How do I become a Yoga teacher?

[DairyNips]

I was considering training as a Yoga teacher then offering classes in my local area. There is a major shortage of anything like this where I live.

I have briefly done yoga in the past as a 10 week course and with a DVD at home. I loved it and think I would enjoy running classes.

So, any idea how I go about this?

Ah thanks sun. I will look at this as a long term plan and use my time to research thoroughly

Dairy - DVDs are about as far from ideal as you can get! If you want to do a practice at home, the best thing is to find a yoga teacher who'll see you once every 6-8 weeks who will devise a personalised yoga routine for you and to do that. She/he will make sure you are doing all the postures correctly, and will alter your routine to work with where you are now, and where you are heading IYSWIM.

I am seeing my yoga teacher tomorrow, for example. I've been seeing her every 5 weeks since January. Initially I had a morning practice based on improving my positive thinking and feeling of being 'held' by the universe (was recovering from a near breakdown). Then I re-hurt the weak part of my back - my SI joint - so now my practice is about strengthening the core muscles around that area, mainly, but with a changing pranayama practice as well. Tomorrow I'm asking her for one to do when I get a chance in the evenings, which is rare, but when I do get a chance, I'd like one that's relaxing instead of energising because of the time of day it is.

The absolute ideal - how yoga is ideally taught - is by seeing your teacher every single day and practising for many hours. Obviously none of us has the time or resources for that! But you can see how DVDs really aren't a good basis for real yoga, and any teacher training course you want to do will want to see that you've spent a number of hours with a real life teacher, either in group classes or one to ones.

The course I'm doing is four years - one foundation year and then three years of practitioner training.

If you want to try iyengar yoga you can find a local iyengar class by typing your postcode into the teacher search on the iya UK website.

I find this style good for precision and alignment in the poses. Teachers are trained to improve your asana not just demonstrate and lead practice.

A weekly class is a good way to start. You can then begin home practise confident that you are practising safely and within your own limits.

You really don't want knee injuries. The most common yoga injuries from unsafe practice.

With a good grounding in this style you can then do more flowing and dynamic styles safely.

Although, Sun, it's worth understanding the evolution of yoga and how and why the different approaches have come about. Iyengar was a student of Krishnamarcharya's yet his approach is very different from Krishnamarcharya's son TKV Desikachar, for instance.

Absolutely agree flamingo.

There are many different schools of thought and styles. All come from the original yoga sutras by patanjali which are thousands of years old.

So read around the subject OP.

I'm giving OP my opinion only. It is a personal opinion based on 20 years of yoga practice and 4 years teaching.

Many people are far more qualified than I am to advise you and I do recognise we all have our individual path.

And that is why yoga is so faberoonie, although I'm fairly certain Patanjali didn't use that word

It's just difficult to choose how or why you want to teach yoga, if the only reference to it you've had is photos of crazily bendy, beautiful women and commercial DVDs, which make it look like yoga is just like aerobics.

I first did yoga to a Barbara Currie DVD - I got rid of them all a few weeks into attending a real yoga course, but am now not on the same path as that first real life teacher I had at all. I feel very empowered, though, by 'getting it' and feeling like I'm making informed decisions (yogic ones, I guess) about my teacher training.

Agree that the commerialisation of yoga hides the reality and can be offputting for students.

That's why its good to try lots of different teachers and styles so that you find the one that chimes for you.

To have an established self practice means you then have something worthwhile to share.

Hi there, just chipping in if you don't mind. I know you want to teach yoga, but this def sounds like a loooong term plan, given the level of commitment. Which is great, go for it absolutely. But I thought it was worth passing on something I just learnt recently from a 'resting' actress who teaches zumba - that you only need to train for one day to become a zumba teacher!! I was shocked, but apparently that's the case and she's making enough money to live on and having a ball teaching a few classes each week. So I thought it was worth mentioning, in case you fancy a shorter-term plan as well! Good luck with it all anyhow.

Thank you for all your thoughts

Pink that's interesting Not sure I'm cut out for the amount of leaping about Zumba involves! I'm actually really surprised it only takes one day?! I know it's not quite the same but I did lots of dance classes when younger, ballet, tap, creative dance, ballroom dancing etc and I'm sure the teachers had trained for longer than that!

Marking my place here

Zumba is unusual in that it is a 'lead' rather than a 'teach' class so the grading and insurance are lower.
At my gym, whenever anything else gets cancelled, they slot zumba in as any of the instructors can teach it
BUT
to teach it well involves a level of musicality and expertise (particularly about knee injuries) that I suspect may jump up and bite the Zumba people in the long run.

Les Mills courses are worldwide - and strictly controlled.

Yoga teachers are, frankly, dime a dozen
BUT
successful yoga teachers are those who can work at multiple levels, from the "just breathe" to "5 second BK" in the same room
and those who admit that they do not know everything
and who learn from the limitations of their attendees - and their skills.

Forward folds in one of our classes were certainly 'upped' by having the good (read non daily mail) part of the UK olympic diving team in the class one day !