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How a non-certified yoga teacher with no guru ended up teaching (and should she be?)
June 11, 2010 By 13 Comments
About Kara-Leah GrantKL's the founder and Editor-in-Chief of The Yoga Lunchbox, mother to a toddler and passionate about both writing and yoga. She lives in Wellington, teaches yoga and is excited about heading make into the workplace. She also loves to cook while blasting dance music and reliving her go go dancing days.
Thank you for your beautiful & courageous reflections KL. I admire your openness and honesty. I also like your descriptions of letting the asanas reveal themselves to us. That’s increasingly my experience too. I feel it very strongly where I am at the moment (in Mysore, India). I’ve also been understanding more of the benefits of having a regular systematic practice (in my case ashtanga vinyasa). The outer constraints enable inner freedom to flourish and I’m now realising all sorts of stuff that I’ve been learning without knowing it. Whatever practice works for people is all good though!
I’ve also been realising the importance of having a practice that enables a gradual dismantling of the defensive ego, so that we do not lose our psyche. You’re very lucky to have come back from that episode (and it probably also shows your strength of spirit). I’m glad you did!
Hi Kara-Leah, I just wanted to let you know how amazed and inspired I am by your latest column…I was blown away by your story, your honesty. I haven’t really heard “drugs” as a topic being mentioned in any yoga context, and I found what you had to say very thought provoking.I stopped drinking 15 weeks ago today, which I am sure is related to my practice-the next one to go: opiates.
I have recently increased my classes to 3 times a week, and am loving it.I also love reading the interviews from the lunchbox, they help me to learn more.
Thanx, Gisele
This is a question I battle, too — as I list teachers on my site, I’m trying to figure out what the credentials for being listed are. Can anyone call themselves a yoga teacher? Do we pretend that a 200-hr certification does the job? Some of the most well-known teachers have never been certified. So it’s definitely a gray area. Your sense of responsibility to your students, and your long-term commitment to self-study and home practice, is what I would hope to see in anyone calling themselves a yoga teacher. If we had those kind of stats on everyone, the certifications would be much less relevant, IMHO.
We’re all where we should be, if we weren’t then we wouldn’t be
Hey Nick,
Wow – how’s Mysore treating you? You summed up so much when you said:
“it’s important to have a practice that enables a gradual dismantling of the defensive ego, so that we do not lose our psyche.”
Yoga is indeed a very powerful practice, and needs to be approached with respect.. something I was so unaware of. A systematic practice provide me with much needed consistency as you say, and I do also enjoy the freedom to work with what every arises on the mat, understanding as I do now that it’s oh too easy to get the ego confused with true guidance.
Hey Gisele,
I really appreciate your comment because I have been considering writing more about yoga, drugs, addiction and consciousness as it is something I have experienced first hand. Your comment reminds me that other people have likely experienced similar things could perhaps benefit from hearing these stories.
Keep practicing, and enjoy your journey.
Hey Erica,
I can understand your dilemma for sure! I guess the reason they introduced 200-hr certification was to give us an easy way to know whether or not someone was qualified to be a yoga teacher… but it’s only part of the story really.
Hey Emma,
Ha! So very true.
Thanks everyone for your comments – really appreciating hearing everyone’s different response.
Blessings,
KL
Yeah, lets talk about drugs. I got some goodies to share on that topic too.
Hey Roger,
Ok, watch out for a post coming soon and drugs and the spiritual journey… I look forward to hearing about your experiences and resulting insights
Blessings,
KL
I really loved your honesty. I have though about the questions you have posed too…what makes a yoga teacher? I have met teachers who quote their years of practice, qualifications and put ‘director’ under their name.. I feel that to be a ‘true’ teacher you need to feel the essence…feel the connection within yourself, with others, within the world. Sometimes I feel the yoga teachers who continually want more qualifications, are themselves, trying to find that very connection…more qualifications will not do it. It is about the finding yourself and finding your way. If being a yoga teacher is about walking the walk….you are one of the most real yoga teachers I have read about. Thank you
Hey Bron,
You bring up a really good point – what is it that makes us seek out outside affirmation?
It’s something my partner Luke asked me in the weeks leading up to my teacher training with Shiva Rea – he reckoned I didn’t need it. And in many ways he was right – I didn’t need it. But I wanted it. I wanted to turbocharge my practice my being exposed to a teacher with a deep wealth of knowledge, and I wanted to make all those connections with other students/teachers.
The certification was an aside really, and I don’t even know if I’ll have enough hours to get it after being delayed because of visa issues.
Look forward to meeting up with you in person again – I remember you from that Swami Shantimurti workshop in Queenstown a few years back now…
Many blessings,
KL
kara-leah, i was bouncing around to see what last bit of “whatever” i came across before shutting down my online search & find on yoga, fitness, anatomy, “whatever”
tomorrow morning i start a long series of even-longer days and long-enough drives for training with lex gillan in houston
i’m gonna miss seeing what’s new on yoga lunch box, magazine of yoga, yogadork, and others (like liveloveyoga, daily bandha, etc) (for the time being) – but i’m starting to get twitchy itchin’ to see what will become of me
your post, here, over 1/2 a year ago, not only still resonates, but resonates right now, with me; clearly there’s a continuity to your honest approach, your search, to “you”
so many issues is this past post too! credentialing, spiritual heritage knowledge, authenticity, geez
autheticity – well, you got it
credentialing – like an inspection sticker for a car, meets minimum standards; question then is does a student want this teacher? can that teacher hold students? then evolve from that
spiritual heritage knowledge – know or decide where, in this point in time (what else can i do?) one places one’s principle core spiritual base: hegelian spirals? western notions of freedom and society? 5000 yr old texts? mayan ruins? 500 year old asanas? 200 year old? 200 year old science? post industrial capitalism? american indian sun gods? chinese meridians? early roman christianity? or even: not sure, yet?
i believe, that current core, then informs how the other types of spiritual heritage, if any, are “valid” or need “knowing” beyond a certain point -
but, and big but for me
is to not only recognize that, but openly state that, to anyone it matters or should know: students, friends, family, etc
ie, i may not know something the same way someone 5000 or 2000 or 200 years ago experienced or knew something i’m interested in, and may want to teach, but i’ll say so
and if i know my base, where i’m “coming from” i’ll say that too
for me, at this point in time, i grind away from an intuitively felt spiritual base, partially formed by my early catholic upbring, modified by readings studies and experiences dating from the late 60′s in philosophy, starting a family at 18, and held up to a recently expanding swell of new knowledge regarding fitness, grounded in current knowledge in anatomy, movement, exercise science, and more
my spiritual base is from a sense of “we’re individuals in one-ness”
my physical base is from current contemporary science, at the point i currently have “learned-to”
so
i sometimes struggle to accept people who individually “fit” in our one-ness in a different “space” than i am used to 
and, I don’t accept poses or postures or movements, regardless of lineage (ancient india, hispanic salsa, even sit-ups) that don’t “mesh” with safe and effective science for each of our bodies as i am continually learning about them
in essence, i will attempt no harm, conscientiously, mindfully, as fully as i am able, by applying those two guideposts, my two evolving revealing processes of finding-out
lot of words, but the confluence of your honesty, and my impending immersion, met, and here i am
thanks so much kara-leah
Wow Adan,
You pack so much into this comment! Which I reckon we could boil down to just one thing – what is Truth. Our truth. What is true for us in this moment. What do we need from yoga right now to open up and shine brightly.
Enjoy your training, may it be blessed with wisdom, and no doubt I’ll see you on the site when you get back!
Blessings,
KL
Hi Kara-Leah,
I googled “how to teach yoga uncertified” and I came across your blog. I’m book marking it!
I really loved this blog. I’m glad I found you. You’re inspiring. I’m a yoga teacher in Los Angeles and I write a blog as well, it’s called “Regarding Everything”…regarding the body, mind, spirit and the journey through this so-called, funny thing called life. http://www.amregardingeverything.com
Feel free to visit my page and be in touch.
Sat Nam.
Anne-Marie Pauley
Hey Anne-Marie,
It’s always fascinating to find out how people discovered this website. Went and checked out your website and ended up listening to your music on ITunes… up so song 3 and loving it.
Thanks for stopping by!
KL