The article below was written with yoga teachers and student teachers in mind. It was printed in “Yoga and Health” a few years ago and created something of a stir. I still occasionally get asked for copies. It has been updated slightly but is substantially unaltered.
Some contributors to yoga publications have expressed grave reservations about the way that yoga is being taken up by sports/fitness centres with the attendant risk of a degeneration into a form of “soft aerobics”. In this article I hope to address these entirely understandable anxieties and suggest ways that teachers can adapt to the rapidly changing society that we live in without compromising the essential spirit of yoga.
A few words about my own background and experience might not go amiss. I have been teaching for over a decade – a mere novice compared to some readers of Y & H, I suspect. However, for most of that time I have been (more or less) a full time professional, having given up my old work as a service engineer. The need to pay the rent has taken me into some unlikely venues and given me a lot of varied experience, often in difficult circumstances. My venues have included two prisons, a sports centre, two fitness centres; a special needs school (for the “stressed out” staff), our local civic centre and two community associations, as well as a number of adult education and private classes.