How Yoga made me a better leader - 5 tips for you to use
I completed my 200 Hour Yoga Teacher training in 2020 and one of the greatest benefits for me, was not just the physical practice, but the principles I can use daily. Which I have then taken into my Marcomms leadership roles. I know my teams have benefited from them and I believe they have helped me so much that I wanted to share them with you:
Leave the Ego at the door.
Day one of yoga teacher training my course instructor said to all of us “I don’t care what you do for a job, I don’t want to know your title”, this made me squirm to begin with. It was only over time did I realise that my identity was wrapped up in my “head of” role and often my ego would be driving my actions. What yoga taught me was to untangle myself from my day job and not let it define me. When it comes to the ego I self check daily- are you making this decision, sharing this advice, feeding back on something because it’s helpful or because of your ego? It’s a real game changer in the work place.
2. Breathing techniques, known as Prānāyāma.
In Sanskrit, “Prana” means life energy and “Yama” means control.
Breathing and most importantly, breathing well, is vital to our health. James Nestor dedicated a whole book to the science behind breathing and his research found how most of us are’t doing it properly.
I use Pranayama daily, not just in yoga. It’s great for stress, research shows that a longer exhale (think inhale for a count of 4 and exhale for 6) will calm down the nervous system, taking us from flight or flight into rest and digest. Try this a handful of times in a stressful situation to see what happens to you and your body.
To help focus the mind I often use Box Breathing or Bhramari.
3. Self Study - Svadhyaya.
Being self aware and going deeper with my own self study has benefited myself and my teams. Understanding my strengths, weaknesses, values and being transparent about them means I can bring the best version of myself to my work. Making decisions based on my values means I don’t feel so out of alignment.
Tips:
To help understand what your core values are: using worksheets from the likes of Brené Brown.
If signing up to a course would be too much to add to your plate at the moment, think about things like Blinkist, Masterclass or How to Academy for bitesize learning.
4. Leading with Empathy
During teacher training you are taught the poses, how to get students into them and any adjustments they might have. But most importantly, you are told to teach the room, not to reel of cues from memory. I’m always trying to sense how people are feeling, how their energy is and what they need from me that day - sometimes it’s to go deeper in Pidgeon pose, sometimes it’s to be left alone.
For my team and my colleagues it’s approaching work in the same way - one of understanding, compassion and being able to empathise.
What that looks like:
Pre Covid a member of my team said she used to get Sunday night worries, so she never slept well and on Monday found it hard to function. We agreed she’d work from home on a Monday, ease herself in and we found a NABs course for her to go on around sleeping tips and improving overall wellbeing.
I dedicated a whole away day for the Managers in my team to go on called “Unlocking your potential” which was a leadership course I built with wellness at the core. I wanted to make sure my Managers were taking care of themselves with boundary setting and influencing frameworks so they were set up for success, not failure.
5. Learn by doing
My course taught me more about my imposter syndrome. Mine is quite specific to Yoga, in that I felt like if I didn’t have the right course, hours of training or credentials then I couldn’t possibly do something. So technically, you do need 200 Hours to be a qualified teacher yes. But for specalisms, like Yin, I decided I needed to do another 50 Hours of Yin training before I taught that specific class type. However, some teachers go straight into teaching it without the additional training. There is no right or wrong here, just that it highlighted for me, I needed that course to justify to myself that I was ready to offer that as a class option. Does that make me a better Yin teacher, no.
What does that look like in the workplace? I always say to my team and someone I mentored very recently, don’t think that you become a leader or a great manager after going on a leadership course. Yes some give you great tools, but in my experience, they didn’t set me up to be the best leader I could possibly be - perhaps I didn’t go on brilliant courses… I learnt the most by doing and showing up.
The best leaders for me have been ones which are empathetic, supportive and don’t lead with the ego.
