A yoga teacher considers what to share on the page
A profile of Nikki Williams connects home practice, teacher training and the decision to write a personal memoir.
A 17 October Lismore Times profile of Byron Bay teacher Nikki Williams announced a 28 October launch for her memoir, Namaste, Pricks. The profile describes a path into yoga that began with Yoga with Adriene videos during lockdown and continued through teacher training at Byron Yoga Centre and in Bali.
A teaching life can have more than one audience
Williams speaks about the uncertainty of students encountering her personal history in a book. Alongside teaching, the profile says she is studying psychotherapy and counselling. The account shows different parts of a working life meeting on the page, rather than a single route into teaching.
The profile appeared ahead of the planned launch, so it offers a portrait of the writer rather than a report from the event. Nor does a personal memoir establish a treatment effect. The useful question for teachers is how much of their own story they want to share, in which setting, and with what boundaries between an author’s voice and the attention owed to students in a class.
Sources
YOGA+