A community means different things to different people. It can be your neighborhood, your classmates, your fellow yoga practitioners, etc. It can a very powerful aspect of life to have a set of individuals that share your belief structure and are actively involved in your growth and the communal learning process.

The yogi community of personal reference here is the Multi Disciplinary Yoga Teacher Training group, that started in January 2012. When I first started as a yoga teacher-in-training, I had tried to inhibit any expectations of what my 6 month long training process would be with a group of yogi’s. The reason for this was to openly embrace all that came with this journey. It was to ensure that I did not have any pre conceived notions which would hinder the full experience of every class and every person that would come my way. A large group with such diversity in culture, age, experience and history, usually has an interesting impact on your thinking processes.

When we are engaged in a group, we usually find very different personalities who provide either a completely different viewpoint on matters or turn out to be our own reflections. Sometimes they point us in the direction of recognizing that which we’ve forgotten; the ‘stuff’ that we may leave behind as we go to work, do our chores, reach that goal, fulfill our responsibilities, etc.

Each individual in this community of yoga teacher trainee’s, including the instructors (or guides), brings insight into spirituality, life, relationships, children, love, devotion, discipline and intuition. There are scientific reasoning’s and inquiries that provide fodder to the spiritual and vice – versa.  The classes turn into saturated time spans where creative juices flow and learning can take many different forms. Everyone has full freedom to express themselves and the dialogue exchange is very powerful. All of these elements resonate both on and off the mat.

This yogi community is a group of individuals who do not judge nor reject anyone’s idiosyncrasies. There is an ease of acceptance that every person is coming from a different background with a set of life experiences that have led to this core community. Where everyone may be after the 6 months is unknown, but the time spent in each others company, frolicking through our minds and delving into our individual lives with fresh perspectives of forgotten recognitions, will always have an impact.

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Editor: Lindsay Friedman

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Rajni Tripathi is a yogini-in-training at the Multi Disciplinary Yoga Teacher Training program at Radiance Yoga Studio. She is a bonified Fur-a-holic (addicted to anything 4-legged and furry ), dark chocolate enthusiast and tea addict. Her soul calling and heart revolve around universal consciousness and humanity, not to mention her two cats. Through yoga, practiced patience and inner solitude she ventures on her life path with the belief that one’s own journey and discovery need not be dictated by another’s dogma or dreams. Any spare time the Universe provides, Rajni spends with her books, her mind, her music and her loved ones. If books are her haven, then music is her solace. She can be found frolicking through her mind and drowning out the noise at dancingrealm.wordpress.com and twitter.