The call of yoga
The first thing I did when lockdown was announced in London, where I live - even before running to the supermarket, stocking up on ridiculous items and frantically looking for toilet roll and hand sanitizer - was getting in touch with the yoga school in my hometown of Buenos Aires, where I started practicing 15 years ago. It was a one-line long email, with a subject that said it all: “Streaming?”
Less than 48hs after that I found myself moving the furniture around and logging into what would be the first of many zoom sessions, an action that quite soon became a non-negotiable in my daily life and, quite probably, the reason why I didn’t entirely lose my mind during the bleakness and despair of lockdown or, as the French so poetically call it, le confinement.
As days turned into weeks and months the effects of the daily practice started talking to me loud and clear: my body became stronger; my emotions calmer; my mind clearer. And then a question arose: had the time come to take my practice to the next level?
The more I thought about this the more sense it made and, at the same time, I was finding it increasingly difficult to keep interest in what up until then had been my “day to day” life. Quitting my job was easy; finding my ideal yoga retreat not so much: planning in the year of the pandemic is no small feat, and what was possible and feasible kept shifting and changing constantly to the rhythm of governments and border restrictions all around.
Nevertheless, and as it happens, the perfect chance came. As soon as Carmen & Dietmar’s yoga reset retreat came up on my screen I knew I’d found my place. And yet the combination of holistic treatments, the beautiful surroundings up in the Greek mountains and the twice-daily yoga sessions in the stunning marble studio took me by surprise, and by the time the end of the week-long retreat came I knew that my time there had not been enough. I left full of bliss but, more importantly, eager to come back a week later to embark on my 200h yoga teacher training course.
There are probably as many reasons to sign up for this sort of adventure as there are yoga teachers around the world. Mine were a combination of opportunity, determination and the courage to finally pursue something I’d always wanted to do. I wanted to deepen my knowledge of yoga, acquire a better understanding of the discipline that quite literally changed my life and get to know myself a bit better along the way.
The training delivered all of that and a lot more. Sitting with Carmen I learnt about chakras, ayurveda and the asana’s sanskrit names, but I also developed a deeper understanding and respect for what makes yoga not only a practice and a philosophy, but an entire way of life.
Training as a yoga teacher is a beautiful journey from which one comes out armed with strong tools but, more importantly, empowered with utter and pure freedom: freedom from the constraints of society; from the established and all-so-common sources of stress and despair and from one’s own often limiting states of mind. And as it happens with all freedoms, this one also comes with a responsibility, which is that of transmitting this knowledge to other people, to help them become free too. Whether you chose to do this from a studio in a big city, up in the beautiful surrounding of the mountains or from the comfort of your own home is entirely up to you, but if you feel the call of yoga into your life the 200h yoga teaching training course is without a shadow of a doubt the right choice for you.
Namaste.
Julieta
