot from my left hand. The ones who can cry in class and we all cry along with them. The ones who come for themselves not to compete with the person next to them.

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If you want to go for the exercise and need to wear pants that cost $100 with a $200 mat, then head into a big city. But just know that if you're not sure how to line up your feet parallel to each other then you probably just wasted $300.....

My Favorite Christmas Memory

It was completely humiliating at the time.



When I was 16 years old I drove a powder blue '77 Plymouth Scamp. My license plates said 'KK-10'. Everyone in a 25 mile radius knew my car. I loved that car and many of you reading this probably did too, hehehe....but I digress.



During that time, my eldest sister and her husband owned a group home for mentally ill adults. Every year my sister would ask my father to dress up like Santa and hand out the gifts at the resident party. He usually would change into his Santa suit in the garage and then go in and hand out the presents. Well this one year in particular, he decided to dress up at home and have me drive him from Cromwell to Haddam, in my car.



See where I'm going with this?



So there we were, just the two of us again, driving down Route 9. Me driving. Daddy in the passenger seat. Dressed in full Santa regalia. Ugh.



He had a bell in one hand and his cassette player in the other. (He had made a mix tape of Christmas songs to play while handing out the gifts. This was high tech back then, kiddies!) He was waving to anyone and everyone as we drove the 25 minutes from our house to the group home, ringing his bell the entire time. He was laughing and 'ho-ho-ing' the whole way, really getting into his part. People were beeping their horns and waving as they passed us. I was trying to shrink down in my seat as low as I could.



I was humiliated and amused at the same time. I don't think any of my 'cool' friends ever saw us. Thank goodness...

Although I thought this was the most embarrassing thing ever to happen to me at the time, it has remained my favorite Christmas memory. I can still hear my father laughing, having the time of his life. I would be humiliated all over again to see him that joyful just one more time. If only I could.

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And yes, Kristina, there really is a Santa Claus.

Time Out?

It might be time for a change.

I'm exhausted. My body is in pain. Yoga is the only thing that makes me feel better. But I'm so tired. How can I possibly keep teaching?

Don't be scared, dear students. I'm not walking away anytime soon and if I do, knowing me, it won't be for long. It's just that I am so, so very tired. My body and my brain need to rest. I'm so tired that I feel unmotivated. I'm in so much pain that I can only think of my own body. I'm so overworked that I have virtually no time for my own practice. If I can't offer myself the benefits of Yoga, how can I offer it to you?

I use as much energy as possible when I teach and on those days, I kind of prepare energetically all day for class. Those students who are brave enough to join me on Friday mornings understand how truly tired I am. It is on Friday morning that I am the most exhausted. Even though I probably have just woken up, I haven't had anytime to store up energy for class. There are many times when I am sitting on my mat praying before the start of class, when I am not praying to be guided through movement, but I am praying not to break down in tears of exhaustion.

And in my own defense, I think I do okay most classes. I still surprise myself sometimes at what comes out during a class flow. Many of you, I'm quite sure, know me well enough to know when I am not on top of my game. So for this, I apologize. Just know that I still continue to give my all, every single class.

So, although I am not making a decision right now, I will probably be making one in the near future. I need to take some time off to rest and recharge. I need to heal my body. I need to find some new inspiration for movement. I need to focus on my own practice.

I love my students so much. I promise I won't be gone for long. I just need to hibernate for a bit.

Daddy's Little Girl (part 4)

My father was my first Guru.

When my Dad had his first heart attack I was about 5 years old. At that time, when you had a heart attack you got to stay in the hospital for a week or more and then you were allowed to stay out of work for six weeks. While my father was recuperating, he and I palled around. Just the two of us.

I remember a lot of that time we spent together. I'm not sure why it made such a huge impression on me except that there was probably much discussion in our home then about his near-death experience. I remember him vividly telling me about seeing his body on the table and how he was removed from his body. He felt like he was falling through a deep crevasse that was bright blue. I had never heard such concepts before in my limited years. The thoughts of, not only my father's near death, but also of the idea that the body and spirit were separate terrified and fascinated me at the same time.

During his weeks of recuperation, he took me all over. We visited the nuclear power plant in Haddam. (Back then you could actually go on tours to learn about nuclear energy!) We went to the Dinosaur State Park in Rocky Hill. He told me the family-famous story of how the day they announced on the news that fossils had been discovered near our home, he snuck over there under the cover of night and dug through the dirt until he found fossils to bring home to my sisters.

It was just the two of us on these day trips. Two adventurers, content in each other's company.

The most vivid memory I have of this precious time together was a discussion about the universe. Although I was quite young, my father spoke to me like I was his peer. I'm sure he used child friendly terms in this conversation but I was able to receive the advanced information and it stayed with me to this day. He explained to me that the universe has no end. This sentence blows my adult mind now just as much as it blew my tiny mind then. I remember asking him if it was possible that the earth was just a molecule in a glass of water in God's house. He said yes. We both pondered that thought for some time.

The strange thing that I am discovering now is, in exploring 'Course in Miracles', the thought I had over 35 years ago, may actually be true.

This one conversation with my father about the universe was the spark of my consciousness expansion. Not only was my father able to stretch my thinking, but as a devoted Catholic he showed me how to love God. He was a living demonstration that a man, a strong, intelligent and great man, could be Christ-like. He was graceful, happy, strong and loving.

During the end of my Dad's working years he was a janitor at St. Mary's of Czestochowa school in Middletown, CT. He often had to assist the priest with tasks at the church. One day the priest needed his help in the sanctuary. A new crucifix was being installed over the altar and the priest needed my father to take the old one down. I remember him feeling so emotional over carrying the 'body of Christ'. He had cradled this statue in his arms with such reverence. Just listening to him talk about it that day left me with an incredible feeling of Grace. It was something that I had never felt before at that point in my life.

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Although his death was quick and unexpected, he knew he was going to die. He knew it was coming and he accepted it. This has angered not only me but both my mother and my sister's as well. We didn't know this until after he was gone and my mother was able to speak with his doctor. But now 15 years later, I think I have finally found peace.

I actually had a clue that he knew it was coming the Christmas right after his death. The Christmas before I had given him a book called 'Dad, Share Your Life With Me'. It was a 365 page book with a life question for each day. After he died, my mother found this book on his desk. He had worked on it all year to give back to me. He worked on more than one page per day. He finished it 3 weeks before he died.

And in the quintessential style of my father, on the last page he traced his hand. Next to his hand he signed it, 'Dad, 62 years young'.

Daddy's Little Girl (part 3)

I was probably 12 years old when I learned my father's real first name.

My father was the youngest of 9 boys of an immigrant Polish family. 9 boys! Wow! Many days I silently ask my Babci to send me inspiration. I only have 2 kids and some days I can barely manage. But years ago things were different. Because my father was so young, he was frequently forgotten about and had to take care of himself. I think that was what made him into the great man that he turned out to be.

Well, back in those post depression days, if you had a lot of sons the church basically expected you to send one into the priesthood. (A lot of families generously did this because it would mean one less mouth to feed.) None of my uncles had been 'called' and so many of them ended up drafted into WWII that it seemed my father would be the one to go. So I think the whole family started to prepare for Daddy to enter the priesthood and in this process my father attained a nickname: 'Rev', as in reverend.....

He never did end up in the priesthood, obviously. He met my mother on a blind date and as they say, the rest is history. But he kept his nickname.

He called himself 'Rev' and so did everyone else, including my mother. All of my cousins called him 'Uncle Rev'. It was all I ever knew as his name. It was one of the things that made him so unique. Everyone knew Rev. When he bought his long dreamed of 30 foot cabin cruiser my sisters and I begged him to name it 'Rev It Up!'. He was a humble man and very grateful to my mother for allowing him to have such a luxury as a boat so he ended up naming it after her, much to our chagrin.

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Rev was every one's friend. People seemed to flock to him and he always had a smile on his face. In fact he smiled so much that, while he lay in his coffin, people at his wake mused that even in death he was smiling.

It's not to say that he didn't have a temper. My mother would tell you that he used to bottle everything up until he exploded but after his first heart attack in his early 40's, he just let it all hang out. A couple of his temper incidents have grown into family lore. During the 1970's gas crisis, Daddy waited patiently in line to get gasoline. During that time you could only get gas on certain days based on the last number on your license plate. And even then you frequently had to wait in crazy long lines. So as Daddy waited in line one day, a much younger man quickly pulled in and cut in front of my father. Daddy got out of his car and calmly asked the guy, "Are you prepared to go to the hospital today?".......

Another time, my parents had taken my best childhood friend, Debbie, and I to a dinner theater to see my favorite play, Brigadoon, for our 8th grade graduation gift. The dinner theater was tiered so you would be sitting below the table above you. The man at the table above us had taken his shoes off and we were eating dinner. My father was so offended by the smell emanating down to us that he started to try to get the guy's attention. "SIR! SIR! SIR! Would you MIND putting your shoes on???!!!" As humiliated as we were then, the memory makes me laugh to this day!

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He was such a blessing to so many people but I was lucky enough to have this man as my father. My goal is to smile as much in my lifetime as he did in his. If that's the only legacy I can leave behind then it will be a fitting tribute to the man who raised me.