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How long should you do yoga before teacher training? Are you experienced enough?

We have received multiple questions over the last few months with a similar theme: about joining a Yoga Teacher Training. We have collected the most frequently asked questions and will answer them weekly.

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If you are considering to join a Yoga Teacher Training, this information might be helpful to help you decide to actually send in your enrolment form. 

For this week, we will answer the question: How long should you do yoga before teacher training? Are you experienced enough?

Teaching yoga and practicing yoga are two different activities. Someone who practices yoga in an advanced stage doesn’t necessarily have the skills to be a teacher.

One of the most common question we get about requirements for yoga teacher training participation, is how much yoga experience is necessary in order to embark on this yoga journey. Nowadays, when you dive deeper into yoga-land, it can be quite intimidating in the on-and offline world. Especially, when you see the endless stream of pictures on Instagram of perfect yogi’s or the amazing students you meet in yoga studios. Often social media shows you the yoga teacher as someone with an impeccable body and stamina that students can look up to.

Let us emphasise that these images are definitely a misconception on what being a yoga teacher is. Teaching yoga and practicing yoga are two different activities. Someone who practices yoga in an advanced stage doesn’t necessarily have the skills to be a teacher. Most of your students will never look like the famous yogis on Instagram, why should you be any different? Every person has their own limitations and every yoga teacher has difficulty with certain poses. By showing your own challenges, your students will relate more to your teaching and they will be more open to explore their own challenges.

So what does it take to become a yoga teacher? What are really the necessary requirements for you to possess before signing up for a yoga teacher training?

- You will need to have a strong desire to learn.   

With this important ingredient, you can overcome any obstacles in becoming a teacher. You can do anything as long as you set your mind to it. This desire is also closely linked to your attitude. Often the less experienced yogi’s are the disciplined ones. They achieve the most growth and show the best results in their teacher trainings. Even a seasoned yogi is usually a beginner in teaching. This makes joining a teacher training challenging for anyone, no matter how advanced your practice is.  

And to answer the question: How experienced do you need to be: The desire to learn and teach yoga outweighs experience. 

If you have more questions about joining the Equal Vinyasa Teacher Training, sign up for the complementary info-session Saturday 26th February 10-12h at our training location, via tt@equalyoga.com