First Class!

Hi Kim

Oh you must be feeling very distressed by all this.

Here are my immediate thoughts:

It is possible that you were not well enough hydrated or are in need of some electrolytes. I just had a private student here the other day (experienced) who was completely wiped out after class. I couldn’t even let him go home for a couple of hours. And then when he went back to his hotel, he went to sleep (early evening) and I believe he slept through til morning.

I actually did invite him to take water into class and he declined saying that he doesn’t like to drink during class. Now you’re probably thinking that you drank and that wasn’t it. But this was a very experienced yogi who, much to his own surprise hadn’t drunk enough. You’ve only had the one class so you have no other experience to gauge. So this is definitely a worthwhile thing to consider.

You have had lots of wonderful experience as a runner, trainer and ballet dancer. It’s always fascinating to me that the movements in yoga can reach all your cells in a way that ‘regular’ exercise cannot. So another reason for your response to the class is that you ‘moved’ a lot of stuff, and possibly a whole lot of physical stuff around your body. Not to mention the emotional ‘cleansing’ that this yoga can help you process.

Now, is it normal for the instructor to want you to stay in the room? Yes it is! It does depend on the student and their response to the class. (There are some teachers who are adamant that you MUST stay in the room no correspondence will be entered into. That’s a different story). If I have a new student and they want to leave the room, I will ask them if they would please lie down so that I can literally keep an eye on them. My rationale: It’s cooler on the floor, I can look after them and my other students. I can place a wet washer on their forehead, I can reassure them. This is better because there have been numerous times when that student has, despite the circumstance, rejoined the class. If you walk out, it’s hard to come back in. That’s a significant factor.

I can’t stop them going out. I can only request they stay in. There are of course times when I let them go out of the room. But that would be ONLY if I go with them to reassure them. If they’re feeling sick, I can’t let them be alone. If there’s someone else who can run the class then great. Or I’ll ask the class to continue in the pose their in or whatever works.

Kim, for your own cyber-safety, would you please go to your ‘control panel’ and edit your username so that it doesn’t reveal your email address? If people want to contact you they can do so by clicking on PM (to access the Private Messaging system). Then you can choose who has your email address.

I hope you’re feeling better.

If you’re willing to go back to class, get some electrolytes into you before and even after class. Understand that the second class may seem harder than the first because your mind will either act as if it knows what’s going on (it’s done those poses now!), or may want to attach some importance to your difficulties today. Now that you know that, you can let that go and just prepare yourself physically and set yourself up to just experience what you experience, no judgments, that’s it.

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂

Since I am a neophyte in terms of ability I can really identify with this issue. The instructors at the studio that I go do encourage new folks to make their goal to just stay in the room for the full 90 minutes. They also make it very clear that, it’s perfectly ok to just stop, or sit down, or lie down, even if that’s the whole 90 minutes. On the other hand, there are some that just can’t make it. And there only reaction is positive and to try and if not the person does leave, they do go and check on them.

I try and drink water all through the day prior to class, not just a lot right before class. I read on here somewhere also, that a person drinks water during the day and on the way to class drinks a gatoraid or sports drink for the electrolites. There was only once that I had to leave class, and that was after practicing for about 6 months, for some reason I could not catch my breath, felt nauseous, and thought I was going to pass out. That’s the only time I’ve done that. Now, during class it is not unusual for me to take a pose or poses off. I do think that ultimately each of us knows how we feel and should act accordingly.