Interoception is the sense of the internal state of the body: your heartbeat, breath, hunger, temperature, muscular effort, tension, and pain. It sits alongside exteroception, our perception of the outside world, and proprioception, our sense of where the body is in space. Every person has a different level of interoceptive awareness, and the good news is, it is a trainable skill. A yoga class is one of the best environments there is for developing it. This episode defines interoception clearly, explains why it matters especially for students managing pain or injury, and gives you specific, usable strategies for building it into any of your classes.

• Why Interoception Matters
• Five Ways to Teach Interoception
• Questions for Teachers to Consider

1. How much time do I actually leave for students to notice anything?
2. Am I being specific about what to notice?
3. Does my language invite curiosity or evaluation?
4. Have I told students that not noticing much is okay?
5. And how confident do I feel when a student tells me what they noticed?

Your Scope of Practice

Yoga Journal article: Yoga Teachers, Here's How to Support Students With Injuries Without Giving Medical Advice

Teaching interoception often leads students to disclose more about what they are experiencing, which can raise questions about where a teacher's role ends. My article in Yoga Journal addresses this directly.

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When we were taught to cue a movement or a yoga asana, we were led to believe that every student could perform it with enough effort or practice. But sometimes a student cannot do what is being cued, not because of a lack of flexibility or effort, but because their skeletal anatomy does not allow for it. This episode busts three common anatomy myths that shape the way we cue, covering the knee, the ankle, and the hip, so that you can cue and visualize the various skeletal differentiations in mind rather than an idealized generic body type.

Listen as I cover:

• Alignment vs Anatomy
• Myth One: The Knee Being Only a Hinge Joint
• Myth Two: Ankle Positioning vs Ankle Range of Motion in Standing Poses
• Myth Three: Every Student's Hip Can Achieve the Same Range and Movement

When you teach as if everyone shares the same anatomy, it sets some students up to fail at something never possible for their skeleton. Understanding anatomy allows you to work with (and teach) the real bodies in front of you.

Related Episode

Ep 134: How A Student's Neutral Alignment Should Affect the Cues You Use

Coming Soon: Anatomy Refresh Mini Course

Across these anatomy-focused episodes, one thing keeps coming up: teachers are hungry for a real anatomy foundation that most trainings never provided. That's why I'm creating the Anatomy Refresh mini course, a low-cost, approachable way to strengthen your understanding of the structures that matter most in your teaching, so everything discussed on the podcast clicks into place, and you can cue with confidence. More details coming soon.

Free Resource

Sequencing for Students with Injuries

If you want help building classes that develop strength and functional capacity safely, especially for students with injuries or limitations, download the free Sequencing for Students with Injuries guide.

Click HERE to send me a text & let me know your thoughts on this episode!

Support the show

Let's connect:

• Check out my website: Enhanced Body
• Connect with me on Instagram & Threads @monicacbright
• Wanna work together? Book a Discovery Call
• YouTube: Yoga with Monica Bright
• Join my Newsletter for teachers below!

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There is a reason the social media challenge around sitting down and standing up from the floor without using your hands has caught on: the ability to get up and down from the floor is one of the most protective, trainable skills a person can maintain as they age. In this episode, I will cover the sobering statistics on falls among older adults, why falls so often become life-threatening, the research behind the sitting-rising test, and concrete, non-fear-based ways yoga teachers can weave this vital skill into classes for students of every age.

This is a personal story for me, as my mother and grandmother both suffered from the effects of falling. It initiated my curiosity and started my research on why falling can be so catastrophic and life-altering.

• Why Understanding This Matters
• The Research and the Sitting-Rising Test
• How to Talk About The Skill Without Inducing Fear
• Five Ways to Weave It Into Your Teaching

Free Resource

Sequencing for Students with Injuries

If you want help building classes that develop strength and functional capacity safely, especially for students with injuries or limitations, download the free Sequencing for Students with Injuries guide.

Journal Article:

Sitting-Rising Test Predicts Long-Term Mortality Risk

A 12-year study of over 4,000 adults found that poor performance on a basic sitting and rising test was strongly linked to increased risk of death from natural and cardiovascular causes.

Source: European Journal of Preventive Cardiology

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Support the show

Let's connect:

• Check out my website: Enhanced Body
• Connect with me on Instagram & Threads @monicacbright
• Wanna work together? Book a Discovery Call
• YouTube: Yoga with Monica Bright
• Join my Newsletter for teachers below!

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Become a supporter of the Essential Conversations for Yoga Teachers Podcast! Starting at $3/ month.

If you're a yoga teacher who wonders whether incorporating strength training, joint control work, myofascial release, or movements borrowed from other disciplines means you are no longer teaching yoga, then this episode helps to reframe that question entirely. Rather than asking whether other modalities are allowed, the question asks whether you can articulate the reasoning behind what you're including in your classes. When we think of yoga as a whole practice, we realize that it's much more than the asanas you teach.

This episode helps you realize the intention behind your teaching choices, which is a better way to determine whether it's still yoga that you're teaching.

• What's The Real Question?
• What Other Modalities Can Offer In Your Sequencing
• Purpose: What Is Yours?
• Remembering the Other Limbs of Yoga
• Going Forward: Questions to Ponder

Free Resource

Download the free Sequencing Made Easy guide, which will offer you a clear, practical framework for building classes that are accessible and well-structured so you can stop thinking you need to start from scratch every week.

Sequencing Made Easy

Click HERE to send me a text & let me know your thoughts on this episode!

Support the show

Let's connect:

• Check out my website: Enhanced Body
• Connect with me on Instagram & Threads @monicacbright
• Wanna work together? Book a Discovery Call
• YouTube: Yoga with Monica Bright
• Join my Newsletter for teachers below!

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Become a supporter of the Essential Conversations for Yoga Teachers Podcast! Starting at $3/ month.

Teaching students to keep their hips square is one of the most consistently taught cues in yoga twists, but the anatomy behind it is more nuanced than what we were initially taught. This episode breaks down where spinal rotation actually comes from, what changes mechanically when the pelvis is allowed to move versus held still, why allowing pelvic movement can actually increase total spinal rotation rather than reduce it, and how to decide which version serves your students in any given pose. The answer is not about the position. Instead, it's about the purpose behind it.

• Where Spinal Rotation Actually Originates
• What Happens Anatomically When the Pelvis Moves
• When Squaring the Hips Does Serve a Purpose
• Why This Matters for Specific Student Bodies
• Poses Where Pelvic Movement Works Well
• Takeaways for Your Next Class

Free Resource

Download the free Sequencing Made Easy guide, which will offer you a clear, practical framework for building classes that are accessible and well-structured so you can stop thinking you need to start from scratch every week.

Sequencing Made Easy

Click HERE to send me a text & let me know your thoughts on this episode!

Support the show

Let's connect:

• Check out my website: Enhanced Body
• Connect with me on Instagram & Threads @monicacbright
• Wanna work together? Book a Discovery Call
• YouTube: Yoga with Monica Bright
• Join my Newsletter for teachers below!

Want me to discuss a topic? Click HERE to submit it!

Become a supporter of the Essential Conversations for Yoga Teachers Podcast! Starting at $3/ month.

As yoga teachers, we inherit most of our classroom language the same way we inherit our cueing language: from other teachers, from studio culture, from a vocabulary that has been circulating the yoga world for decades. Much of it is well-intentioned and lands exactly as we intend it to. However, some of it does not.

This episode looks at how language we use around bodies, effort, and emotional release can affect students in ways we never planned, why yoga classes in particular amplify the impact of language, and what practical shifts any teacher can make starting immediately. We'll discuss how to evolve the language we use from a lens of curiosity.

Topics include:

• Why Language Is Received Differently in a Yoga Class
• Your Language and Students' Body Image
• Trauma-Informed Teaching in Practice
• How Students Receive the Practice
• Three Practical Shifts to Use In Your Next Class

Related Episodes

Ep 137: Yoga Cues That Need Updating and Why
Ep 132: Savasana: Everything You Need to Know

Free Resources

10 Questions to Ask Injured Students
Sequencing for Students with Injuries

Click HERE to send me a text & let me know your thoughts on this episode!

Support the show

Let's connect:

• Check out my website: Enhanced Body
• Connect with me on Instagram & Threads @monicacbright
• Wanna work together? Book a Discovery Call
• YouTube: Yoga with Monica Bright
• Join my Newsletter for teachers below!

Want me to discuss a topic? Click HERE to submit it!

Become a supporter of the Essential Conversations for Yoga Teachers Podcast! Starting at $3/ month.

Many of the cues yoga teachers use with students were built around helping students maneuver their bodies into what we think a pose is supposed to look like rather than what their bodies actually need to do. This episode examines three of the most widely used cues in yoga, breaks down what the anatomy tells us about each one, explains why individual body proportions make some of these instructions impossible for certain students to follow, and offers specific alternative language teachers can use instead.

We'll cover:

• Why These Cues Exist
• "Navel to Spine" and What Actually Creates Core Stability
• "Flare the Ribs" and How We Should Teach Backbends Based On Spinal Movement
• "Stack Your Ankle Under Your Knee" and Students' Individual Bone Proportions
• How To Evaluate The Cues You Use Going Forward

Book a Strategy Call

Monica facilitates anatomy trainings for yoga teachers and mentors teachers who want to build a practice grounded in real anatomical understanding. Book a strategy call to talk about what deeper anatomy education could look like for you.

Free Resources

10 Questions to Ask Injured Students
Sequencing for Students with Injuries

Click HERE to send me a text & let me know your thoughts on this episode!

Support the show

Let's connect:

• Check out my website: Enhanced Body
• Connect with me on Instagram & Threads @monicacbright
• Wanna work together? Book a Discovery Call
• YouTube: Yoga with Monica Bright
• Join my Newsletter for teachers below!

Want me to discuss a topic? Click HERE to submit it!

Become a supporter of the Essential Conversations for Yoga Teachers Podcast! Starting at $3/ month.

Most yoga teachers graduate from their 200-hour training with a solid foundation in philosophy, history, sequencing, and anatomy, and almost no preparation for the injured, painful, complex students who are in their classes every day. This episode examines the specific gaps in how teacher trainings currently approach injury education, what those gaps cost teachers, and three foundational changes that would make a meaningful difference without requiring yoga teacher trainings to overhaul their entire curriculum.

I'll cover the following problems that need to be addressed:

• The Way Anatomy Is Taught
• Why Current Practice Teaching Doesn't Prepare Teachers
• The Amount Of Classes Trainees Take & What Happens In Those Classes
• Why Props and Modifications Aren't Always The Solution
• Three Things Trainings Could Do Differently
• How Continuing Education Helps

Book a Strategy Call

Monica facilitates anatomy trainings for yoga teachers and mentors teachers who want to build a practice grounded in real anatomical understanding. Book a strategy call to talk about what deeper anatomy education could look like for you.

Click HERE to send me a text & let me know your thoughts on this episode!

Support the show

Let's connect:

• Check out my website: Enhanced Body
• Connect with me on Instagram & Threads @monicacbright
• Wanna work together? Book a Discovery Call
• YouTube: Yoga with Monica Bright
• Join my Newsletter for teachers below!

Want me to discuss a topic? Click HERE to submit it!

Become a supporter of the Essential Conversations for Yoga Teachers Podcast! Starting at $3/ month.