159: What Is The Purpose of Asana? (A Deep Inquiry)
If I were to ask you what the purpose of asana is, what would you say? Would you say it was to feel better in the body? To build strength and flexibility? To prepare the body for meditation practice? To help people connect more deeply to their breath and themselves?
These are all beautiful answers!!
But if you gave a very specific movement cue or alignment principle when teaching asana, and I asked you what the purpose of that was, what would you say?
I think many of us value clarity and specificity in our teaching, but because of the way we were trained to teach movement, we fall into highly dogmatic or aesthetic based cueing even when that doesn’t honor our values.
Today’s podcast episode is a deep inquiry into the purpose of asana, especially as it applies to teaching movement in a specific and precise way.
In this episode, you’ll hear:
a long list of priorities to choose from in your asana teaching
why it is so problematic that yoga is sold as a healing practice and taught as a performative practice
how this question shows up differently in group classes and private lessons
what true co-creation with your students looks like
what I prioritize in my movement teaching and why
how I recommend you move forward in this inquiry
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Have you ever been in a yoga class where the yoga teacher gives a long dharma talk about ahimsa, and then when the movement practice begins the teaching style feels very aggressive? Or maybe you have been that teacher yourself. I know I have!
I think there are really subtle and beautiful ways to teach the movement part of yoga in a way that has the deeper philosophical teachings embedded within it, but most of us were not taught to do that, and it is more challenging to do than you might think!