Vajrasati teacher training graduation
April 12th, 2007
This month sees two new graduates from the Vajrasati teacher training school as well as a new intake of students…
April is a time traditionally associated with birth and the Easter festival often falls in this month. The Christian message of the death and resurrection or rebirth of Christ follows an older lineage of rebirth festivals at this time of year.
The Easter egg is not from the Christian faith, and is a natural and obvious symbol for birth, both actual and potential. It is a symbol of birth on many levels. Birth is usually the result of contact on some level, whether the birth of a being a feeling or an idea. The Vajrasati teacher training program is a point of contact, between an individual and yoga, with little else between. Over time, this relationship creates the energy for an egg to be created, which is the potential yoga teacher, waiting to be born.
The last stage of the training course is a series of assessments with feedback sessions, homework and a written exam, which is known for several reasons as the ‘ring of fire’. It is through this ‘warming up’ that the new yoga teacher is eventually born. It is out the other side of this heating process then that we find two new teachers emerging, Donna Shilling and Anita Hall. The contact with yogic ideas, the chance to experiment, constructive feed back, tips and discussion all are mainstays of the training, and also continue once each teacher comes through there passage of entry through the teacher training to the Vajrasati teachers’ community.
The Vajrasati yoga school is still developing and this year we hold our first Vajrasati teachers’/trainees’ yoga day as well as our first exclusively graduates’ development day. Graduates have had input on the web site through book reviews, tips on savasana and the much relished letters from India, as well as organising their own yoga morning workshops. They also attend one another’s classes, pop back as guests to the teacher training sessions and as students to the end-of-term assessments. They also participate in the buddy system, which works to connect the Vajrasati trainee and graduate communities.
It is in many ways more clear, therefore, to see the graduation not so much as leaving the training community but an entry into the graduate community. Vajrasati yoga, if it is to realise its full potential – to support, diversify and expand, the continued development of each graduate – must find ways to initiate and support events and activities that lead to a sense of shared knowledge and intuitive understanding, with a strong focus on accessibility. As long as Vajrasati adheres to the principle that the group grows with the individuals within it, and not that the individuals have to limit themselves to the current understanding of the group, then Vajrasati will be able to retain its creativity and its recognisable identity.
New Intake
At the other end of the training, Vajrasati is pleased to be welcoming five new trainees, all who will, no doubt, cause Vajrasati to grow and develop in depth and understanding. It is likely that the teachings will once again be refined and taken forward by the contact with a wider field of life experience that the new trainees will bring.
Those wishing to enrol on the training for next year are encouraged to start that process now by reading through the acceptance criteria and tips for getting on the training, as well as making a point of reading through the newsletters each month, coming to classes and events and talking to graduates and trainees.
Leave a Reply