66) Enhancing Yoga Training standards

Few months back the entire Yoga Community was rocked by an article in the New York times tiled "How Yoga Can Wreck your body "by William Broad . There have been lot of discussions for and against that article . Being a Yoga teacher myself  my take on the entire issue is that the problem is not in Yoga but in the un-intelligent and un-scientfic ways Yoga is being taught and practiced .  It is high time that the Yoga Teaching institutes lift their standards of teaching and teach Yoga more from a Scientific point of view .

I have dealt about this issue in my earlier post No: 62) The Importance of BioMechanics for Yoga Practitioners and Teachers .

I am summarizing the essence of what I want to convey by quoting Shmuel Tatz , one of the experts in Movement therapy . 

"What I wish for yoga professionals to understand is that they must know the biomechanics of the human body. Also, they need to work with someone, as Glen Black did with me, for at least 5 years to learn about body pathology, mechanics, disease and injuries. Yoga teachers should be aware of all facets of the human body so that they do not themselves nor recommend to their students other than what is health giving and safe.  I studied yoga after I learned physical therapy. If yoga teachers have a basic education in physical therapy they will never do hyper-extensions of the spine because they will know the great damage it can cause the discs.

... most teachers have no training in biomechanics and there is, then, always the danger of injury to themselves and to their students."

For the complete letter refer to my post at No:62 .

Why I reiterate this point again is that there seems to be no serious efforts from most of recognized Yoga Institutes in equipping their students with the solid knowledge of bio-mechanics / kinesiology so that they can be better Yoga practitioners or teachers . This applies not just to Yoga institutes but also other fitness institutes which are mushrooming day by day in all major cities and towns . No doubt many of these institutes do teach some amount of Anatomy and Physiology but that is inadequate . They can give you the foundation but if a Yoga teacher is serious about lifting his standards then he /she must invest lot of time energy, resources in learning Kinesiology and use that principles to practice ,teach yoga .

Currently I have myself curtailed most of my Yoga teaching to invest my time and energy in learning Kinesiology and other Movement therapies beyond Yoga so that I have better knowledge and tools with me to enhance my own practice  plus also train my students to have a very safe and effective practice .