What I Learned in a 200 Hour and 300 Hour Yoga Teacher Training

“], “filter”: { “nextExceptions”: “img, blockquote, div”, “nextContainsExceptions”: “img, blockquote, a.btn, a.o-button”} }”>

The primary time I walked right into a yoga studio, I used to be on the lookout for a special health routine. Nothing extra.

It was 2018 and I used to be dwelling in San Francisco. I shortly fell in love with a category at CorePower Yoga known as Yoga Sculpt, which was a mix of yoga, weights, and cardio. Appreciating the impact it had on my thoughts in addition to my physique, I fell exhausting sufficient for it to coach as a Yoga Sculpt teacher. By that summer season, I used to be instructing two courses every week.

I’d additionally fallen for the studio, the place I felt a deep sense of neighborhood. I started spending all of my free time there, and once I was requested to take a management role, I went all in. I’d simply misplaced my job as a content material supervisor, so the timing couldn’t have been extra aligned.

I hadn’t deliberate on enrolling in one other coaching whereas I used to be adjusting to my function on the studio and instructing twice every week, however someway I discovered myself enrolling in an eight-week 200-hour yoga instructor coaching (YTT) via CorePower.

From the second I made that call, it appeared like all the things in my life began to vary at an unprecedented tempo. Abruptly my days had been consumed by yoga.

My 200-Hour Yoga Instructor Coaching

The coaching required us to fulfill three evenings every week for 3 hours. It was fast-paced, however our two lead trainers and their assistant coaches reassured us that we had been precisely the place we had been alleged to be and inspired us to belief the method.

My Introduction to 200 YTT

The first focus of the 200 YTT was to learn to train CorePower’s set sequence, which is a “Degree 1” energy vinyasa yoga class consisting of a sequence of the identical poses taught in the very same order every time. Our curriculum was designed to assist us memorize the set sequence in addition to be taught cueing and respiratory formulation, hands-on changes, yoga philosophy, chakras, fundamental Sanskrit, anatomy, prenatal yoga, and the enterprise of yoga.

With no time to lose, we dove straight into practising methods to train. The sequence was damaged down into 11 sections, every containing a number of poses. Having realized formulation for cueing and breathwork in my Yoga Sculpt coaching, I felt assured in my skill to steer college students via a number of of the essential poses, together with Sun Salutation A and B. However I wanted to apply having a newbie’s thoughts as we explored instructing much less acquainted poses and transitions and realized the underlying why behind the order of the sections.

We completed memorizing the sequence within the first three weeks of the coaching.

By week 4, we went deeper into anatomy and changes. I used to be additionally required to watch courses, which implies I sat in the back of the room and took cautious notes on the cues, pacing, and total expertise as one other instructor led college students via their apply. I began to note refined issues I hadn’t been conscious of earlier than I started coaching, like had been the lights too dim or too shiny? Was the music too distracting or simply proper? I discovered myself being overly important of sure issues.

Later within the coaching, we practiced instructing in small teams. We acquired suggestions from our trainers on “glows and grows,” or issues we did effectively and issues we may enhance upon. That suggestions was important for serving to us enhance, though when it was my flip to show, I all the time felt like my coronary heart would beat out of my chest. It’s a sense that I generally nonetheless expertise once I stand in entrance of a category, though it dissipates once I bear in mind to focus much less on myself and extra on my college students.

Religious Sparks Fly

Given the limitation of 200 hours, we centered totally on asana, or the bodily postures. However we additionally coated some religious and philosophical features of yoga within the coaching, and that’s what most captured my consideration.

Throughout week 5, we realized concerning the chakras, that are the seven power factors in our physique that run alongside a central channel. And every week, we had been anticipated to show in homework and studying assignments on yoga philosophy, together with the yamas and niyamas. Our publicity to Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra got here from studying the translations included in the back of our manuals, though we had been assigned to learn The Interior Custom of Yoga by Michael Stone, a psychotherapist and instructor of yoga and Buddhism, and that provided some further perception into yoga philosophy.

There was one lecture that I vividly recall. In it, our trainers referred to “little s and massive S.” The “little s” is what we understand as our self—our self-image or ego. The “massive S” is our true nature or pure consciousness, which a few of the academics translated as our spirit or soul. To at the present time, this is among the ideas I depend on most for self-reflection.

We utilized what we had been studying by collaborating in a Karma Yoga Challenge. My fellow trainees and I volunteered at a homeless shelter and helped put together meals and handed them out, an expertise that offered us the chance to attach with one another and the bigger neighborhood whereas demonstrating that a part of dwelling your yoga is being of service to others.

Our coaching additionally required us to attend courses at completely different studios. I hadn’t anticipated this to be such an integral a part of my understanding of yoga philosophy, however l will always remember attending a category at Love Story Yoga within the Mission District of San Francisco the place we chanted mantras in Sanskrit earlier than we started transferring our our bodies. On the time, as a result of it was so completely different from CorePower’s teachings, the chanting felt very on the market for me. Little did I do know a seed was being planted in my soul.

Studying to Educate Poses

The eight weeks went shortly. Along with the lectures and homework, I took round 60 studio courses throughout that point.

Within the final week of our 200-hour coaching, my classmates and I ready for ultimate written exams and took half in a “Deliver a Newbie” evening. As academics in coaching, we had been anticipated to facilitate an inclusive and well-rounded class setting for somebody who had little to no expertise with yoga. We guided the scholars into poses with none of us messing up our cues or forgetting any sections. Afterward, the newcomers gushed concerning the class, which we took as a mirrored image of how well-prepared we had been to show.

The instructing instruments had been particular to CorePower’s sequence, which I discovered to be an clever method of studying methods to safely ship cues and adapt the apply to the wants of scholars in a supportive method.

On the day I acquired my 200-hour certificates, my classmates and I commemorated the event by taking photographs in enjoyable poses. I celebrated with headstand, a pose I used to be proud to apply as a result of I had lately realized how.

However I knew my yoga journey was nonetheless at first. My 200 YTT had given me the instruments to show a secure and complete asana class, however I used to be nonetheless largely at nighttime and interested by yoga scriptures, philosophy, pranayama (breathwork), and meditation.

A couple of years later, I moved to South Lake Tahoe, California. As earlier than, I discovered a neighborhood at a yoga studio the place I taught some courses. It was a boutique studio, and with out the foundations and requirements of CorePower, I discovered myself turning into extra artistic and exploring a special instructing voice.

As my skill to steer others via asana progressed, I knew that I nonetheless had a lot extra to be taught. I felt a void. I used to be additionally instructing however barely practising so the voice of imposter syndrome crept in. I consistently requested myself, do my college students really feel linked with the apply of yoga past the bodily? Ought to I be doing extra to share that with them? Can I name myself a yoga instructor once I can’t even keep a constant private apply?

On the similar time, I knew that I used to be being pulled elsewhere.

My 300-Hour Yoga Instructor Coaching

The following chapter in my story started with a Google search. One evening I typed “birthplace of yoga” on my keyboard and the small city of Rishikesh popped up. I spent hours watching YouTube movies concerning the place referred to as the “yoga capital of the world.”

I felt instantly drawn to this vacation spot and started on the lookout for yoga colleges that had been primarily based there. The Himalayan Yoga Association (HYA) appeared to align with all the things I used to be searching for. Over 27 days, I’d prepare for 300 hours in hatha, Ashtanga, pranayama, meditation, Ayurveda, anatomy, alignment, and yoga philosophy.

“That is it,” I believed. “I’m lastly making it occur.”

My Introduction to 300 YTT

Many of the nervousness I felt concerning the coaching was soothed by the truth that one other yoga instructor I knew had agreed to hitch me on the journey to India. On March 1, 2023, the 2 of us and the remaining college students in our 300-hour yoga instructor coaching had been welcomed by our 4 academics with a fireplace ceremony. It ended with kirtan, an act of devotion which entails chanting mantras in Sanskrit. It took a couple of songs for us newcomers to really feel snug singing, clapping, dancing, and chanting with one another, since we’d solely met a couple of hours prior. It was a good looking solution to immerse ourselves within the coaching.

The next day, we had been instantly thrown into the deep finish with a jam-packed schedule and what felt like data overload. We began simply after daybreak with nasal cleaning practices, similar to jala neti and sutra neti, adopted by pranayama, meditation, and hatha yoga. These practices strengthened that yoga isn’t only a bodily apply however a whole system of practices that features bodily postures in addition to respiratory methods, cleaning practices, and way of life changes.

By late morning, I used to be famished. In between philosophy and anatomy courses, we took a break for a strictly vegetarian lunch with a number of lentils, potatoes, veggies, and rice. There was chai, however I missed espresso. I typically struggled to focus throughout the post-lunch class, wishing I may take a nap or sip an espresso.

There have been two yoga asana courses a day, and so they weren’t precisely a stroll within the park, which meant I went via a whole lot of Tiger Balm. The coaching ended at 7 p.m. with alignment and Ashtanga, and at evening I used to be bodily and mentally exhausted. I used to be studying what felt like a lifetime’s value of data and my physique was nonetheless attempting to regulate to the bodily apply.

I discovered myself fully overwhelmed.

My favourite class was the late-morning philosophy lecture. Our instructor had an aura about him that lit up your complete room. He taught ideas about yoga that I had by no means heard of earlier than and that additionally utilized to a number of Jap religions, together with Hinduism and Jainism. I used to be fascinated by samsara, the wheel of life, the place we’re all repeatedly experiencing start, demise, and rebirth. I realized about moksha, which is breaking free from the cycle of samsara and attaining the very best type of human life by which our Self or Soul turns into one with the divine. It was one other massive S second.

These ideas of divinity and reincarnation opened my eyes to new methods of considering life. I couldn’t assist however marvel if these ideas could be taken significantly in my courses again house. How would my college students reply?

A Utterly Completely different Understanding of Yoga

The coaching in India uncovered me to features of yoga I had recognized nothing about. Maybe this could have been no shock, since I got here to India with the intention to discover extra of the religious aspect of yoga.

First, there was the bodily apply of yoga. Most Hatha courses within the West are slower-paced and beginner-friendly. The hatha courses at HYA felt like boot camp. I didn’t know you would do a push-up in Wheel Pose till, effectively, I did a push-up in Wheel Pose.

I had solely practiced Ashtanga a handful of instances previous to my coaching in India. It consists of a number of sequence of set sequence of poses, starting the first sequence adopted by the intermediate sequence. My 300-hour YTT coated the intermediate sequence of Ashtanga yoga, which focuses on backbends. However having little or no background within the major sequence, I confessed to my instructor that I felt fully misplaced.

Shocked, he requested, “Didn’t you do the first sequence in your 200-hour instructor coaching?” I used to be embarrassed to confess that I hadn’t. A couple of others within the 300-hour had the identical expertise, and by chance our instructor was variety sufficient to interrupt down the poses within the major sequence for the primary few weeks earlier than transferring on to the intermediate sequence.

Apart from being pushed to the bodily restrict with the asana practices, I used to be blown away by how very important pranayama, meditation, Ayurveda, and yoga philosophy had been to the custom of yoga and people who practiced yoga in India. We realized a whole pranayama sequence, and I witnessed the development of my respiratory as the times glided by.

We had been additionally uncovered to completely different meditation methods and had been requested to learn an excellent portion of the Yoga Sutra. Our instructor had us chant every sutra in Sanskrit earlier than diving into its that means.

The whole lot appeared so disciplined, from the schedule to the foundations. There was how and what and why you need to eat, based on Ayurveda, which is the sister science to yoga. There was additionally what was thought of the perfect instances to apply pranayama and meditation.

The yoga way of life in India was a whole 180 from the yoga way of life I used to be used to within the U.S.

Studying to Educate Yoga

Whereas we realized numerous new expertise and an enormous quantity of data, we didn’t learn to train any of it. The truth is, we didn’t train in any respect. I requested my instructor if we had been going to obtain suggestions or apply instructing. “That’s what your ultimate examination is for,” he mentioned.

Ultimate exams at HYA took a whole week. There have been written checks for anatomy and philosophy, and verbal checks for pranayama, meditation, hatha, and Ashtanga. The hatha examination additionally required us to show a brief class that included joint actions, Sun Salutations, ahead bends, twists, and inversions.

For the Ashtanga examination, we had been break up into teams to show your complete intermediate sequence. Fortunately, we had been allowed to have our notes in entrance of us. It was our first time instructing since we’d realized the sequence. I can’t think about how this is able to have gone with out my notes. With gratitude, I handed.

The Instructor—and Scholar—I Am Right this moment

My two YTT experiences had been equally transformational however in fully other ways. Every has made me not solely a greater instructor however a significantly better scholar.

Yoga within the West has introduced me nothing however optimistic experiences and opened my eyes to aware dwelling. However throughout the 4 weeks I spent increasing my apply in India, I got here to grasp that yoga is a steady bodily and religious apply that’s consistently unfolding effectively past the partitions of any studio. With that understanding, my apply and I each underwent a real metamorphosis. One by which life itself turned the varsity.

RELATED: I Learned Yoga in India. Then I Did My Yoga Teacher Training at CorePower.