after class 8/30/08

so back in jill’s saturday class.

i can’t make it next week but i am reserving judgment of any kind for at least another few weeks.

i will say this: that the women who’s reaction i most wanted to see, weren’t in the gallery after my dance.

i had another amazing dance, it felt so good. and i turned and looked and everyone seemed… bored? sigh. then on a backup dance i did, in just a bra and panties, which somehow felt so good, i never touched the floor and felt like a stripper, no feeling, just movement, and the comments in the locker room– they were saying, oh gosh you should have seen her in her boots! i felt like i was almost back there.

i think i will really need to pole at home more often. now that it is cooling down (somewhat), the living room will be more palatable for at-home pole sessions.

i miss amanda.

well.

clearly, i have been more disillusioned by the TT experience than i thought.

life has been busy but for some reason i have stopped making room or going out of my way to make room for S.

i think a big part of it was that throughout everything i was getting so much encouragement from teachers to try out and somehow i got it into my head that they were supporting me and wanting me to do this, thinking i was a good candidate. i think that part of this disillusionment is that i feel that they were not honest with me in giving me feedback or evaluations.

ruminations on the past two months. and the madness of this TT experience.

you know, i’m so okay with it that i’m kind of surprised and i feel like i should be more upset! haha. i told nick that they didn’t call me back and he went “what the hell they’re so stupid blah blah” and i was like nick, honey, i’m not mad so i don’t need you to be. hahaha.

i have no idea why i wasn’t picked. i asked ali to let me know what things i need to work on to be considered as a possible TT candidate in the future… because i want to know if where i am going, with my EC, coincides or will coincide with what they want fro ma teacher. it’s not that i want to tailor my experience to what they want… it’s that i have realized that the qualities they are looking for in a teacher are veeery specific, and i don’t want to waste my time or theirs if i don’t have them or don’t care to have them.

there was a lot about TT and the assessment that i didn’t understand until all was said and done. 30 women tried out and only 10 or less will be chosen. but ali said outright: if you can commit to teaching full time, you will be given preference over everyone else. i know that i had already told her that the schedule would be very difficult for me and i was going to try out even though i wasn’t sure i could make it work, which in hindsight, may have been shooting myself in the foot a bit.

it was so strange, so many of the wome nthere had NO IDEA what the time committment was for TT, they were going into it blind and they were still so willing to rearrange their lives for it. and i realized that i love S, and want it to be a part of my life, but not my whole life. i couldn’t teach full time, i need more then that to be balanced and happy. i need a job like mine on the side at least, where i can be assertive, and aggressive, and yell at stupid people and not just be supportive all the time LOL.

i am in a great, great place at work. i worked so hard to be trusted with the clients i have, and if i left i would have to pass off my clients to someone else and then wtf, where would i be two months from then when TT is over? i wouldn’t be valuable to my company anymore because someone else is already doing my job. it’s different if it’s TT part time and i can keep my job and still be there for my clients. but full time? sigh. i was so crushed when i heard that. if i chose TT over my work, right now, then that would be making a huge decision about my future and limiting possibilities for me in a way that i am not comfortable with.

i also know that just because they don’t pick you, doesn’t mean that your dance isn’t honest and expressive and beautiful. being appropriate for being a teacher isn’t necessarily any kind of commentary about you as a student. i know now (beth, the other TT mentor, said this to me) that if you move too far into your EC, they do not consider you appropriate as a teacher anymore because they want clean and defined movements. i’m not saying that i am there, but they are looking for a very specific type of movement in a teacher and it doesn’t bother me one bit that i don’t fit that mold. i may, at some point down the line, and if that happens then it is splendid! but teaching S is much less about understanding hte movement and the philosophy than i had thought it would be. i mean, they cut you based on the physical movement before they interview you… so. this has been a great experience and if anything it has forced me to REALLY think about my priorities, how much i love my job, where i am in terms of my EC, all of that. i think i had TT as this whole huge thing in my mind, because teaching is so noble to me… but even just this little taste of corporate S and all of that has made me a touch less idealistic about it. =(

the last word on TT

Thank you very much for attending the S Factor teacher training assessment class this weekend!

After thorough evaluation of your assessment and application, I have concluded that additional experience with this movement would be most beneficial and appropriate for you at this time. Therefore, I regret to info rm you that I will not be inviting you to participate in the Fall 2008 training session in New York .

This weekend, you were one of many amazing and qualified candidates! I highly recommend you move forward with your personal journey with S Factor and thoroughly enjoy your time as student. Your continued experience as a student will only enhance your insight as a potential teacher down the road.

If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me via email [email deleted].

wow. relief.

what was i thinking? how could i take 2 months off when i’ve worked my ass off to get the google project? i’m getting paid the most of anyone in my position in my company, and i’m on a track to become a project manager someday soon, and i was going to throw it away… i was a nervous wreck just thinking about how i was going to ask for time off right now.

and not only that but nick was really going to support us for two months completely on his own, while i’m losing out on thousands of lost salary dollars over those two months?

…he said: “i was worried that if you got picked you would do it.”

sigh.

back to the drawing board. now that i know, finally, i can get back to the rest of my life. finishing my MA possibly? haha.

TT assessment

it was exactly like taking a regular class. beth and tina were there, beth was the “teacher” leading us through warmup. and tina was doing warmp with us while ali ran around the room and took notes and corrected form. she did three things: tell me to sit up more during abs (OMG i’ve been doing it the “easy way” this whole time, not sitting up far enough and holy moly i feel it today… abs were WAY longer than usual haha); telling me to relax my feet during brain massage and also during open leg stretches.

then we did “pole time” but it was only L1 tricks and textbook style. i realized i never learned the “beginner” ballerina– we did the advanced ballerina from the beginning (hips forward). we also never learned a stationary corkscrew which is what she wanted us to do. then she had us all snake– we split into three groups and were spotted by beth and tina whiel ali rotated around and saw our snakes. unfortunately, although my first snake was wonderful and i was very happy with it, by the time ali got to our group (last) we were all a bit tired. but– no worries on that. snake is snake is snake.

then we did dance in three groups (we were in A with the 5 poles) which beth picked songs for. during dance i was not feeling the song but my body had frustration that she just needed to get out. all these weeks and weeks of being stressed about everything. she was all over the floor and wall and chair. ali said after that i was just exploding all over the room and she was right on. it felt good but at the same time– music wasn’t loud enogh, not my song, but still i did what i wanted to do. i connected with my body even if my head wasn’t into it (or out of it, rather).

then there was a Q&A session. i was telling yesim it was shocking because some of the women were asking questinos like “what are the hours of the TT” “how much does TT cost” “are we supposed to get 2 months off from work”– all the questinos that i have been struggling with for hte past two months! and they were just coming in compltely blind about the committment. amazing. it makes me wonder if i was an idiot for worrying about money, time, leave of absence, etc LOL.

nina was in it with me. it was nice to see a familiar face. she said my dance was great. beth and tina were both sweet when i left. but, it is traditional S fashion to be very positive all the time =)

we find out tonight if we are thruough to next round but ali said something that put me at ease a lot, which was that they are assessing TEACHER movement, not student movement. so you may be amazing and so true to your EC and your body and never get chosen for TT…. which i think i’ve always known but to have her say it explicitly meant a lot to me.

well, it’s over.

teacher training part 93024

As promised, here is the training schedule for the NYC August-October teacher training program:

Monday-Thursday: 10:00am – 4:00pm
Friday: 10:00am – 6:00pm

so, that’s a real monkey wrench, eh?

i have polled everyone for advice. but in the end, no one can make this decision for me. well, at this point, it’s relaly just coming up with a plan B, seeing as i won’t know until the end of this weekend what options are open to me.

the more that i think about it, the more that i wonder: how much of this is supposed to be a difficult decision? i quit xanga, i started school. that wasn’t easy. that was about as disruptive of a decision as i could possibly have made. and while i’m still not done with my MA, i know that i will be one day, and that those choices i made three years back started a whole bunch of wheels in motion. and i may not be making tons of money– i mean, if that was my first priority i would never have ended up here, no way in hell, i graduated from stern iwth a degree in marketing for chrissakes– i am spiritually so much richer now than i was four years ago. it’s a point of enormous pride for me, how much i have grown.

i asked my mom today: maybe i’ve been doing so well over the past two years at work just so that when this opportunity came along, i could ask for 2 months off, and get it. i mean, who knows?

ever since i received that email, with the hours of TT posted, i have been trying to rationalize this for myself. rationalize this opportunity. i know nearly everyone i have spoken to has said, this is not the time. you can wait for the next time that this chance comes your way. but something inside me says, insistently, that no, i can’t wait, and this, right now, is the time that it is supposed to happen.

i don’t know. i don’t know. i don’t know.

of course, this is all moot if i don’t make it past all the different assessment rounds.

also, i had another TT nightmare last night. but (fortunately) i no longer remember any of it.

TT nightmare, part I

i guess it was inevitable.

part of it entailed having to walk on a fabric ramp that had been strung between the floor and a platform. but when you tried to get anywhere, get closer to the platform end, the fabric stretched and it was so silky that it was like being on a treadmill.

in another segment, we had to do tricks on the pole. but i was so sweaty that my hands were just sliding off the pole. for some reason i forgot my sticky eco ball, and i decided to try dry hands. the lotion never dried and it was worse than before. i couldn’t do even the simplest trick.

i dont remember much else. it’s been too many hours and the memories have dissipated.

on thursday i am planning to S at home.

i am afraid to add a category to file this under: “TT”. so, uncategorized this shall remain!