This requires me to lay aside my aca-demic neurosis of attempting to control, ignore or transcend my body for the sake of identifying myself solely with my mind.
There was a yoga session led by a friend of mine before the Friday sessions at ICTE and it was such a great way to begin the day. It quieted the thought spirals and worries. I felt the way I feel after a chiropractor appointment. Calm and awake.
I continue to learn acceptance of my body while not reducing myself to it.
This reminds me of a quote from Looking for Alaska that goes something like, "She was more than the sum of all of her parts." I love that line and it reminds me to not equate my value and worth as a person with my physical body.
The goal of pratyahara is not to ignore everything or to tune it out but to develop calm awareness and concen-tration in the midst of a distracting world.
This is a lovely way of thinking.
an anxious teacher isn’t the most convincing, so I try to swallow my nerves and to smile confidently at them as they enter the room.
I took Ashlee's idea about playing freeze tag after students gave one another feedback on their initial creative nonfiction drafts yesterday. I shy away from doing stuff like that usually because I give in if some of them start to groan about having to get up/not wanting to. Yesterday I basically just said we're doing it, and they had SO much fun. I wonder if sometimes I approach these practices that help students to get out their own heads with tentativeness that allows them to resist.
What if they start to view me as some “crunchy,” new-age hippie wasting their time?
This is how I feel with several practices I've incorporated into my teaching. Some I've kept, while others I've trashed because I can't figure out how to garner buy-in. With some students, or classes, it feels impossible to gain their respect unless I go a more traditional route.