Scott Page's Yoga Blog

Yoga Workshop Series

with Scott Page

“Behind and Beyond the Asana Practice”

Join Scott for four Mondays in May to explore what is Behind and Beyond the Asana (physical) practice of yoga.

Behind the practice is the history and philosophy of yoga.

Beyond the practice is the pranayama (breathing) and meditation (dyana).

Each Monday will begin with a 30 min. gentle flowing asana followed by a 90 min. lecture, ending with a 10 min. meditation.

Here is the Lecture Schedule:

Week 1 – May 7th– History of Yoga
Week 2 – May 14th — Yoga Philosophy
Week 3 -May 21st– Pranayama (Breathing techniques)
Week 4 -May 28th– Meditation (dyana)

Location: Scotts Yoga Room- 10780 N. 129^th St. Scottsdale, AZ

Date and Time:  May 7, 14, 21, 28 -  5:00pm – 7:10pm

Cost:   $50.00 for all four sessions ($12.50 per session)

Interested:   Contact Scott at  spage8@cox.net.  Via face book at

Scott page yoga fan page, or call or text  602-820-2873

The yoga room only accommodates 10 people. That will be the number of participants. Don’t wait..

Shopping Bliss

I came to teach my Vinyasa 2 yoga class this morning. While I was waiting in line outside of the yoga room at Lifetime Fitness Scottsdale, I noticed some of my regular students coming out of the previous class. I jokingly said to them “Are you ready for class? Where are you guys going?” They said that they went to the earlier class and were now on their way to go shopping. I jested that shopping was the ninth limb of yoga. So here in Scottsdale, I think that shopping should be the ninth limb of yoga. Then I realized that if I added it, I would have to find a place to put it. It should go as part of the first limb, the yamas (social observences), but that would be awkward because the last of the 5 yamas is aparagraha, non- grasping or non-greediness. That is kind of like the anti-shopping. I guess I need to move it away from there. The best place for it is after meditation and before bliss. That is between the 7^th and 8^th limb. This makes perfect sense because for many here in Scottsdale, shopping is more than just a physical experience, it is a meditative practice. Constantly practicing  yogic shopping leads to bliss. At least until the credit card bills comes in. Shopping yogis can practice this limb in pretty much any high end retail outlet, but the serious shopping yogis can be found spending much of their time and money in Lululemon and Lucy stores. Those of you from out of town can easily find a place to practice yogic shopping while visiting here in Scottsdale. Just follow any toned, calm, Starbucks drinking women wearing yoga pants and carrying a “Coach” handbag.

I am not involved with a yoga teacher training program anywhere that I teach, but I frequently have students from teacher training programs practice with me, observe my yoga classes, and ask me for guidance or advice. This is partly due to the fact that I strive to make all of my classes fresh and   innovative. From the music to the poses to the sequencing, I try and make it fun and challenging. Unlike many other yoga teachers who are repetitive or overly prepared, I teach intuitively, and while I have general guidelines of what I want to teach from week to week, I never know what poses I am going to teach until I get to the class and the class and I are breathing together in the beginning. The class flows through me as if I am just the messenger of the poses, not the director of them.

I am sure to tell prospective or new yoga teachers that you should approach every class of every level as if there are the following people in your class. The first is a beginner who has never done yoga before.  You may be the only impression of yoga that they ever have. The second is someone who could change your life such as a movie producer,  columnist, writer, celebrity, the owner or CEO of a large company. The third is the CEO or owner of the club, gym or studio that you are working at.  There may in fact be one of the three, two of the three, or none of the three present in your class. You usually don’t know whether they are there or not. If you teach every class with that kind of awareness then you will be teaching the best class that you can teach each and every time. Too many yoga teachers get “burned out” teaching classes because they see teaching yoga as a job. I see it differently. I see yoga as my passion and am so grateful that people are willing to pay me to share it with them. There is never a day that I dread going to teach a class. On the contrary, It energizes me knowing that I may, in some small way, make someone’s day or life better by what I teach them. When I first started teaching yoga full time as a career, people told me that I should not practice with classes or do so much demonstrating because I would get tired and not survive. That was over five years ago and I feel better than ever…. Good thing that I don’t listen to what everyone says……….

Namaste…

Sorry. I have been soo busy with my new Facebook fan page that I have been neglecting my blog and have not been posting. I am going to set forth one day a week minimum to post info on my blog. Next, I am getting inundated with spam again. I have my filters set and have a long list of key words that are blocked, but about 50 spam comments a day get through and I have to manually delete them and update my key words list There are now between 800 and 1000 spam comments a day that are caught and dropped into the spam folder. I alway  invite people to comment on my blog posts. Here are a few guideline though. Do it in English. I do not understand squiggly line, wing dings, or portugese. Start the comment with my name and how you know me. It may go like this ” Hi Scott. I am in your class at xyz yoga. I want to tell you….(something positive)…………………………..”  I will read that. The rest I delete as spam. I don’t need any more perscription drugs, life insurance, property in Minnesota, Dates, porn, handbags, great deals, compliments on my blog style, blog header, etc. If you are family, your comment will be immediately deleted no matter how it starts. LOL. You should call me with input and ideas.  Enough said.

A post of more substance will follow soon….

namaste,

Scott

I have been without business cards for the last 5 months or so. I used to print my own business cards, but then I lost the program that I was printing them from. It is not like being a yoga teacher requires business cards. It is not like I am in outside sales and am cold calling and leaving my cards. I just use them to give to students so that they can find my webpage and blog. I was always content to have a simple card with an om symbol on it. I was recently exploring some new card designs and came up with a few. I asked my friend Kevin for his opinion on my designs and he said that he would work on a few ideas. Kevin came up with some really great designs and from them I chose this one. It is the second one from the top in the first row. The top two were my designs. The cards should be here this week. I am always open to comment and opinion.

I frequently use a version of this quote in classes that I teach. The quote is about the importance of each day, and a reminder to seize the day because each day is precious. We only get so many days in a lifetime. Be mindful of this.