A yoga practitioner who is considering coming to take the yoga Teacher Training Program at Sunstone Yoga Academy just needs to have a love for yoga. Most people who come want to deepen their practice, or they love yoga and just have to tell others about it, or they consciously want to teach yoga – all of these types of people come to teacher training to figure out how to share their love with other people. We want them to walk out of the yoga teacher training program confident and competent and ready to do all those things.
We have had people come in who have a regular practice of four to five classes a week (or more). We have had people who don’t have a regular practice or who have a steady practice but only one to two classes per week. It’s definitely more challenging in this second situation but we have had students who have been very successful coming in with the lighter practices and who now can’t imagine what it would be like not to have taken the teacher training program.
There are certainly age and physical limitations that people need to be cautious with, and there are definitely some people we would not recommend the yoga teacher training for, but it very much depends on each person’s individual situation and we are happy to explore with a potential student whether the program is right for them.
The biggest questions for a potential student are really to figure out what their goal is and what their resources are and whether they are ready to take on this type of challenge. We do have a list of ten things to consider if you’re looking for yoga teacher training, but these are mainly logistical (i.e. the credentials you will receive, how to choose a school, what length of training you want, etc). Beyond that, we’ll ask potential new students
- If they have the time?
- If they have the commitment (depending on the type of yoga teacher training they are considering)?
- If they have a good support system?
- If they have the resources for the program (not just financial but also the opportunity cost of what else they might be doing during that time)?
It’s important for new students to come in with an open mind and ready to learn. We remind them at that start to remember what their values are. For example, a student may have a family, and a job and a love of yoga. Sometimes they’re torn between competing needs and values. And it can be easy in the moment to forget that although right now (with the yoga teacher training) they are putting learning and achieving a goal ahead of some of the other things that are really important to them, it can be easy to forget that it’s ok and that it’s just a shift for the time being. Often at the beginning, the yoga teacher training students aren’t sure what they got themselves into, if they’re ready for it, if their families are ready for it. We always encourage potential new students to check with their support systems and remember that it will affect the people around them. And we always thank the families at graduation – we’re so grateful to them for sharing this person with us for the eight weeks or however long it took, and for understanding that this is something the student needed to do and that it will make them better in the end.
What matters more than any of the practical questions is really whether they have the love of yoga and the desire to deepen their practice and learn the skills that will allow them to teach and share yoga effectively. By the end, students tend to be transformed and confident and very ready to teach. We hear a lot from new teachers (and even new teachers who are learning a new series of poses) ‘oh my gosh, I was really nervous to teach my first class, but as soon as I got out there, I realized how very prepared I actually was.’. We hear a lot how people are leaving very prepared to do what they set out to do.