Why I like teaching "Absolute beginners."

For a bunch of reasons, I get super excited when someone shows up at a class, having never done a single yoga class in their life. Same with teaching the Absolute Beginner series: I LOVE it!

Some teachers I know have confided in me that for whatever reason they just kind of freeze up or feel an internal “ugh” when confronted with an absolute beginner.

But for me, it’s different. And as I get ready to teach the six week series I’ve been been contemplating all the reasons it brings me satisfaction.

First of all, I’ll admit, there’s some ego involved: I get to instill these students with good habits, according to me! I know that everyone remembers their first yoga teacher—why this is true I’m not sure, but it is! And not only do they remember their first yoga teacher, but they usually remember one or two things that person taught. So I get to say things like “yoga is not a self-help plan; it’s a self-acceptance plan” (thank you Janet Stone for that one), and “practice makes practice” (Iyengar, I think). And lots of other fun slogans, including the idea that the goal of yoga is. . . happiness! . . .and not flexibility.

Also, I feel very empathetic to the brand new student who needs to be convinced that it’s easier to do yoga with bare feet rather than socks, some very basic things like that, that should be whispered to the student softly rather than said out loud, causing embarrassment.

Other basic things I love to pass on: spread your fingers as wide as possible in downward dog and press down the first section of your fingers like a gecko to save your wrists. And props! I love to demonstrate how to use a prop and why it’s better to do a pose correctly and with ease with a prop rather than struggle into the pose without one.

I get to demonstrate how movement and breath are interlinked, and how spine and breath work in sync and when that sync happens the mind naturally slows down.

And on and on. . .all of the great lessons of my teachers. Newcomers and beginners are so much more open to the basic, good lessons of yoga than experienced yogis who can be a tiny bit jaded if I’m being honest. Nothing is worse than going in to adjust an experienced yogi, even a small adjustment, even a feel-good as opposed to a corrective adjustment, and be met with a vibe of “I know what I’m doing. Why are you even adjusting me right now?” You know who you are.

So if you’re reading this, and you can think of an absolute beginner who could benefit from yoga, please, send them my way: it would be a gift to all us!