When I teach anatomy to yoga teachers, even when there’s a mix of new teachers who have yet to teach and experienced ones, I hear many of the same things when it comes to challenges to learning anatomy:
- “There’s so much to learn.”
- ” There are so many details.”
- ” I don’t really focus on anatomy. I like to focus on the more spiritual side of yoga.”
- ” I have a hard time remembering all the bones, muscles and joints and how it all applies to practice.”
I completely understand this. As a teacher who started out as a physical therapy student in college, I remember the first time I opened an anatomy book, I was completely overwhelmed. From that point forward, because of the path I took both academically and occupationally, anatomy was always part of my professional career. So I’ve had the opportunity to learn it in the context of medicine and the health care industry. For many teachers, they come to yoga teaching without that background so they’re learning anatomy for the first time (outside of what they might know from their own studying, research or their own personal experience with their own health).
The other challenge teachers face is that anatomy is taught very differently depending on what teacher training program you’ve taken. Yoga Alliance requires 20 hours of anatomy be part of a 200 hour training but they don’t specify how that anatomy be presented. It could be presented as part of sequencing or poses, or could be presented with books, presentations or through visiting teachers who specialize in anatomy. It could be presented in a very general way or in a very detailed way, providing much more detail than most teachers would need to teach a yoga class. The point is, there’s a great deal of variety in how this topic is shared and this can lead to a great deal of variation in what teachers know about this subject.
Why does this matter? Well, it matters because although yoga is much more than just the poses, the poses are what teachers primarily offer to students. They may integrate meditation into their classes but the poses, presented as part of a sequence is the main way we share the practice. As such, any movement based practice requires a good understanding of the body. While it’s great to bring up other aspects of yoga, like the more spiritual side of the practice, we really have to have a solid understanding of how it moves.
Understanding anatomy also helps us:
- Give better cues
- Help students modify poses
- Help students with injuries
- Answer questions with more confidence and accuracy
- Teach our students movements on the mat that can help them off the mat as well.
There’s much more we gain from understanding anatomy well, but let’s focus for a moment on some of the concerns raised by teachers:
First of all, understanding anatomy for yoga is different than understanding anatomy for surgery. Of course if you’re a doctor, you need to understand anatomy at the detail level. But for yoga, we need to understand anatomy at the macro level. Keep this in mind as you take trainings, read books and take online courses. As you find yourself getting caught up in the fine tuned details, stop, take a deep breath, and ask yourself, “How does this apply to the big picture?”
Look for teachers, books, online courses, articles and other resources that teach anatomy at this level. Of course, dive into content from teachers who go into the fine tuned details as well but keep in mind what I suggested above. While it’s neat to understand what happens at the cellular level, if you don’t understand what happens at the level of bones, joints and muscles, it’s hard to apply what you know to teaching.
Always find a way to apply what you’re learning to practice. For instance, let’s say you took an hour and read a chapter on the types of joints in the body. You’d read about hinge joints, elliptical joints, ball and socket joints and other types. Be sure when you’re done, you can find ways to apply this knowledge to teaching. For instance, if the hip is a ball and socket joint and the knee is a hinge joint, how does that knowledge apply to a pose like Pigeon, where both the hip and the knee are moving? This application of anatomy knowledge to yoga is where the rubber meets the road. Anatomy knowledge without application to yoga can often be the missing link.
Give yourself a list of things you’d like to learn and find ways to learn them. In my online course on anatomy called “Your Yoga Anatomy Blueprint” and in my anatomy manual, I’ve selected what I believe are the key components of anatomy for teachers to know and know well. These are things like anatomical movements, bones, joints, muscles, muscles in poses, modifications and red flags to look for in practice. I didn’t pick a number of things because I wanted to provide two resources in two different formats that share essential aspects of anatomy. From there, teachers can dive into more detail in other ways, including taking trainings in person. If we don’t have a blueprint for learning anatomy as a teacher, the subject is just too big for us to navigate and come out being able to apply it to teaching.
Any time you take a training, read a book or article or take an online course, start teaching that information right away. For instance, I read a great article yesterday about the internal rotators of the hip and applied it immediately to teaching last night. I created cues that shared the anatomy and as I shared the cues and the students started to move, I watched what happened. I looked to see if my cues were explaining things clearly as demonstrated by how the students moved. I assessed after that part of the practice to see if I felt it was too wordy or heady. This is how you remember what you learn. You apply it immediately to teaching. The first few times it will feel awkward. You may have to go home and check your references. But over time, it becomes part of your knowledge base.
It’s easy to get that feeling of overwhelm when trying to learn anatomy. If you have a blueprint and keep in mind applying anatomy to yoga, you’ll start to be on the right path. I’ve got an 8 video series that’s free on my You Tube channel that will walk you through quite a bit of the basics of anatomy in yoga. You can take my LEARN YOGA CHALLENGE by clicking here.Â
As always, I’d love to hear what you think. Please comment below.Â
Thanks for reading!