by Elissa Jordan Adventures in Teaching Revised 2021 by editor Veronica King I’ve had the same conversation a countless number of times since I started training to be a yoga teacher - a conversation about continuity in access to a skilled senior teacher. Traditionally yoga was taught over many years from a guru to a student. This student would often live in their guru’s home and what was given to them for a practice was never once questioned. Times have changed and in this busy world people … [Read more...]
How to find the purpose in your teaching
by regular columnist Elissa Jordan, Adventures in Teaching Once upon a time there was a young yoga teacher who spent her days cleaning the windowsill in her acharya’s home, up on a ladder, terrified of heights, scrubbing away. The other students of this one acharya were packed off to teaching assignments, but our young yoga teacher was made to wait. As days became weeks and weeks became months, our young yoga teacher waited patiently, perched upon her ladder, for her big day to … [Read more...]
The Yoga of Business: Goals, Clarity, Values & Commitment, Part 4
by guest author Jenifer Parker, business owner of Healium, Wellington Consistency Makes It Happen Once you have all of these elements coming together -- a specific, defined goal; clarity around the values on which the business is formed; and a commitment to that goal as a business -- then the only thing that prevents a person from becoming successful is a lack of consistency. I have a friend who set up a yoga studio, hiring other teachers and running a beautiful little business. Things … [Read more...]
The Yoga of Business: Goals, Clarity, Values & Commitment, Part 3
by guest author Jenifer Parker, business owner of Healium, Wellington Committing to Your Goal Of course, a lot of people have goals, even specific ones with well-laid plans and a great deal of clarity around their purpose, that still don't succeed. Why is this? A lot of people look at goals as rather personal endeavors that are easy-come, easy-go -- like New Year's resolutions. They don't affect anyone but you, right? So, you don't get the goal, it doesn't really matter. You can … [Read more...]
The Yoga of Business: Goals, Clarity, Values & Commitment, Part 2
by guest author Jenifer Parker, business owner of Healium, Wellington Clarity Drives the Process As we have all experienced, sometimes goals do not come to fruition even when they are specific. They can be ridiculously detailed and give a clear way to success, but still fail spectacularly. And sometimes -- as many of us have experienced in the yoga world -- these businesses succeed financially, while undermining the very values that we claim to hold and espouse as yoga … [Read more...]
How to answer: what exactly is the energy body?
by guest author Elissa Jordan It started with a story about a mouse in a toaster. Our second weekend in Nelson, as part of the Advanced Yoga Teacher Training with Jenifer Parker of Wellington’s Healium, focused on the energy body. Looking back over my notes from the weekend I see the conversation ebb and flow as only appropriate for a weekend focusing on energy. The movement of stories rode one energetic wave after the next - starting with that mouse in a toaster, and moving to a … [Read more...]
The Yoga of Business: Goals, Clarity, Values & Commitment, Part 1
by guest author Jenifer Parker, business owner of Healium, Wellington In recent weeks, numerous blogs around the web have brought up issues around yoga and business. For many, the common perspective is that yoga and business don't mix, and that going into business with yoga not only denigrates yoga but makes it impossible to be a "true" teacher of yoga. My perspective, however, is that by running any yoga teaching as a business, you better embody the principles of yoga in practice, or … [Read more...]
Who knew? There isn’t just one right way to do things. Even in Yoga.
by regular columnist Elissa Jordan, Adventures in Teaching One of my Dad’s favourite stories to tell about me as a little girl is the one about my favourite word: why? I carried the word with me everywhere until it was a scraggly, worn-out dirt-encrusted version of itself. There’s some discrepancy as to whether or not this was, in fact, my first word. Dad says yes. Mom thinks it was second, after no. Either way, right from the start I’ve wanted to know the why behind things. Not one to be … [Read more...]