The search for the true self can follow a winding road. Background, environment, judgments, opinions, even self-analysis, generally do nothing but distract us from the truth. Rather than serving as descriptions, information such as family, race, country, friends, clothes, cars, houses, even choices of hobbies, become self-identifiers rich with all the boundaries, rules, and generalities associated with them. It is a thinking similar to an apple thinking itself to be a “red”, a “round”, or a “tangy” but missing the fact that it is an APPLE which happens to be red, round, and tangy. I am a man, I am a woman, I have no family, I am the youngest of five, I am American, I am a soldier,…,I am a Yoga teacher.
Depending on where he is on the road to self-discovery and the development of his practice, the Yoga teacher himself may be proportionately influenced by what he may believe a Yoga teacher and class should be like. The difference between the teacher still bound, however loosely, to his own image of himself and one who is free of it is undeniable. Entirely open and light, life flows through the latter without tripping on any of his own opinions of what it (life), he, or his class should be like.
He does not stress when his class is so full that the mats are an inch away from one another (it’s good to be Paul Toliuszis!). It is what it is. He does not try to make the class hard or easy, slow or fast. It is what it is. He wants for everyone to be happy but he knows he’s not the one to make that happen. He does not care about the fact that Milli Vanilli does not exactly grace the sound systems of many (any?) Yoga studios. It is what it is. He does not try to make his class … special, to put his signature on it. This, ironically, makes it so. It is what it is!
The teacher is. The class is. And as such, the pupil is. All is allowed to be what it is. When floor space is exhausted inside the practice room, the pupil will simply roll out her mat just outside the door. Her experience is. It is no wonder that at Green Monkey Yoga in South Beach, Paul Toliuszis’ pupils not only acknowledge but actually smile at the new face among them.