HOW TO CUE YOGA POSES: What Goes Where

Transcript

if you are a yoga teacher and you've struggled with finding good cues for your students great now step your right no left left right i'm dr davis and i'm going to teach you a simpler way to cue also if you want to know more about queuing if you like this video this is an experiment so please comment below and tell me that you want to see more videos on cueing for anatomy and alignment now today i'm going to teach you how to keep it simple we're going to follow one simple rule before you do anything else with cueing just you need the basics you need to be able to tell people what goes where that's it what goes where let's check it out first you don't want to be queuing like this inhale expand your radiate heart through your fingertips as you reach to the gods and exhale bowing the heart towards the center of the earth where the molten lava creates the power of the radiant and downward facing dog whoa how the hell did we just get to downward facing dog and what was i supposed to do in between those steps and what the hell is this about a radiant molten lava center of the earth look there's a time for poetic cueing and sometimes i like it but the point is if you can't even tell people what to do and how to follow you along as you move through a yoga flow where to put their feet where to reach how to even get into the pose then you haven't told them how to do the class anything extra is a cherry on top that's totally cool but if you can't get them to step their right foot forward reach their hands overhead take their hands to the floor step back etc then you haven't guided them through the class and people are just going to be pissed off and confused so here's the same basic sequence in a much simpler way exhale step forward inhale reach up exhale hands to the floor step back and hips to the sky so that was really simple i told them what goes where the other thing you might notice is that i'm using three word cues most of the time inhale reach up exhale step forward etc this is going to be especially important if you are cueing a vinyasa because then they know where to breathe in or out and then what to do with what part of their body in order to get them into the pose so let's check out a basic sun salutation i'm going to do my best to do three word cues and again pay attention i'm saying what goes where that's it that's what you need to know in order to actually move through the sequence of poses let's check it out inhale reach up exhale fold forward inhale half lift exhale plant your hands step back lower halfway down inhale heart lifts exhale hips to the sky downward facing dog inhale reach the right leg up exhale step forward inhale reach up exhale plant your hands step back chaturanga inhale heart lifts exhale hips back downward facing dog left leg up inhale exhale step forward inhale reach up exhale chaturanga inhale up dog exhale down dog inhale step forward and half lift exhale fold forward inhale reach up exhale hands to your side super simple no frills but it gets you through the poses the reason i'm emphasizing this first is not because there aren't other great ways to cue but because if you cannot get somebody to actually find some semblance of the pose that you're uh that you have in mind for the class then they're lost they're confused and if they're lost and confused they're definitely not in the state of yoga they're not in a meditative state in fact they might be in the opposite they might be in a state of anxiety and panic and if you're trying to teach a yoga class do you want your students to feel anxiety and panic or do you want them to feel like confident that they know at least what they're basically trying to do now let's check out a couple of other q examples by the way if you have examples of bad or confusing yoga cues please comment below i'd love to see what you think has been a bad cue and i'd love to see alternatives please comment so here's a bad yoga cue let's say we're in downward facing dog and the teacher says something along the lines of now inhale into the root chakra and blossom the sitting bones what the hell is a root chakra and how do i blossom my sitting bone but your sitting bones are fused via two joint sets and cannot move you cannot blossom your sitting bones here's an alternative cue that's simple and makes sense so again let's say we're in downward facing dog all i can say is lift your hips higher into the air or how about press your booty to the sky or how about another one imagine that your booty is a helium balloon and it's gonna float away okay some of these are silly and ridiculous but the point is that if you say simple and tangible things that people can actually picture like push your hips higher okay i can achieve that external goal or here's another one we're in a lunge we're reaching overhead and the teacher says something along the lines of now spin the head of the humerus externally as you press the scapula towards the ribs and lift the acromions to free and liberate your supraspinatus tendon well okay technically that was actually a good anatomical cue if you understood it but nobody's gonna understand that so here's a simpler version no no really guys like this is so easy watch no like really you're not gonna believe it okay here we are we're in a lunge we're getting set up for this really amazing anatomical cue here it is wait for it wait for it wait for it okay here it is ready reach up that that that's it it's just it's just it just reach up that was that was enough so yes of course we can add some variety and some spice into our queuing later on but if you can't just tell people how to reach up then you and your students are going to have a really bad time so if there are questions that you have about cueing or sequencing if you want to see more videos like this please comment below and tell you tell me what you want to see and i'll make it until then motion is lotion so move your body every day i'll see you in another video