How can you demonstrate your expertise to your students and your colleagues?

Are you an up-and-coming yoga therapist? Graduating from a yoga therapist training program can be both exciting and a bit frightening; it inevitably poses a question: What’s next? Where are you planning to apply your new knowledge? Do you plan to set up your own private yoga therapy practice, join a wellness center with other alternative health care practitioners, or find your way into the clinical setting with licensed medical professionals? Whichever option you choose, your students and colleagues will expect you to speak their language and demonstrate your expertise. You know what you know; how can you show it to others? 

Your students will mainly gain confidence in your knowledge and your skills if you take an interest in what they are going through and if the practices you choose for them help them feel better. Both of these factors depend on your ability to actively listen to your client, observe your student’s responses to various practices, and draw conclusions about the effectiveness and applicability of the chosen techniques. To make better choices, it helps to keep written records of what was said and done during your yoga therapy sessions so that you can remember it better. Regular record-keeping also allows you to reflect, analyze, and process your work, which is invaluable for refining your skills as a yoga therapist. In addition, you can demonstrate your professionalism by keeping your practice organized and running smoothly, by giving your students home practice sequences with your name and logo, by sending them easy-to-fill-out forms, and by sharing professional-looking educational handouts about the benefits of yoga for different layers of the body. 

You can demonstrate your professionalism to your colleagues by speaking their professional language and following similar standards for running your practice. This means getting your ducks in a row in terms of your business organization, having all the forms you need to have,  following the best practices in client observation, assessment, and goal setting, and keeping clear, consistent records of your sessions in SOAP format that is common in the healthcare field. 

All that might seem like a lot, but often, all it takes is choosing the right tools to help you set up a system that continues to work over time. Join me for Up-and-Coming Yoga Therapists Sangha hosted by the IAYT’s Membership Coordinator Kelly Froio to discuss different aspects of becoming a professional yoga therapist and the tools you can use to streamline your practice and make your life a bit easier. In this virtual event, we will discuss different ways to show our expertise and professionalism to our students and our colleagues in various settings. We will also cover how we can use consistent record-keeping to get organized, improve confidence, and refine our professional skills as yoga therapists.

Join us on Wednesday, November 29, at 4 pm ET / 1 pm PT

REGISTER FOR THE EVENT >

This event is open to IAYT members only. If you had considered joining the International Association of Yoga Therapists but haven’t yet taken the plunge, now might be a good time! Use code SEQWIZ for $10 off your first year of individual membership (valid for new members only; not applicable for membership renewal of existing members. Promo code expires 12/31/2023.)  Joint IAYT > 

Hope to see you at the event!