Most of them shock the hell out of me, too.

You know that scene in Pretty Women where Richard Gere tells Julia Roberts that people don't surprise him and Julia's response is that most of them shock the hell out of her?

In my world of teaching I am mostly oblivious to how people feel about me. Check that - I'm pretty good at knowing how people feel about me and I really don't care all that much. Hey, I am who I am and as long as I'm doing my best to teach and entertain, you can take me or leave me!

As I prepared to teach yoga yesterday to a very small summer class (oh, why can't they all be small summer classes) I set my intention to teach by intuition.

I will preface yesterday's in-practice experience by saying that I am VERY hands-on in small classes. I used to never touch anyone, now I'm so touchy feely that I can rub my entire body against another woman and not even worry how she feels about it. There are two or three people, however, that I NEVER touch. I get "the vibe" from them and I just stay away.

This experience with one of the women in my class started a few years ago when I told her that I found belly dancing to be sexy. You'd have thought I'd insulted her mama. She was so offended that I would dare call such a beautiful thing sexy, or even sensual, that I could scarecely believe such prudes existed in the realm of who I know. But, there you have it. One person's sexy is another person's "don't look at me, I'm hideous".

This woman comes to too many of my classes to absolutely hate me. I would put her in the category of possibly tolerating me as long as I'm not too mouthy. Fat chance, lady! She never smiles. She may smile at others, but she never smiles at me. Or even near me, come to think of it. She thinks my stories are juvenile and my jokes are stupid. I know that's very difficult to believe but my "shinning" tells me so.

In class last night, as I set my intention to follow my intuition, I began to go into that teaching "zone" that I love. The one where I have no clue what I'm going to teach and then it all falls into place. We examined two standing poses in intimite detail. I even used belly dancing as an analogy. So much for not being mouthy. I just go ahead and bring up that very painful topic - although I didn't get near any words that began with "se". And (wait for it) I TOUCHED her. I sat right behind her in one pose and worked with her breathing through the pose. Anyone who says I don't have balls, please go pound sand.

After class, I had that really heady feeling like things were pretty good and I had done exactly what I was meant to do - teach a proper beginner's class. Two people came to speak to me after class. One was Mrs. Non-Sexy Belly Dancer herself. She was smiling. She was happy. Said something things I had done gave her fresh perspectives on the pose and really "clicked" in her head. Said thank you. Can you speak?!

And now for my encore, folks. . .a rabbit out of a hat.

Yup, they certainly do shock the hell out of me, too.