Throughout our YTT there was quite a lot of talk about going back to “Real Life”. What will things be like after this? Am I going to be different? How will my life change? Will the things that used to bring me joy still feel the same? I’m not even sure that joy has the same meaning to me anymore. So many questions that throughout the whole 25 days I couldn’t find answers to. Or, that’s what I thought anyway.
Everything about Holistic Yoga School is still sharply engraved in my mind. The first step into the Atrium where I was greeted by my new Teachers with the softest eyes and sweetest smiles I had ever seen. Not to mention the beauty that surrounded us in tropical plants and vibrant energy. It felt like coming home that evening. I can close my eyes and hear a circle of laughter between our group of trainees and teachers, our daily dose of smiles and new friendships. And a head stuffed full of so much new knowledge I couldn’t wait to come home and figure out how to unpack it. I still feel myself standing out in the parking lot for my last time, staring longingly at this beautiful palace that had been sanctuary for such a short yet significant amount of time. I wondered how I would feel waking up and not being able to step into the backyard of the Solarium first thing in the morning. Not walking with naked feet in the soft grass through a space in which I had gained and lost so much of myself. I said ‘Goodbye’ to that sacred space, like it was a long time best friend of mine.
In my car, a long teary eyed drive gave me answers. I didn’t stop, not once until I had gotten about three hours away. I knew that if I stopped I might just turn around and go back. I cried those same questions about “Real Life”. I thought, I’m not ready! However, the more I cried the less it felt like tears, and the more it felt like letting go. I realized it wasn’t that “I’m not ready” to go home. It was that I didn’t know if I was ready to let go of those parts of me that I was leaving behind me. Those attachments that I watched char and float away into the sky. Some emotional pain that I let wash away while singing and dangling my feet in the river. That self-doubt that vanished while learning to love myself so deeply. More and more lessons were becoming clear in just those few hours. It felt sad and liberating at the same time. All I was left with was a deeper understanding of my Self and eyes so cleansed from my tears the whole world looked new.
Tomorrow will be one week since I last walked out of HYS, but it certainly hasn’t been the end of my journey. I’ve already endured new heartache and stress since caming home. In some moments I think it’s going to break me, take me back in the steps that I have been climbing the last five weeks. Then I remember that space, the sacred space I learned to create inside that yoga room, the atrium, sitting by the river, and mostly inside myself. I take a deep breath in filling myself with purity, and exhale releasing any of those stale feelings away. Clearing my sacred space, making room to inhale pure light in, and exhale that light back into the world around me. I thought I was learning to be a yoga teacher, but instead I learned about myself, and my own true meaning of the light within us all. It’s not just about anatomy and asana anymore, but teaching by letting the light shine through us.
Namaste
Nikki Williams
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