Greetings friends! I didn’t mean to disappear on you for almost a week but there’s been a lot of action and moving around.
I took off for teacher training at Vidya Yoga & Fitness midday on Friday. I was proud of myself for the level of organization that I executed in preparation for the weekend. Before leaving on Friday, I had all materials finalized for the weekend, the house clean, laundry done, my suitcase packed, meals and snacks prepped, the car gassed up…and I got in a run before hitting the road for a 3.5 hour drive!
I did the math this weekend and figured that I have made 27 round trips to Kingsport, Tennessee over the last four years to lead teacher training at Vidya. Kinda makes sense that I have it all down to a routine/science now! 🙂
I always pack my lunch for the car. On the drive up, I typically listen to podcasts and chat on the phone with my family. It seems to fly by.
I drove straight to the studio to kick off our weekend of training. We always start with a 75-minute hot power practice.
While the physical practice was challenging, packed with flow and very sweaty, I also wove a message in throughout that what you practice regularly grows stronger.
It’s easy to see and believe this when it comes to things like yoga, running and lifting weights where we see ourselves mastering new skills, running longer and faster and getting stronger. But the thing is that this also happens with what we practice mentally and emotionally.
What are the things that we INTERNALLY practice regularly? Is it judgement, comparison, negativity, lack, fear…or is it acceptance, gratitude, love, positivity, abundance.
We all got cleaned up after class and met to finish the evening with a book discussion on The Four Agreements. Cannot recommend this book enough if you haven’t read it. It outlines simple but hard hitting guideposts for reducing suffering and increasing peace and joy in your life.
- Be impeccable with your word.
- Don’t take things personally.
- Don’t make assumptions.
- Always do your best.
After we wrapped at 8:45p, I checked in to my hotel and heated up a dinner I packed from Whole Foods (I pack everything on ice for the drive and then transfer it to the studio fridge when I get there).
I was back at the studio at 8a on Saturday morning to teach another hot power flow class and then we covered the four gates of speech, giving and receiving feedback and the five vayus before breaking for lunch.
I love to get out of the studio and get some fresh air on my Saturday lunch break so I went for a three-mile walk while I listened to a Yoga Medicine podcast episode. I grabbed a bagel sandwich on my way back in to training. Turkey and provolone on a sun-dried tomato bagel.
The afternoon consisted of breaking down alignment for various standing asanas, how to teach breath and movement together (where to inhale and exhale in a sequence) and some arm balance and handstand play. We ended the day with a 40-minute kundalini shaking and dancing meditation, which is one of my favorite things!
We ended our day around 5:45p. I wasn’t ready to go back to the hotel so I wandered around Target for a bit and then grabbed a really delicious greek salad with chicken at the bar of a local pizza restaurant.
The rest of the evening was a movie and popcorn in bed.
I was back at the studio at 7:30a on Sunday morning to teach led Ashtanga. We practiced for about 75 minutes and then took a group walk over to Pal’s for cheddar rounds.
Pal’s is a quick-service/fast food restaurant and the original location is in downtown Kingsport. They are very famous for their cheddar rounds and when I commented on Friday night that I’d never had them, it was decided we’d all go for breakfast on Sunday. Cheddar rounds are bite-sized fried hash brown bites filled with cheddar cheese. They were pretty darn good!
Our Sunday was a mix of talking about yoga as service, learning about the five kleshas and branches of avidya, covering the five koshas and yoga Nidra and more. I was sad to say goodbye to the TTs when we broke at 4:30p because it was my last weekend with them! They were such an incredible group to work with.
I arrived back home in Charlotte shortly after 8 and my little pumpkin was waiting up. <3 I had gotten him a few little surprises at Target and he oohed and ahhed over them and thanked me. (Little Blue Truck Halloween, Halloween sprinkles and two new color changing cars.)
Side note: Burts Bees Baby still has some of their cute Halloween PJs in stock. Finn LOVES these pumpkin ones! I’m not sure if my code still works but you can try JEN_PBRUNNER20 for 20% off!
I got him down and popped a frozen pizza in the oven for my dinner. It was a long weekend of yoga teacher training but a really good one. Sometimes I arrive home feeling a little drained but I felt so lit up after this weekend. And coming home to Finn’s sweet face and snuggles was the icing on the cake!
It was right back to regular routine on Monday…I got Finn to preschool at 9, lifted at the gym and then taught yoga at Charlotte Yoga at 10:45a. I picked Finn up from preschool at 1 and we had a “Finn and mommy” afternoon together. We hung out at home and went on a walk with Virginia.
We had to run out late afternoon for a few errands and were surprised to arrive home to find we had no power! There was an outage effecting 109 homes in my neighborhood. I waited a bit and it didn’t come back on so we got back in the car to pick up Chick-Fil-A for dinner. Finn thought his candlelight feast, candlelight bath and flashlight book reading was a pretty fun night!
The rest of this week looks like computer work and more yoga teaching and will hopefully end with a weekend in Florida. I’m keeping a close eye on Hurricane Ian. It seems it will be hitting far enough east of my parents that they should have minimal impact from it. We’re actually supposed to get more rain in Charlotte than they are! Also totally anticipating that our flight might get cancelled due to the storm system overall. We’ll see. In the meantime, I am saying prayers for all the Florida residents who are in the path of the storm and hoping things turn out okay for everyone. Scary stuff.
I hope y’all have a good week.
QUESTIONS
Have you watched any good movies lately?
Have you ever had Pal’s?
Do you have an all-time favorite fast food item?
What would you like to practice more of in your internal life?
