On yoga classes and toxic bosses
Yesterday marked a milestone for me: I taught my very first official yoga class, and let me tell you, it felt absolutely amazing!
The yoga studio I’m teaching at — Hotel Sonido Del Mar, in Tulum Mexico for March until April 2024.
Reflecting on this experience, I couldn't help but acknowledge the immense journey that led me to that moment. From completing my professional 200-hour Yoga Teacher Training (YTT) program, to soaking up the wisdom of countless yoga classes I've attended as a student over the past 15+ years, every step played a crucial role in preparing me for that class.
YTT was essential for understanding the history, ethics, concept of sequencing, timing, consent, and safety of teaching yoga. The thousands of yoga classes from all over the world was eye opening for variety, nuances, wisdom, humility, and inspiration.
I saw myself drawing from all of the knowledge throughout this journey, learning from the best yoga teachers I’ve had the privilege of being a student of, and also the “what not to do” from the handful of bad classes and studios I’ve come across.
We’re all human and imperfect. I used to get really riled up for sub-par experiences, and now I see that even they come with learning and growth.
We can’t control what others say, do, believe and behave, therefore we can’t control the toxicity that is unavoidable in this world.
Once a therapist suggested, regarding a toxic boss I had at the time, to repeat to myself:
“Who she is (& what she says and what she does) defines exactly who I am not.”
And that really helped to put this barrier between that toxicity and I. Not saying one is better than the other, but rather that we’re different. And for me, that I can take something out of this, that I have control of.
Gaining control of a toxic situation that you feel like you have no control over, is a key turning point to reducing the stress that comes from it. (Which, is one of my favourite topics to talk about, and I’ll be delving deep into this in my April retreat in Mexico!)
This makes me think of Tad Hargrave (Marketing for Hippies)’s Reel on “Drink down poison, spit up medicine.” He says that:
It’s easy to be a critic, to sit on the sidelines, and take the beautiful intentions from other people in the world and twist that into something dark. We take in beauty and spit up poison. We have all have enough baggage to do that. It’s not a big accomplishment.
The novice starts to take in beauty and spit up beauty. Or take medicine and spit out medicine, without twisting it. The one I relate to is taking poison and spitting out poison. Story below.
The master learns how to take in poison and spit up medicine. Hats off to a lot of you — because that’s what you’ve had to do in your lives. You’ve taken in a lot of poison, and turned that into medicine for the world. And that’s not easy. What’s the poison you’ve metabolized and turned into something that will actually feed life instead of harm it?
My very first experience with toxic boss & workplace was at ALDO.
My manager at the time would say things like
“Did you run the file through spell check? If you did, but missed this spelling mistake, then are you telling me that someone logged into computer and purposely changed it back to the wrong spelling?”
to my colleagues and I.
And one of Mr. Aldo’s sons, the VP of Sales at the time, screamed at a floor of hundreds of employees during a weekly sales meeting,
“Fucking none of you, are allowed to fucking smile this week! You should all be ashamed of yourselves!”
because the sales numbers were bad. (Imagine if we had smart phones back then, filmed and posted this on the internet?)
After witnessing so many of my coworkers bawl their eyes out in the bathroom, after we worked so hard, stayed late so many times (I actually missed my bf’s sister’s wedding), only to be treated like this, the 20-something year old me just bitched and whined all day every day, for weeks and months, until my boyfriend and best friends got tired of it.
I felt helpless. And no one, or at least I didn’t know anyone, at the time had the courage to stand up to that. I didn’t know what “boundaries”, “mental health” or “psychological safety” were. We just thought it was the norm. You get a job, it sucks, but you push through, keep your head down, and enjoy the fact that you have a job and are making money.
(There were no Gen Z’s on Instagram and TikTok with videos making fun of corporate America, hustle culture and toxic behaviours. No one was cancelled and forced to apologize publicly on social media.)
I took in poison and spat up poison.
It got me nowhere.
I thought I’d feel better after venting and complaining for hours on end, but I didn’t.
Then I decided to make a change: I took a notebook, wrote down what happened, what the toxic thing was said or done. Then I’d write out what I’d say or do in that situation, instead.
I started to train my brain to have a different path, literally and figuratively. The neural pathways needed to change. The thought patterns had to change. I had all this knowledge about neuroscience and it was time to apply it to real life.
And I unfortunately/fortunately began to fill this notebook during my years of working there. And for every interview question of “Tell me about a difficult time you’ve had at work and how you handled it,” or “Tell me about a time when you’ve disagreed with someone from work,” I had a notebook worth of examples to pull from.
I began to practice turning poison into medicine. To save my sanity, to protect my mental health, to develop my coping mechanism.
Unfortunately, it didn’t and doesn’t stop the source of the problem. Again, because we can’t control other people, we can’t avoid toxic people because they are bound to show up in your life time. (Yes, some red flags during interviews can give you a sense, but people can change based on what’s going on their lives. Also yes, some toxic behaviours go away after time and it’s like you won the lottery because that person had the clarity to go to therapy and/or began to change.)
At some point, I’ve had to say, “Ok, I think that’s enough poison, and I’ve got enough medicine from it now, let’s stop ingesting poison and remove ourselves from this toxic environment.”
But that takes enough medicine in you, to be strong enough, to leave.
Maybe that’s why they say “everything in life happens for a reason.”
Maybe because I’ve seen what not to do, that now I know what to do.
Because of a toxic retreat participant in a yoga retreat I attended, I then learned to implement intake calls and Meet-up Circles to ensure a good fit for my retreat.
Because of the depression and anxiety I’ve experienced, I now create the space and time to heal myself and others in the format of mental wellness retreats.
Because of the poison that’s come my way, I’m learning to spit up medicine from it.
I’m grateful for the amazing yoga teachers I’ve met, and I’m also grateful for the toxic bosses I’ve had.
Though I do admit: the latter comes with a few months to years of delay, because you first have to heal from the abuse. I’m sorry if you’re going through something horrible with someone toxic, and I hope you will find your path to your own medicine, and then share it with the world to make it a better place. ✨
The yoga rooftop space that I’ll be teaching at, at my mental wellness retreat, April 21 - 28: Dora Resort
If you want to come join us for yoga, neuroscience workshops, snorkel with sea turtles, swim in the cenotes and more…
Remember: healing is a journey, and you’re not alone 💗
Anna ✨
