By Faye Martins

Why should yoga teachers and serious practitioners study healing methods? To many enthusiasts, yoga is more than the mastery of asanas, pranayama and the rest of the eight limbs of yoga. The practice and study of yoga is a lifestyle that pervades all aspects of living rather than a selective application of principles. This is even more so if you aspire to share your knowledge and passion by leading a class of like-minded people. For some people, it will be enough to teach classes, but for others the power of healing attracts them like moths to a light bulb.

Earning your Yoga Instructor Credentials

Yoga is an extensive field with various types of practices including Hatha, Prenatal, and Hot Yoga. Before you specialize in an intensive program, make sure to try out all the other types of classes to find the one that most suits your personality, preferences, and the needs of your students. There’s no telling what you will discover about yourself by trying other types of yoga before focusing on one.

To earn your instructor certification, you would have to take the required number of study hours, and comply with credentialing requirements.

Advantages of an Instructor Intensive

An intensive program for yoga instructors will be similar to the comprehensive 200 to 300-hour courses. Depending on the subject matter, completing a yoga instructor intensive is a big step toward a foundational or specialist certification.

Typically, intensives can take from one week to years of study to help long-time yogis and rising yoga aspirants to develop the confidence required to face a class. Aside from imparting practical teaching strategies, these intensives will help you grow as a person and develop a more profound understanding of yourself and your passion for yoga.

Yoga: Beyond Flexibility and Begin to Study Healing Methods

The practice of yoga remains popular and will continue to be so in the near future. It has been proven to increase flexibility, build strength and improve your outlook. Intensive courses will provide the opportunity for would-be instructors to brush up on principles that teachers should know in order to lead a yoga class. A thorough yet concise curriculum spread out over a few classroom sessions will give you the time to ponder the effects of yoga on those who are suffering from certain health issues, including asthma, diabetes and cancer.

The Ultimate Value of Yoga Instructor Intensives to Study Healing Methods

Yoga courses give instructors a foundation to build their skills on. All teachers are works in progress. You can only know what works by trying it and you will find that all students are different in their response to a given technique or method. One student may have a pinched nerve that reacts unfavorably to a particular technique. As an instructor or therapist, you have to find alternative methods or modify an existing technique to adapt to a student’s body. You will meet a few students and teachers who lack tolerance or compassion for people with pre-existing conditions. At the same time, many students will thank you for helping them.

Skeptics

As many skeptics will point out, “Yoga can’t cure everything.” I don’t think most people expect yoga to cure all that troubles humankind. Most of the skeptics scoff at prayer and holistic methods for healing. So, what can we say to a skeptic? Yoga is part of the solution and your life can change dramatically with a positive outlook on life. Yoga, happiness, prayer, and holistic methods are great adjuncts to medical methods. To think otherwise is to embrace negative energy and pessimism. The goal of pessimism is to drain the life force from others. For this reason, pessimists often find themselves alone and wonder why.

Yoga can become part of a person’s healing process. It is a physical activity that may help alleviate pain and address bothersome and dangerous symptoms. The physical aspect can be likened to physical therapy, but the overall impact is greater because yoga can also affect mental and spiritual health. The core principles of yoga promote self-awareness, self-control, serenity and deeper awareness of the mind-body connection. If you can achieve this state, you can show others the way to yogic bliss.

© Copyright – Aura Wellness Center – Publications Division

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