More Communication Skills for Yoga Teachers

When Yoga teachers gather in a workshop to hear a lecture about communication - what is the first topic that comes to mind? Is it cueing skills, voice inflection, or when to ask a student for permission to assist? Those are important issues for anyone who teaches Yoga, but lets take a look at many more areas that could use some work.

Communication is a two way street. How can we exchange ideas if students are made to feel stupid for asking questions? Granted, Yoga classes cannot operate like an open forum, if you have a lesson plan in mind, but a student who is experiencing pain should not have to feel bad for asking about it. Nor should he or she have to wait until the end of class to ask an impatient teacher about his or her pain.

Listen Empathically: When a student asks a Yoga-related question during class time, the Yoga instructor present, should listen to all of the details. There are times when a Yoga student asks questions, which are on the mind of many more classmates.

for some Yoga students, it takes a lot of courage to ask a question in a group setting. Some students ponder questions for days before asking them. Their heart rate may rise because it took courage to ask the question.

With all this said, listening is a primary communication skill. As a Yoga teacher, you are respected by your students, so do not violate a trust by bolstering your ego. The key is to listen intently, because you may have questions of your own, which will result in a deeper answer.

Who becomes a Yoga students best teacher during Hatha Yoga practice? His or her body, and mind, must eventually be the best Yoga teacher. If not, we have failed to give our students the gift of self-realization. To go further: Yoga students must learn to think for themselves. If they are dependent on a Yoga teacher, all the time, then our teaching method is flawed.

Why do I say this? If a student is not present for Yoga practice, we must make him or her gently aware of it. There is no need to make students dependent on us. Good students will always return to Yoga class.

Yoga must still be practiced after our students have rolled up their mats. Breathing, walking, talking, eating, posturing, and acting with mindfulness, is the sign of a Yoga practitioner. All of the amazing physical feats are nice, but any flexible Pilates student, dancer, gymnast, or martial artist, could do the same.

Copyright 2007 Paul Jerard / Aura Publications

Paul Jerard, E-RYT 500, has written many books on the subject of Yoga. He is a co-owner and the Director of Yoga Teacher Training at: Aura Wellness Center, in Attleboro, MA. http://www.riyoga.com He has been a certified Master Yoga Teacher since 1995. To receive a Free Yoga e-Book: "Yoga in Practice," and a Free Yoga Newsletter, please visit: http://www.yoga-teacher-training.org/index.html

Leg Equipment Weights Add On Weights Yoga Benches Healthtechniques

How to Meditate Like Goldilocks

If Goldilocks were to leaf through a few meditation books, she might find some approaches to be too hot, others too cold. But soon enough, we know she'd land on a system that feels "just right" to her. She always does.

Meditation is Like Porridge

When you take your first taste of meditation, it is good to follow your inner guidance. Too hot? Too cold? Find an approach that feels "just right" as it offers you a bridge from your every day state of mind into the clarity, awakening, and healing you seek.

Scattered Mind

In our ordinary state of mind, we rapidly alternate our focus between what is wanted and what is not wanted. This creates static in our vibration. When you focus in such a way that increases the split in your energy, you feel worse. When you deliberately select a focus that brings you into alignment, you feel better.

The more you become like Goldilocks, the more you can clearly tell which technique feels too hot, which one's too cold, and which one is "just right" for you. The more you follow your inner guidance, the more easily and swiftly you can bring yourself into a deep and beneficial meditative state.

The Missing Ramp

Most people give up their meditation practice (or never even begin) for one reason. This reason takes many forms but there is really only one reason. It may feel like "I don't have the time." Or it may show up as "I don't really understand how to do it." It may even look like "I try but I fall asleep."

All these obstacles to meditation are the same at their root. They may look different, but they are all evidence of something missing. The thing that is missing is a ramp.

Your mind is functioning at one frequency and meditation asks it to function at a completely different frequency. When you sit down in your everyday mental pace and ask yourself to jump levels with no ramp, you may be asking the impossible of yourself.

But when you have a ramp, you can do it. When you have a simple way to reliably move from the rhythm of your everyday mind into the rhythm of meditation, you advance rapidly. You begin to reap the benefits of meditation that usually take years and years to achieve.

Aligned Mind

A physical ramp will get your car from one level to another, but what kind of ramp will elevate your mind? The ramp that brings you comfortably into meditation is built of inner alignment. and just like Goldilocks, who knows a good ramp when she sees one, you will know you have achieved a shift in your vibration when you have found your inner alignment. It feels "just right."

Here is an exercise you can do right now to begin your inner alignment. Try this before you meditate and see if it changes the experience for you.

1 - Sit with your spine upright and close your eyes.

2 - Imagine a vertical beam of light running through your spine. It extends infinitely above your head. It also extends below you through the center of the earth and beyond.

3 - allow your muscles to relax and let this beam of light call your spine to a relaxed and powerfully upright posture.

4 - On each in breath, feel your breath begin at the base of your spine and let it rise through the beam of light to the top your head.

5 - On each out breath, feel the breath and the light expand outward to fill your whole body. Feel it illuminate and cleanse your physical cells as well as your energy body.

This simple process of beginning your alignment with the vertical axis offers many benefits:

It brings you into greater awareness of the now.
It promotes healing.
It heightens your sensory awareness so that you have more joy in your human experience.
It augments your insights and talents.
It increases your natural abilities by making you whole.

As you do this process, I recommend you approach it like Goldilocks. Find a way to do it that feels "just right."

For a complete system of inner alignment that leads you into deep meditation in record time, comfortably and easily, read Dr. Rebbie Straubing's book "Rooted in the Infinite: The Yoga of Alignment" You can download the introduction and first chapter at http://RootedintheInfinite.com

Learn Yoga Through Free Online Cles