I have been really missing Yoga, and with our house having hardly enough room for a cat (let alone swinging one), I have found it difficult to find the space to practice. I stopped teaching around 2013 when I was writing my book, and I have found it very difficult to get back into it – mainly as I have been too stiff and the postures have been painful due to the health problems I have had.

When I was teaching, I used to find just as much benefit as my students, as I taught by practising the postures along with the class and I found that having my students rely on me to run the class was the impetus I needed to keep going regularly, as I would be letting everyone down if I didn’t go. However, due to my inactivity from writing my book, and health problems, I put on some weight.

So I have been unfairly telling myself that I am too fat and stiff to teach and I must get myself in shape before I begin teaching again! I realise that this began a viscious circle as Yoga will help me to get into shape in body and mind, yet I need to teach to give me the OOOMPH to do it! Hmmmm….

Then I remembered a previous student telling me that she loved my class as I was a REAL person, and being overweight herself, she felt that if I, as a slightly weighty teacher, can do the postures well, then it was achievable for her. She said (in the kindest possible way) that had I not been curvy, sometimes stiff and awkward, sometimes falling off balance and laughing, sometimes just feeling like a pile of poo and really not feeling like Yoga today but doing it anyway, she would have been easily discouraged from continuing…. and had I been perfectly balanced, always happy, perfectly postured, completely at peace, that she would have felt that it was unachievable for her. As she was suffering from depression when she first came to class, she could very easily have thought ‘who am I kidding – I’ll never be like that!’.

Remembering this made me think – maybe being a size 18 Yoga teacher with stiffness and stress is not such a bad thing? Maybe when students see my improvement they will realise that they are also improving with me?

So after several unsuccessful attempts at restarting a personal regular Yoga practice, I have decided that the only way to do it is to teach again!

I am considering doing an online class – Yoga for ‘Real’ People! Maybe a live Skype or Youtube channel – hopefully I will get some time to implement this in the New Year!