BE BAD
REWILD YOGA 200 HOUR TEACHER TRAINING
ACTION ORIENTATED |
Unlike conventional teacher training programs that involve extensive reading and studying, BE BAD focuses on taking action. Participants engage in activities like cold showers, concentrated eating exercises, meditation, power yoga, tough conversations, often “put on the spot” and self-video recordings to work through nerves and the fear of judgment – that we often make up in the area of the unknown. This training will encourage you to mess up, get it “wrong” and be bad. Reading and studying from various teachers, authors, spiritual leaders will be a guide for our own discussion, but the emphasis will be on our own personal inquiries and how they affect our relationships. This is less about following a certain way, and more about finding our own way.
PUBLIC SPEAKING |
This bootcamp (we call bootcamp, because the duration is relatively short in comparison, yet intense) addresses the fear of public speaking, which widely considered the #1 fear among humans. Overcoming this fear will open us up, giving us access to new dimensions of ourselves. This access is a great internal source of vitality that will transform your stress, in an instance, from depression to elation, from anxious to calm. Standing from your center and speaking from neutral offers an inner still point where we can access truth from inside and outside of us. In this space of truth we will reveal our curious nature, igniting unfiltered spontaneity.
TEACHING STYLE |
REWILD’s teaching style is simple. We emphasize presence. We use pillars of practice, from Baron Baptiste method, Journey into Power, to give us access to the presence of our body. These pillars include: ujjayi breath, drishti (eyes), bandhas (contractions of body, generally hands, feet, core), tapas (heat = to burn away), and vinyasa (flow = connect). Teachers are trained to actively listen to students’ breath from beginning to end and end to beginning. This commitment minimizes petty distractions and engages everyone in the room to be present, breath to breath. This creates a supportive meditation between teacher and students, with a sense of moving forward into a state of flow. The flow must be established from within, which is why the breath is vital. Why would someone want to do this? This breathing practice challenges the teacher and students commitment to practice listening, using a simple, universal and automatic tool, the breath. What is the purpose of this? By listening to my breath, for a committed period of time, my normal thinking pattern dissolves, and my attention becomes refined and innocent. Innocent in the sense that there is no thought or alternating agenda in my mind and I am moving and breathing in an honest, intentional, and clear manner. The breath (and pillars) anchor me into the “what is” and away from the “what was” or “what will be”. And this skill has the power to calm me down from chaos and wake me up from boredom. The purpose of meditation is to control the mind. Instead of my thoughts controlling my mind. A mind that is bothered with petty distractions is never in control of itself. This is a mind that is reacting to every thought or numb to their own whirlpool of thoughts. Either way this mind is not free from thoughts. Since this mind is not free from thought, the thoughts have control of the mind. Our mind produces thoughts that push us forward in a state of anxiety or pull us back in a state of depression. This is the negative side effect of thought. Of course there’s also the positive side effect of thoughts. The negative thoughts will drain our energy and the positive will charge our energy. Negative thoughts can motive us into positive thoughts, which would be considered a transformation of thought energy, and great self awareness. Thoughts take our energy and thoughts give us energy, depending on the quality of thought. The action of either giving or taking exists an effort of energy. Both these scenarios involve control of thought. Is there a possibility beyond the realm of thought? And if so how do we move beyond thought? All thoughts are stale and lack freshness. If it was thought before you would already have some opinion or some relationship to it – whether extreme or petty. So in this space of thought exists great familiarity or comfort. I’m familiar with my dog, I know how she acts so I’m comfortable with her. My thoughts, whether positive or negative, I’m familiar with since they exist in my mind all the time, I’ve become secure in them. An original thought is considered original, because it comes from nothing. If it came from something, it would fail to be original. So what is nothing? If there’s something in my mind then am I not pulling information from a pool of information that already exists in my mind? If there is nothing in my mind then where is my mind? In eastern philosophy they refer to this mind in several names that all mean the same thing. “No mind”, “empty mind”, “beginner’s mind”, “original mind”.
Most of us are led by our thoughts, not our mind. Both the positive and negative thoughts have value. For instance, when an exploiter takes advantage of me, I remember not to do business with him again. That negative thought reminds me to stay away from that danger. When I feel secure I’m inclined to think positively. When I feel insecure I’m inclined to think negatively. If this is true, then my thoughts control my feelings and my feelings control my thoughts. If this is my way of being then I am controlled by my thoughts and feelings, which cannot be distinguished. I have no ability to discern fiction from reality. Thoughts are produced by my mind and feelings vibrate throughout my body. The problem with all this exists in my thinking, which is all I know or all I’m familiar with. My thinking is limited. My thinking is judging and considered good or bad. Right and wrong. Positive or negative. Secure or insecure. It’s yin-ing and yang-ing within the domain of its limited experience. The thoughts are controlling the mind. And the thoughts are all familiar. So how does the mind control the thoughts? Something has to be forfeited. To surrender is to give up or let go of something. How do we give up or let go of our thoughts? And when we let go of our thoughts, what does that leave us with? The mediation’s purpose is the practice of surrendering arising and persistent thoughts, to access a state of thoughtlessness, yet maintain awareness. In awareness, without old thoughts, is where origination happens. And new thoughts. And new understanding. Our spirit thrives in our awareness. Our ego thrives in our thoughts. We need both, but how many of us and how much of the time do we spend in our thoughts? In teaching our style of power yoga, the teacher has the responsibility to foster a space of surrender and control over and over again. Through this practice of surrender and control, we begin to recognize the value of our mind and the waste of our mind. We start to notice more and more the lies we tell ourselves vs the truth that exists. The more we move beyond the lies the deeper we get to truth. This is what makes a REWILD YOGA classes special – the emphasis on the search for truth from within and throughout our environment. That truth is realized beyond thought. Thought only comes later, to try and explain it. And the deeper the truth the more difficult to explain.
VOCAL WORK |
Communication skills, particularly voice modulation, are essential in powerful communication. The training includes exercises to explore the range of one’s voice, grounding it for a more impactful teaching presence. This is an act of expression. When we stretch ourselves we get access to parts of ourselves we didn’t know existed. In this newly discovered territory we may realize a hidden part or talent of ourselves that was sheltered before. If we’re “risk averse” we stop growing. We will test the range of your voice to see what is possible. This vocal practice may open you up to a new way of expressing.
YOGA PRACTICE |
The program covers 53 yoga poses within Baron Baptiste’s Journey into Power Sequencing. Participants learn not only the poses themselves but also their purpose and alignment. The focus is on building confidence in making decisions and being adaptable, which translates to various aspects of life, including career, relationships, and overall well-being.
TRUTH |
The practice of seeing things as they are, without our opinions distorting what we see. This will be practiced in many different exercises, such as yoga, meditation and some different fun games, that will test your abilities to recognize truth in real time.
Steve K.
BE BAD | lead trainer
