Yoga is a Hammer

When I teach the anatomy sections of yoga teacher trainings, I ask the teachers-to-be to brainstorm a list of all of the things you could do with a hammer.

Nail! 
Break ice! 
Play croquet!
Make art!
Break a window!

You get the picture?

Then I tell them why.

Approximately 1,000 years ago (or 2012, whichever comes first) I heard iconic teacher David Swenson say “Yoga is a Hammer” in response to a panel discussion about the article “How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body.”

(I’m sure you can google it).

This teaching had a profound impact on me personally, and on my teaching of yoga and teaching of yoga teachers simultaneously.

My interpretation of this teaching, “yoga is a hammer” is that yoga is just a tool. You can use it to build your body or to break it down. Teaching yoga to a room of students is similar to teaching hammer skills to a room full of construction students. You are handing a hammer to each one, and trusting them to do the right thing, to follow your instructions, and to ask for help if they don’t understand you.

Your student might be in class to repair their body. Quiet their mind. Cultivate a tight ass.

Or they might be there to beat themselves with a hammer.

(I have done this).

I have used yoga as a hammer in so many ways, including to beat myself up about why I can’t do something, why I don’t look a certain way. I have attempted to force, I have worked in anger. I have also used it to rebuild my confidence, to re-train posture, and to bond with my fellows and friends.

People will tell you that yoga can damage your body, but for some reason we give them a lot more social media attention than we give to people who post that you could get into a bicycle accident, or hurt yourself skiing, or miscalculating your step off of a moving walkway. Of course yoga can hurt a body. Repetitive movement can hurt a body. Overconfidence can hurt a body.

Life can hurt a body.

Does that mean you should not live?

May I encourage you not to concern yourself with all of the bizarre, freak ways in which yoga could damage a body, and instead to concern yourself greatly with the ways in which you can teach discernment, self-awareness, and autonomy? These things will support your students when they play basketball on the weekends, balance their checkbooks, and discipline their children in addition to supporting their bodies in the practice of yoga.

Bodies want to be healthy. They want to heal. It is in their nature to do so.

Teach your students to practice yoga like a turtle with a hammer. Slow and steady. Build up to physically challenging moves. Laugh at people who suggest you put your foot behind your head as a method of reaching enlightenment. Move slowly in the direction you’d like to go rather than forcing your body into pushups and handstands. If they are fun, if you are nimble and young and full of joy for being upside down, then sally forth. Slowly. Like a turtle.

When you see or overhear a conversation about this idea that yoga will wreck your body, offer a one-sentence, succinct and true answer, and move on.

Here is mine:
“Yoga is a hammer, I am a carpenter, and you can be, too.”

(Use your powers for good).

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