It is said that when you are ready, the teacher will come.
We are under the illusion that we can do many things by ourselves; but in almost every instance everything is set in motion by and requires the assistance of others. Think about it, the food you eat for example is first picked by a person, processed by someone else, packed by another, placed on the supermarket shelf yet by another…so on and so forth. Designing a building, writing a book, composing a song are what appear to be solo endeavors but without the inspiration factor, which undoubtedly has its roots in the work of someone else, you wouldn’t be able to give birth to your creation.
When you freely give your ideas and input to someone else because you know they may be able to benefit from your knowledge or even give birth where you cannot, you are literally moving your own seed to more fertile territory. Furthermore, when a creation, an experience, a thought is discussed, constructed, published, recorded, distributed, enacted and ultimately enjoyed by other people; the unfathomable magic of our ability to co-create occurs. This is the very essence of the relationship between the yoga teacher and the student.
When I set out to become a yoga teacher, my main incentive was to quench the thirst I had for some deeper knowledge of yoga. In other words I had no desire to teach really, it was all going to be for me. Little did I know things were about to change drastically. When I placed a sticker that read: “We’re all in this together” on the front cover of the binder compiling my courses and assignments, I was far from realizing how true it was until the very first time I informally downdogged my peers at work. They ganged up and begged me to teach them a class.“The demands of being an architect is taking a toll on our bodies, and you can help fix it” they said. So naturally, after gently denying their request a few times, I gave in and taught them some of the things I knew.
To this day, I remember the powerful feeling that washed over me right after we concluded class. I literally felt the calling and knew there and then that teaching was going to be my new life. Changing people’s lives was suddenly a real possibility and it brought me buckets of happiness. Evidently it was time to share the knowledge and spread the seeds beyond my own personal garden, but the most interesting insight I had in that moment was that even as I endorsed the role of the yoga teacher, I would always remain a student and more importantly it became clear that the ultimate teachings were about to come from my students.
In the numerous years that I have been teaching, every single one of you has and continues to teach me important lessons and offers me ways to grow and expand my soul. You give me authorization to “read” your physical, mental and energetic predispositions which enriches and deepens my understanding and fuels more insight into my own practice, You invite me into your emotional world by sharing bits and pieces of your life only to remind me that first impressions should never be trusted nor even formulated in the first place.
You help me pick you up and get you on the road to recovery by being open, engaging and trusting making me realize there is great beauty and grace in seeking the help of others. You make me feel welcome and you make me magically want to teach even on the rare occasions when I don’t feel like it. You force me to always leave my baggage at the door; baggage I rarely ever pick back up post class, because you somehow make it vanish behind your enthusiasm for learning and receiving. You give me a platform to teach from my own true nature, without judgment or criticism and I remember that ego is the only way to perdition.
By walking through the door and showing up over and again, year after year, you allow me to practice kindness, flexibility of mind and breathe with all my might, you give me reason to connect, vibrate and be one with all that is, more importantly you make the roller-coaster that is life a fun ride to be on.
Thank you for enabling my Yoga-hood to unfold alongside yours. We are all teachers, we are all students, we are all one.
Danielle Abisaab