10 Great Reasons to become a Yoga Teacher

Yoga is very popular these days. And no wonder: It makes you healthier, stronger and more able to deal with the stresses of every day life.

However, many people simply ‘consume’ yoga: they take classes and go to workshops. There is nothing wrong with that. But when you want to go deeper the only real alternative is to become a teacher yourself.

Yoga has always been transmitted from Teacher to Student, but there is a time that the student herself must become a master. And there is no time like now to begin that process.

When we are caught up in our daily life, it becomes more difficult to listen to our intuition: That tiny voice inside our consciousness that knows right from wrong, and knows what we should do at every moment. The lower self, however, -what we also call ‘ego’-, is more present with us normally. It is always caught in the turmoil of what you like and what you don’t like, and it can bring us only fleeting satisfaction, but not lasting happiness.

The ego presents us with excuses to have it our way and reasons not to practice, or eat sugar and drink too much coffee. To become a yoga teacher is to become more able to lead yourself through these temptations of everyday life with your head held up high.

Here are ten reasons why really everyone who practices yoga, should ultimately become a teacher in it.

To take a class in yoga is relaxing, also because there is no discussion with your lower self about whether you can really hold that posture. You just do it and as a consequence are able to practice more intensely. By becoming a yoga teacher yourself you strengthen the relationship to your higher self, become more aware of your infinite potential and this will help you in your practice, both deepening it as well as making it more frequent (preferably daily!) As you learn to listen to the voice of the teacher of your higher self, your own inner ‘guru’ you will find that constant practice, which is all about a state of mind, becomes much easier.

Being a yoga teacher is all about being able to lead yourself! Life presents us with many challenges and the courage you bring to them defines you as a human being. A yoga teacher training will connect you with that higher self which is always victorious no matter what life throws at it. Living life to the fullest, with contentment and following your dreams becomes possible. Yoga will clear the path of distress and show you your true path in life, even when you are 'in the wilderness' i.e. when you feel confused, your practice will help you regain an understanding of what matters most.

Physical exercise followed by meditation will help you get a sense of what is important and what is not. Doing yoga and meditation in the early morning, practiced every day, will make you more conscious throughout the day. So you need to begin your own practice, and this is only really effectively possible by becoming a yoga teacher, as a mere student it is hard to bring up the stamina to sustain a daily practice. There are meditations that can space you out, to be sure, but there are also many meditations that we call ‘applied meditation’ (found especially in Kundalini Yoga) that will work actively on the hypothalamus and will give you a razor sharp sense of your priorities, making you a much more effective human being, no matter who you are.

Thankfulness is an essential ingredient of yoga practice. When we meditate on how blessed we are, life becomes easier. And there are so many things to be thankful for. When one engages in yoga, and especially when one teaches yoga, contentment is a constant benefit you will receive, because it gives a lasting satisfaction that cannot be thwarted.

When you have a good practice and teach others with that practice as a base, people will automatically start to trust you. You will become a reference for them in these times when so many seem lost; a lighthouse that others can use to navigate their lives. As a competent yoga teacher, you should not be surprised if many people flock to you for advice. Even for things that are not about yoga!

Taking charge of your health is important for everyone, and being healthy means taking the right amount of rest, water, air and food. Doing a yoga teacher training will present you with a coherent system of exercise food and meditations to boost and maintain your health that you cannot only use to teach others but will benefit you as well. Yoga Teacher training will teach you about the right foods and exercises to detoxify yourself so you can become the radiant beauty you are destined to be.

There are ‘soft’ types of yoga that will make you calm and flexible, but there are many forms of yoga, for example Kundalini and Ashtanga yoga that will help you build an 'invincible' body. In fact, the stated aim of many hatha yoga practices is to build a ‘diamond body’: a body that can withstand any pressure. Do not be fooled by those who say that yoga does not give you a real workout, because it does, and it does so in a much more complete way that many modern exercise programs. It will not only make the muscles stronger, but also the tissue between the muscles, which is not necessarily something that weightlifting can give you.

We have many habits that sustain us, and some that do not. Deepening yoga practice be doing a teacher training will give you the chance to work on yourself. And it will shed light on those bad habits. Anything that is in the light, and not right, will wither away. Even if your bad habits are ‘mental’ they will still be rooted somewhere in the physical system, the body. They cannot simply be solved by saying: ”I will not do X anymore.” They are lodged too deeply in us, in our body, and our subconscious. Yoga gives and alternative approach by recognizing that even the most mental of bad habits are rooted somewhere in the flesh, and will help you expel these bad habits from your body-mind system in an integral way. And you will find it easy. Buckminster Fuller, a famous inventor, once said: “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” To take up the constant practice that being a teacher requires, you are building this new model for yourself!

There is no job that gives more satisfaction than serving others to make them feel better! As a yoga teacher you will sometimes need to confront people, and say tough things to them. It is a seed that you plant so that they may grow, and ultimately feel inspired. When you show people how they can break out of their self-incurred limitations, they will be eternally grateful to you, even if they don’t like it much at first.

This is a bonus that is bestowed to yoga teachers of one discipline only: Kundalini Yoga. The energy that style of yoga brings is so strong (basically everything is focussed on bringing energy to the top of your head) that you have to wear something on your head to channel the energy. Any head-cover will do, but a turban had the added bonus of realigning the bones in your head and making you instantly recognizable as a yoga teacher. It also makes for an awesome fashion statement.