Hi Teachers! This is boring but necessary info for teachers about our MBO software - just some things of which you should be aware. You need to have 2 logins: 1. which I assigned to you as a teacher; and 2. one for you as a student.
Your teacher login is for signing students into your classes, looking up other teachers in Staff Management to find subs, changing the teacher for your class in the event you get a sub, and also for updating your Teacher Bio and Profile.
Your student login is for you to sign-in and register for classes as a student. How do you get your student login? Same as any other student! Go to yogaeast.org and click on Click here - register, sign in for classes, update your profile
That takes you to the opening screen. If you have only signed yourself in as a teacher, then use Is this your first time? to create your login.
When signing students into your classes, if you have problems, please leave a note so we know to fix it. If it takes you more than 15 minutes to sign in your students, abandon the attempt.
To contact me: you can email me or you can phone me. Please keep in mind that I'm in bed by 7:30 pm and I get up at 3:30 am to practice. Send me an email or wait until Mysore class ends to phone me.
Since we started using MindBodyOnline on April 15, many new students have used MBO to register and sign-in for classes and workshops. It makes running the studio much easier. Students who register online do not have to fill out the waiver! It saves all of us time and trouble. I hope all of you will explore the program, read the Help information and encourage your students to use it to both pay for classes and workshops and sign-in before class.
I encourage each of you to create availability for private appointments in MBO. This can easily be done to make your expertise available to many students who contact us looking for private classes. Please contact me to set up your appointment availablity.
If you have any questions about MBO or if you would like to meet with me personally for a tutorial or to see how the program can help you as a teacher, I am happy to meet with you.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Asteya - Non Stealing
Asteya is one of the 5 yamas or "restraints" mentioned in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. It means "non-stealing". Recently I received an email from Susan Nichols, the founder of the Yogitoes company, and the holder of the patent on the 'Skidless" towels, which we sell. She advised us that a factory in China is making knock-offs of the Skidless towel. This is an illegal patent infringement, and it violates the principle of non-stealing. I hope that no yoga students will buy knock-off yoga towels. The Skidless towels we sell are the originals and come only from the Yogitoes company. They are great towels, excellent for people who sweat more and tend to slide on a regular sticky mat.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Goodbye, Mr. Joseph
We are saddened to announce to death of Joseph Dunham, who was a long-time assistant to Pattabhi Jois. He reportedly died of a heart attack this weekend while visiting in Cambodia. Last year Joseph told me that his first yoga experience was a workshop with Ramanand Patel. Joseph was a wonderful person who helped many of us get along in Mysore. Here's the address of his blogspot showing him seated in Padmasana on his beloved Enfield motorcycle.
http://chezmrjoseph.blogspot.com/
http://chezmrjoseph.blogspot.com/
Monday, June 14, 2010
No Frills Yoga
Back in April the NY Times had an article entitled A Yoga Manifesto . It was about a few yoga studios in NYC who are offering no frills classes on a donation basis or a reduced rate. The article stated that although yoga attendance has declined in the US, spending on yoga has almost doubled. The yoga studios featured in the article are opposing this trend by offering no frills classes and no "glorified" yoga teachers.
The teacher who was mainly interviewed for the article had been an assistant to Bikram Choudhury, and he quoted Mr. Choudhury's advice a few times... just go to class, do your practice and don't be concerned about the teacher, what the teacher was teaching and what you liked or didn't like about the class. At the studio featured in the article, Yoga to the People, there are no cool decorations, no showers, no incense, no chanting beforehand, and all the classes are the same. In the words of one of the students, “I like that you make the class what you want.” The class fees at the studios range from $5 to $10 or by donation.
Bikram Choudhury's philosophy about yoga is one of the reasons I added hot yoga classes to Yoga East's curriculum. Back in 1994, when I was still studying in the Iyengar system, I ran across Mr. Choudhury's book, Bikram's Beginning Yoga Class. His iconoclastic attitude about yoga was a breath of fresh air. Later on Bikram continued to generate debate about yoga, what it is and how it should be practiced, and even later about how yoga should be managed as a business. The second edition of his book, published in 2000, is still remarkable among yoga books because it uses real students as models - students who are all shapes, colors, ages, sizes and levels of ability. I like Bikram because he challenges us as both students and teachers of yoga.
Sometimes I think wishfully about changing Yoga East to the donation or flat rate fee business described in the article. It would make running the studio so much easier. In fact, we use this for some of our reduced-rate classes, charging $10 for some classes that have in the past been poorly attended. However, as an overall business and curriculum plan for Yoga East, I think it falls short as an approach to teaching yoga and running a studio - no assistance to students, no individualized attention, no props, no modifications, no special training needed for teachers... just leading people through a sequence. This weekend I gave a talk on Multiple Sclerosis and yoga at the MS Expo. At the end of my talk I asked the room of 50 or more people if they had questions and no one moved. Then I asked, "How many of you have been to a yoga class and had a bad experience?" Hands shot up all over the room, and several students shared how they had been to a class just like the one described in the article, and even though the class was described as a class for beginners, it left them behind - not knowing what to do or how to do it.
This kind of approach also fails to support some of our best teachers. Several Yoga East teachers have been excellent teachers but their classes did not have large attendance. We've had to "subsidize" their classes because they were not self-supporting. My intermediate class focusing on inversions will never be a class that's packed full to the brim. I continue to teach that class because that sequence, unlike any other, produces students who are incredibly strong and accomplished, but it will never be a popular class. When Darren Rhodes first visited Louisville he had not found another studio that taught the inversion sequences from Light on Yoga. He was impressed by the ability of our students to handle his intermediate class with aplomb, and I think much of that comes from our emphasis on teaching inversions, which cannot be taught in a large class.
I've seen many students come from other studios where Ashtanga Yoga is taught. I can tell right away who has come from a Mysore program and who has come from a studio where only led classes are taught. Individual attention and assistance from the teacher is crucial to develop an accomplished Ashtanga practice, no matter how much of the series the student is practicing. To have a student in class who needs help, and not to give that help is a fundamental departure from the yoga teaching tradition.
When Bikram said the students should "suck it up", I don't think he was giving permission to offer less teaching and less assistance. Actually, I feel certain that Bikram challenges teachers to be even more engaged in teaching. It's true that some students haven't yet learned that not everything has to be a certain way to have a great yoga experience. That experience doesn't depend on being in the right spot in the room, with just the right temperature, right teacher, right style of yoga, etc... in the true spirit of yoga, what ultimately is learned is how to develop samatvam, the ability to have evenness of mind in any situation.
The teacher who was mainly interviewed for the article had been an assistant to Bikram Choudhury, and he quoted Mr. Choudhury's advice a few times... just go to class, do your practice and don't be concerned about the teacher, what the teacher was teaching and what you liked or didn't like about the class. At the studio featured in the article, Yoga to the People, there are no cool decorations, no showers, no incense, no chanting beforehand, and all the classes are the same. In the words of one of the students, “I like that you make the class what you want.” The class fees at the studios range from $5 to $10 or by donation.
Bikram Choudhury's philosophy about yoga is one of the reasons I added hot yoga classes to Yoga East's curriculum. Back in 1994, when I was still studying in the Iyengar system, I ran across Mr. Choudhury's book, Bikram's Beginning Yoga Class. His iconoclastic attitude about yoga was a breath of fresh air. Later on Bikram continued to generate debate about yoga, what it is and how it should be practiced, and even later about how yoga should be managed as a business. The second edition of his book, published in 2000, is still remarkable among yoga books because it uses real students as models - students who are all shapes, colors, ages, sizes and levels of ability. I like Bikram because he challenges us as both students and teachers of yoga.
Sometimes I think wishfully about changing Yoga East to the donation or flat rate fee business described in the article. It would make running the studio so much easier. In fact, we use this for some of our reduced-rate classes, charging $10 for some classes that have in the past been poorly attended. However, as an overall business and curriculum plan for Yoga East, I think it falls short as an approach to teaching yoga and running a studio - no assistance to students, no individualized attention, no props, no modifications, no special training needed for teachers... just leading people through a sequence. This weekend I gave a talk on Multiple Sclerosis and yoga at the MS Expo. At the end of my talk I asked the room of 50 or more people if they had questions and no one moved. Then I asked, "How many of you have been to a yoga class and had a bad experience?" Hands shot up all over the room, and several students shared how they had been to a class just like the one described in the article, and even though the class was described as a class for beginners, it left them behind - not knowing what to do or how to do it.
This kind of approach also fails to support some of our best teachers. Several Yoga East teachers have been excellent teachers but their classes did not have large attendance. We've had to "subsidize" their classes because they were not self-supporting. My intermediate class focusing on inversions will never be a class that's packed full to the brim. I continue to teach that class because that sequence, unlike any other, produces students who are incredibly strong and accomplished, but it will never be a popular class. When Darren Rhodes first visited Louisville he had not found another studio that taught the inversion sequences from Light on Yoga. He was impressed by the ability of our students to handle his intermediate class with aplomb, and I think much of that comes from our emphasis on teaching inversions, which cannot be taught in a large class.
I've seen many students come from other studios where Ashtanga Yoga is taught. I can tell right away who has come from a Mysore program and who has come from a studio where only led classes are taught. Individual attention and assistance from the teacher is crucial to develop an accomplished Ashtanga practice, no matter how much of the series the student is practicing. To have a student in class who needs help, and not to give that help is a fundamental departure from the yoga teaching tradition.
When Bikram said the students should "suck it up", I don't think he was giving permission to offer less teaching and less assistance. Actually, I feel certain that Bikram challenges teachers to be even more engaged in teaching. It's true that some students haven't yet learned that not everything has to be a certain way to have a great yoga experience. That experience doesn't depend on being in the right spot in the room, with just the right temperature, right teacher, right style of yoga, etc... in the true spirit of yoga, what ultimately is learned is how to develop samatvam, the ability to have evenness of mind in any situation.
Laura Dement's Due Date
Just want to let everyone know that Laura's due date is July 23rd. We'll keep eveyone posted on the baby news!
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