How to Sound Like a Yogi

Image courtesy of chrissylovesyoga.com

So…yoga’s pretty popular.

Yoga can be really great for you. It can help you develop better flexibility and ease up some pains. It can help you feel calmer and give you an outlet for anxiety. It can help you make friends and meet a new community of people.

What it won’t do is stop you from sounding like a douchebag. In fact, for all the great, normal-sounding yoga teachers out there…there are inevitably whisper-y, Sanskrit-spouting pseudo-therapists out to make your mind melt. In a bad way. If you’d like to sound more like one of these “yogis”*, here is a comprehensive guide so that you can begin gather your cultish followers in just a few short days!

*Not to be confused with any people from Western Asia who practice a specific brand of spirituality that rich Americans seem to like inviting to parties to prove they’re cool and cultural.

1. Refine your “yoga voice”

Let’s begin with intonation. Every word you say needs to be drawn out by about 30 milliseconds more than normal. You aren’t telling people to “relax into the pose”. You are telling them to “reeeelaaaaaax iiiiinto the pooooooose”. Secondly, it’s crucial to get throaty and soft. Imagine you’re speaking through a wad of cotton at the back of your throat, push it up into your nose for just the slightest nasal quality and make sure you breathe out at the end of every sentence.

2. Speak in Sanskrit

Image courtesy of www.indiatimes.com

If you weren’t aware, all those names for poses that sound like tasty noodle dishes are in Sanskrit, which is an ancient language that originated in India. Don’t let that stop you from using it randomly while speaking if you’re white. It certainly hasn’t stopped anyone else. Go ahead and say the word “cat-cow” interchangeably with “chakravakasana” even though most linguists consider Sanskrit a more or less dead language. Just make sure you’re only using a few words that you’ve memorized to make yourself sound cooler and don’t go to the effort of actually learning a new language.

3. Talk about chakras, auras, consciousness, etc

Courtesy of in5d.com

There are some number of chakras in your body. Your body also exudes any amount of colors through your aura. Additionally, you can tap into or have more than one consciousness. It doesn’t really matter. As long as people are aligning them a lot with either each other or various body parts, you’re good to go, i.e. “align your 5th chakra with your heart aura” or “tap into the consciousness of your knees and align them with your most spiritual aura”. Your students will struggle so hard to understand what you mean that they’ll feel like they’re doing it. And if they don’t feel like they’re doing it, just tell them to try harder.

4. Ask a lot of reflective questions…slowly

Courtesy of elephantjournal.com

“How does that feel?” “Can you go deeper?” “Is your heart forward physically and emotionally?” “Where can we take today’s practice?” “What are you bringing to your mat today?” “Can we all find a place to settle into?” “How does your mind react to this?” “How does your soul react to this?” These are not questions that require an answer, from you or anyone else in the room. They’re meant to inspire. They’re meant to confuse. They’re meant to keep all the focus on your beautifully breathy voice and cool Lululemon yoga pants. Or that line by Kate Hudson, whatever. Either way, your pants should be the loudest thing in that goddamn yoga shala.

5. Don’t say anything at all

Image courtesy of yogtemple.com

Is everyone sitting down? Great. Sit down too, pull your legs into position (“lotus” or “crisscross applesauce” for the rest of us). Now be silent. For a really long time. Long enough that you start feeling uncomfortable and then 5 more minutes. Imprint the gravitas of this stretchy balance game on your hapless, doe-eyed students. You’re meditating, to them at least. Doesn’t matter if your eyes are closed or open. If they’re closed, pretend you are a coma patient that can still hear everything. If they’re open, focus on a spot at the far wall above the tallest person’s head as if your eyes are fucking laser beams ala Cyclops from the X-Men, also known as the lamest X-Man. Then when it sounds like somebody’s about to leave, say “let’s begin with a gentle opening stretch”.

So there it is, everything you need to know to sound like one of the many, many stock images of small white women who came up when I did a search for “yoga teachers”. Use your power for good.