Yoga teacher Connie from Lain am See works differently

Lain am See - Cornelia Nagel is a yoga teacher.

She seems grounded and arrived.

But it took some time to get there.

Before the start of the yoga class, there is a little bit of chatting. A yoga student tells a funny story from work. Connie, the teacher, starts laughing. Their laughter is unmistakable, it is resounding, long-lasting, happy and, above all, contagious, so that finally the whole group laughs. Cornelia Nagel looks like you imagine a yoga teacher: tanned skin, strong gray half-length hair, well-toned arms and legs. But the 51-year-old is not a typical yoga teacher, she is different. It is not about performance and body styling, nor does it come across as spiritual or esoteric. Cornelia Nagel is down-to-earth, she doesn't pretend to hover above things, and yet she manages to ground her students. Elli Biller from Dorfen, who has been taking yoga lessons with Connie for ten years, confirms this:“I like their optimism and their happiness. I've tried a lot, but I stayed with Connie. "

Perhaps Cornelia's other side is the reason for its authenticity. For almost three decades she sold luxury watches to prominent, extravagant customers - in addition to her work as a yoga teacher. “During my time in retail, I learned how to deal with people. I developed a feeling for what people bring with them and what they need. This has brought me many advantages in my yoga work, ”says the 51-year-old.

Cornelia Nagel was born in Weil am Rhein and grew up in a village of 3,000 people between Basel and Freiburg. There the only child of an optician and a secretary goes to elementary school and goes to high school. But only up to the eleventh grade. “I didn't want to learn what the teachers told me to do. I wanted to learn what interested me, ”is how she explains her decision from today's perspective to leave her parents' house at the age of 18 and move to Munich. She feels “constrained by social expectations, I wanted to get out of there”.

The relationship with her father is difficult. “He was dogmatically Christian and had planned the classic path for me: training, getting married, having children.” Leaving was not part of his daughter's life planning. Her mother, however, supports her immediately. “I think she was able to achieve through me what she would have liked to do herself,” says Cornelia Nagel looking back.

For the young woman it is clear: “I want to go to town and learn to be a goldsmith.” She has always liked to surround herself with beautiful things.

Your mother sets the course.

But Cornelia found her apprenticeship herself, not as a goldsmith, but as a commercial clerk at Munich's first address for luxury watches: Uhren Huber in Residenzstrasse.

“I just ran off and asked in jewelry stores,” she recalls.

“Actually, I've just started running all my life,” she says.

From an early age she has the feeling that she is living past life.

She can still remember the interview with Mr. Huber very well. "I came in there in my black wool dress." He had his legs on the desk and was smoking a cigar. “Well, girl, do you have any sales experience?” He asked. Although she says no, she gets the training position. Good years follow. “The working atmosphere was very good and the customers were interesting.” Celebrities such as Charly Watts, drummer for the Rolling Stones, singer Seal, Prince of Bavaria and Princess Gloria von Thurn und Taxis give each other the handle. "Everything that has a reputation and reputation has bought from us," says Cornelia Nagel. "We even had to close the shop for Diego Maradona."

Although she enjoys working at Huber Jeweler, she is plagued by the feeling of “living past life”.

She gets the strength to go on from yoga, which she has been practicing for several years.

“I first met at the age of 14.

I was very nervous and unable to concentrate at school.

That's when I came across a yoga class in the adult education center. ”After the first lesson, she knew:“ This is balm for my soul. ”This key experience has accompanied her to this day.

For the successful yoga teacher, who has been running her own school in Lain am See for six years, yoga is above all decelerating.

“I take the somatic approach, in which breath plays a major role.

You should feel yourself again and perceive yourself from within, ”she explains.

"Connie succeeds with her wonderful deep relaxation," confirms yoga student Elli Biller. “At the end of every lesson, I'm happy to have been there.” Another concern for Cornelia is that anyone can manage her lessons. “I don't like complicated exercises. Yoga should be accessible to everyone. ”That is why there are also participants aged 18 to 70 - from eco to notary.

Marco Jakob, Cornelia Nagel's partner for 18 years, is impressed by her gift of “being able to bring people down.” She is “an open person, without any fear of contact, always with a smile on her face,” the 51-year-old describes his Connie. She lost her fear of contact in her job as a watch seller, she says: “I had so much to do with celebrities and in the end I noticed that they are just normal people, like you and me, with very original needs: for love , Recognition and consolation. ”But it is a long way until Cornelia comes to this realization and becomes an“ open-minded, calm person ”, as Marco Jakob describes his wife.

Back to youth: During her apprenticeship, she was in a relationship with a childhood friend. “We had such an on-off relationship,” but it ended up in a marriage. After studying engineering, her husband got a job offer in Trieste. Cornelia accompanies him with joy. She enjoys a year off by the sea, in Italy - the country she longs for. “That was a wonderful time, I put a lot of my fears off there.” She enjoyed the impressive nature, the dolce vita and the freedom and learned the language. “With very conservative teachers”, but that wasn't the worst.

After a year in Trieste, I went to Bolzano for another two years. There she works in a bookstore. After three years it is finally time to say goodbye to Bella Italia, "which was incredibly difficult for me". The young couple is not going back to Munich. “I didn't want to go to the city anymore, I had discovered my soft spot for nature,” says the 51-year-old. By chance the two end up in Erding. “At that time I got into a serious identity crisis,” recalls Cornelia Nagel. In addition, the couple's values ​​diverged. “He always wanted a picture book family, two children, a sports car, a station wagon, a new building in the settlement. Actually, what my father always imagined for me. ”Her husband receives the offer to work in Oman. This time Cornelia stays in Erding. "I realized,that following my husband is not my life. I wanted to do my own thing. ”She decides to train to be a yoga teacher. “And then I came to,” she states.

At that time she didn't want to go back to luxury watches, she looked for a job that suited her and found it at “Kunst und Spiel” in Munich, a shop for sophisticated children's needs.

She visits her husband every six weeks in Oman.

“A wonderful country,” enthuses Cornelia and, contrary to all prejudices, she feels valued and safe there as a woman.

In Oman she meets “very strong, self-confident women”.

The couple receives invitations in embassies with exciting international encounters.

But all these conveniences cannot hide the failed long-distance relationship.

Eventually the two go their separate ways.

It is the right decision for Cornelia.

"I felt really free for the first time, had little money, but was happy."

"In her bright red trench coat she looked to me like from another time, like a modern Mary Poppins, by the way her favorite film"

Life partner Marco Jakob

And she radiates that too, because at the Erding train station she finally meets Marco, her current life partner.

“In her bright red trench coat, she looked to me like from another time, like a modern Mary Poppins, by the way her favorite film,” Marco Jakob thinks back with a smile.

He also immediately notices her bright, light blue eyes.

The two become a couple, and that's how Cornelia finds happiness in her private life.

For almost two decades, the trained graphic designer has been your “best friend, advisor, teacher and lover. I love him for the deep appreciation he has for me and my work. He's the person I love to spend most of my time with, ”says Cornelia, describing her partnership. In addition, the new relationship satisfies her unfulfilled desire to have children, because Marco has two children from a previous relationship. The couple maintains close contact with the now 23 and 25-year-olds. “We also got a bitch. Leonie has been with us for 16 years now, ”says Cornelia happily.

But fate would have it that she could not get away from the watch business.

In Munich she meets Thomas Bachmann, a former colleague at Uhren Huber, who, together with Joram Scher, has founded his own business for high-priced used watches, so-called vintage watches.

He persuades her to join them as an employee - which turns out to be a stroke of luck.

"I think I can say that I am a good yoga teacher, but certainly also a good vintage watch seller."

There is a story behind every used watch.

She enjoys her work because, unlike new watches, there is a story behind every used watch, and “I love stories,” says Cornelia. At Bachmann & Scher she met very interesting people with passions. “It's like when someone has a soft spot for classic cars. Every detail counts: the rarer, the better preserved and the more original a watch is, the more popular it is, ”says the specialist.

One of the highlights was the auction of the Rolex by Hollywood star Paul Newman. “We followed it with excitement on the live ticker. The initial bid was 20,000 euros, and it ended up under the hammer for a good 15 million euros. ”A personal engraving made it so valuable. "I already have a gamer gene in me," admits Cornelia. Dealers from all over the world came into business every six weeks. “Most of them had their money, the watches and some even diamonds in their trouser and jacket pockets,” she says with a laugh. She also has fond memories of a former Russian decathlete who always drives up in a pink Bentley.

Cornelia likes her job, but she feels drained.

“It's about forgeries, fraud and a lot of money.

Also about failed existences that entrust you with their life story - an emotional powder keg. ”Her work as a yoga teacher always helps her to cope with the stress in the shop.

But she is beginning to doubt.

“The generation of customers has changed over the years.” Watch freaks had become speculators.

“Special watches became an investment boom.” With that, Cornelia Nagel’s work was “demystified, the magic was lost”.

But the 51-year-old continues to advise her extravagant customers in three languages.

In the evenings she pursues her calling and gives yoga classes - Cornelia Nagel and Marco Jakob now live in Dorfen.

Alcohol ban for the men's yoga class

For bathing and saunas, the couple regularly go to Lake Lainer, around 15 kilometers away. One day an employee shows Cornelia the area next to the sauna. From then on she held her courses in the spacious room under the roof of an old but renovated barn. “In the beginning, even the Loaner regulars' table came to me,” says the yoga teacher. "Only men, everyone over 50, including Schorsch, the boss from Lake Loaner." She then had to ban alcohol for the yoga class, she says with a laugh.

In the course of time, Cornelia and Marco move their center of life to Lain am See.

They build a wooden house, Connie rents additional rooms in the barn for her yoga school, and Schorsch even builds her a platform for outdoor courses, right on the lake.

She still regularly takes the train to Munich to see Bachmann & Scher.

"For most of my life I had gotten so used to this tension between two worlds and myself that I probably thought it was normal."

Then her father dies and she gets into a vortex.

“I was burned out, couldn't any more.” She quits and concentrates on her yoga school, which is now doing very well.

Schoolchildren from Dorfen follow her into the hidden Lain.

“At the moment I am doing better than ever.

I have the chance to look inside myself and discover myself, ”she says happily and forges plans.

If it is possible again, she would like to offer more body work, such as Thai massages, because: "I am firmly convinced that you can heal the soul through body work, you just have to go into the deeper layers."

Looking back on her previous life, she quotes CG Jung: “The right path to wholeness consists of fateful detours and wrong turns.” Mary Poppins also made her way in the film and done her job: She brought the family to a harmonious coexistence.

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Connie as a student

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She wants to go out into the big wide world early on

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Cornelia Nagel, the watch expert

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Connie's yoga classes are happy.

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