5 Ways Yoga Teachers Can Support Students During the Holidays

When I was a young medical doctor, I would often roster myself to work in the ER over Christmas, allowing colleagues who celebrated the holiday to be with their families. We were prepared for a very busy time in the emergency room, and one of the most common symptoms we treated was depression, with its underlying sense of alienation and loneliness.

For all of us, the holiday season exerts pressures at some level. It can be one of the least peaceful times of the year. Holiday shopping, visiting with family, the hassles of planning and traveling, managing food and alcohol consumption, getting enough exercise, and maintaining our yoga routines can all be overwhelming.

As yoga teachers, this is an ideal time to encourage our students to apply what they have learned in class. We can tell our students that managing the holiday season is their opportunity to practice all they have learned and embodied over the year.

1. Begin Class With a Guided Meditation

There are a number of ways we can teach students to maintain a calm center during the storm of the holidays. The first thing to do is to dedicate some quiet class time for contemplation and meditation. Allow students to find a comfortable, seated position. Once they have settled in, ask them to contemplate what a particular holiday means to them. As they develop a sense of meaning, suggest that they focus on disentangling commercial pressures from the essence of the holidays.

You may try prompting them with questions like:

• In what ways do you wish to connect with yourself and others this holiday season?
• What will best support you and others in sharing meaningful experiences?
• How can you release any external pressure and focus on what really matters?

2. Teach Breathwork Techniques to Handle Stress

Stress is the biggest issue for most students during the holidays.

During meditation, ask your students to visualize one stressful situation and how they would normally deal with it. Ask them:

• What would it feel like to acknowledge stress without holding on to it?
• Can you trust your own intuition and creativity to help you solve any problem?
• How would it feel to ground yourself into consciousness, calmness, and focus—and then deal with that situation?

You may then choose to guide them in Alternate-Nostril Breathing (Nadi Shodhana Pranayama), Conqueror Breath (Ujjayi Pranayama), or Channel-Cleaning Breath (Nadi Shodhana Pranayama). Remind students that yoga is more than technique; it is a way of being. Breath is the best tool we have to remain present; any time is a good time to practice moving and breathing more slowly and intentionally.

3. Inspire Your Students to Make Time for Yoga

One thing that students really need to contemplate is how easy or difficult it will be for them to maintain some kind of yoga practice or discipline during the holidays. This could be something that is opened up for general class discussion, since peer support is extremely valuable.

Schedules often break down during the holidays, so we need to become much more creative in how we apply yoga in our lives. We can be prepared to take opportunities that present themselves to apply a technique in appropriate ways. For example, we could:

• Stretch at the airport while waiting for a plane.
• Practice breath awareness while we contemplate an object we wish to purchase.
• Use some standing postures to relieve tensions while we are in the check-out line at the supermarket, bank, or post office.

At the same time, we need to remember how important it is to create time to calm and ground ourselves between events. During class discussion, ask your students to consider what an appropriate routine would be for them during this period. When can they schedule a five- to ten-minute yoga or meditation break?

Asana, Pranayama, and meditation practice are not ends in themselves, but means to an end. That end is to develop a greater inner resilience and a more stable mind that can handle the difficulties of life with greater calm and poise.

4. Be Realistic and Supportive

As yoga teachers, we want to encourage our students to be the best versions of themselves—but we also need to remind our students that the goal isn’t to be perfect. In fact, perfection doesn’t exist. That’s why we call it a yoga practice.

It may be helpful to remind your students—especially during the holiday season—that it’s often a good thing to let go of our routines without guilt, and to notice what happens when we do so. We can practice a different type of yoga, perhaps the Yoga of Remaining Calm and Aware. Then when we do come back to our usual yoga practice, we bring a greater depth of experience and wisdom with us. We can get back into formal practice with renewed enthusiasm and a clearer direction of what we want to work toward in the new year.

5. Offer Tips for Practicing Higher Yoga

If students wish to practice some form of higher yoga to nourish their spirit during the holiday season, they should focus on how they can support others less fortunate than themselves. It is an excellent time to practice selfless service and giving. It is a time when we can learn from and support others, especially those going through difficult times.

Here are a few tips you might offer your students for practicing higher yoga:

1. Honor yourself, your relations, and the planet by choosing a noble and virtuous intention for the New Year, such as practicing nonviolence (ahisma) toward yourself and others.
2. Follow your own heart. Learn to listen to yourself—your own higher intuitive inner voice—through meditation practice.
3. Practice contentment (santosha). Contemplate how much you already have and what you really need. Cultivate gratitude for all the things you have.
4. Bring consciousness into the moment. For example, before eating, be aware of what you are going to eat and perhaps say a simple prayer or thanks. Prepare to really enjoy what you are about to eat, to take it deep into your tissues so as to fully nourish yourself.
5. Be flexible in body, mind, and spirit. Learn not be constrained by plans but to go more with the flow.

About Our Contributor

Dr. Swami Shankardev is a yogacharya, medical doctor, psychotherapist, author, and lecturer. He lived and studied with his guru, Swami Satyananda, for ten years in India (1974-1985). He lectures all over the world.