Please use this forum to ask any questions you may have about yoga in general or Yin Yoga in particular, or to discuss anything you have discovered that may be of general interest. Note, spam will be removed and the user deleted, and this includes putting website in your posting that are purely commercial.
Aside from the obvious appeal of the Yin model - a big attractor for me is the nature of the teacher/student relationship. After many years coaching based on a client centric model, I found yoga classes to be more expert centric. Using the Transactional Analysis framework (1) - I have always argued that we help people develop using an Adult to Adult style. But after three years of yoga classes they have often ‘felt' more Adult/Child based.
Hearing Paul and Bernie respond to questions by helping the owner consider what is good for them was a revelation and and big factor in my investment in Yin.
So my questions are ...
(a) I wonder to what extent other people have been attracted by this Adult/Adult based relationship between guide and learner?
(b) How do teachers find putting a client centric approach into practice when you have a room full of people and a restricted time frame?
(c) How do teachers deal with clients who actually want a Child\Parent relationship and want the teacher to ‘Fix them and impart all their wisdom in a 60 minute class!!'.
Hey Mick. I am glad that you are planning to come and spend a week with us, because we spend a fair bit of time on these exact points (although we won't use the terms from TA. I have studied TA, and agree with the basic philosophy but I don't put it terms of Adult/Child.) There is definitely still a lot of Guru/Shishya (teacher/student) in the yoga world today, but I think it is slowly changing.
I see my role as "teaching the student how to fly her own airplane" rather than trying to fly it for her. I refuse to take on the parent or doctor role. A therapist has to be more directive, but I am not a therapist and don't want to be fulfill that role for students. I am an instructor and the best thing I can do is teach the student to be her own teacher.
