Teaching Yoga for All Body Types
Teaching Yoga for All Body Types
The traditions of yoga do not exclude based on weight, shape, income, color, ability, gender identity, or anything else that may marginalize us. However, many groups of people have less accessibility and fewer opportunities to develop a yoga practice. Yoga teachers can overcome many of these challenges by pursuing advanced yoga teacher training to become a more inclusive yoga teacher.
Learn to Teach Inclusivity
There is skill and experience needed to create an inclusive and welcoming environment for your students. Advanced yoga teacher training gives you practical knowledge and hands-on practice to become a leader in your yoga community while advancing your career as a yoga teacher.
Anatomy and Physiology Knowledge to Teach All Yoga Bodies
With advanced anatomy studies and advanced yoga teacher training, including functional movement, you will learn to teach yoga that aids in daily actions. For example, squatting, reaching, and balancing are components of asana. Pursuing Advanced YTT and knowledge of how asana translates into mobility and strength gives all body types room to grow and stabilize, improving activities off the yoga mat.
Functional yoga closely relates to accessible yoga, where every body type can participate, regardless of physical or mental state. Accessible yoga removes all obstacles, and the student becomes the purpose instead of the pose. Perceived and real limitations vanish.
Methods for Teaching for All Yoga Bodies
As a yoga teacher, learning to modify your pose cues and sequencing to fit your audience creates inclusivity. Modifications can apply to specific poses by offering your students the opportunity to use props, change their base of support, raise or lower their arms, and generally seek comfort for their bodies. The pose then takes on a new form to fit the individual instead of a textbook perfect shape.
Modifications also include props. The safe use of mobile blocks, bolsters, and straps give the body more space to move, transition, and reach. Stationary props like chairs and walls make balancing more accessible. Other poses can transition to the floor for a new perspective and to remove any vulnerabilities of imbalance. Vṛksāsana and Garudāsana are perfect for supine positions, and you can find a variation of Natarajāsana on the belly.
Modifications also apply to the transitions between poses. Moving from Adho Mukha Svanāsana to Vīrabhadrāsana I is typically cued as a fluid movement. Changing your guidance to transition Adho Mukha Svanāsana to Bharmanāsana, then to Anjaneāsana, and lifting the knee and shifting the feet a bit can also help a student find Vīrabhadrāsana I.
Watch Your Language as a Yoga Teacher
Purposeful language helps remove any stigmas that may accompany different body types and abilities. For example, an inclusive yoga teacher may replace goal-focused language such as "full expression," "find your edge" and "you should feel" with inviting phrases that focus on the individual. An inclusive yoga teacher may try using phrases like "what would it feel like if" and "Find movement within the pose that feels true to you" instead.
Pursue Advanced Yoga Teacher Training
Having an RYT500 designation (Registered Yoga Teacher with 500-hour yoga teacher training) as a yoga teacher is more than a title. With advanced yoga teacher training, yoga teachers learn to understand the many nuances of the body.
For example, aging takes a toll on mobility, injuries need time to heal, and one's spirit may struggle. Fluctuations in weight, strength, and confidence appear throughout a lifetime, and yoga can accommodate all of these stages. Teaching for all yoga bodies and life stages requires empathy, but most importantly it requires advanced teacher training and knowledge of the physical body.
Your Students Will Benefit from an Inclusive Yoga Teacher
Becoming a yoga leader for all body types creates a safe space for all. Fears and hesitations of students are replaced with comfort and personalized instruction. Students can create meaningful movement within their bodies, boosting yoga's true callings and purpose to find peace.
As your community grows, yogis of all varieties and life stages come together. Yoga for all body types creates a group that celebrates themselves and serves their physical and spiritual needs at any given time.
Did you know you can learn do Advanced YTT Online at Prema Yoga Institute?
Prema Yoga Institute has gone virtual. You can advance your skills as a yoga teacher online with Online Advanced YTT Trainings. For example, our Functional Anatomy Training is now available online and trains yoga teachers how to:
Develop your confidence teaching to all different types of bodies
Think critically about biases that often go overlooked in anatomy and movement science
Gain support and education to skillfully move away from a "one size fits all" type of teaching
Learn to better see and "Read" bodies in order to better meet your student's varying needs
Interface more effectively with doctors and health care professionals
Advance your teaching towards a Yoga Therapy Certification
And more (click here for details)
Additionally, The Functional Anatomy Training counts as 50 CE Credits with Yoga Alliance OR towards your RYT500 at Prema Yoga Institute.
Visit Prema Yoga Institute to learn more about our training, which is now available online with interactive trainings through 2022!
PYI is an accredited program based in New York city, teaching students around the globe through online classes. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you advance your yoga practice and teaching!
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