During this past week I have had both great classes and great learning experiences.
The neuro Pilates/kinesiology class at which I helped (taught by Sarah and Mike) at Pony Locale went really well! The participants showed up in numbers and in spirit! All were very interested in what was being asked and demonstrated and everyone enthusiastically participated. So, it was obviously a great class. It was a great learning experience, partially due the content, of course, but mostly due to what I learned through watching and listening to the participants, and to Sarah and Mike. I’m very encouraged that next week’s class will be even better and I’ll learn even more.
I taught two classes: one at Pony Locale on Friday evening, and one at the YMCA on Saturday morning. Although Friday’s class had only one client, I felt it went really well. I learned so much and it gave me confidence that I could teach, I am able to change quickly adjust to a new teaching situation, and that I learn so much from seeing others move, no matter their comfort level with a new exercise. The same was true on Saturday. I taught a larger class, but they were all new to me, so I learned from watching and hearing from them. I also learned a lot from taking a class from Holly, a better and more experienced teacher then me, and someone who knows how to challenge her clients!
As I have struggled with many aspects of my movement since my brain injury I have been watching how others move, trying to remember how it felt when I was moving before my accident and trying to find that again. Trying to find ‘that again’, for me anyway, was a mistake. I won’t move that same way again, and it’s not neccessarily a bad thing! I don’t walk, swim, run, jump, or play water polo anywhere near as well as I used to, but that doesn’t mean I need to revert to how I was pre-brain injury. I recently, and maybe subconciously, stopped looking at my situation as a struggle to ‘get back what I’ve lost’, and instead I’m looking at it as a challenge to find new goals. Perhaps the most exciting thing I’ve learned this week is that I still have so much to learn!