How to find your voice and turn your practitioners into fans
A guest article by Andine Pfrepper
Put a finger between your front teeth. Now try to speak. As clearly as possible! Not so easy, is it?! After a few sentences, take your finger out again and carry on speaking. Do you notice the WOW effect?! Within a very short time, your voice will sound much clearer and more present. And all without any effort.
Imagine teaching yoga with this presence all the time. Your students can follow you and you effortlessly fill the room with your voice. You also no longer get hoarse and don't feel strained from talking so much. Wouldn't that be wonderful?
Your voice is your most powerful tool in your yoga class. Maybe you've been to a yoga class before and thought to yourself: The teacher teaches good yoga - but the VOICE is just not good. What a pity! But the voice can be trained and even small exercises can have a big effect - just like the experiment I showed you at the beginning.
After all, what is the use of all the yoga knowledge if the spark doesn't jump? What they don't tell you in teacher training: "Teach from your heart" is just one aspect. Finding your voice is a process. It takes time until you can express yourself in words that really speak from your heart and with which you can instruct your students clearly and precisely. There is no ONE technique to achieve this. There are many and they are all important. My tip: just enjoy trying things out and practicing - like in yoga. It's called "practicing yoga" and not "being able to do yoga."
Here are 5 tips for you to try out to make your personality and your voice stand out from other yoga teachers (…and turn your practitioners into fans):
1. Be authentic
There are many reasons why people attend yoga classes. They want to do something good for themselves - and take something with them for their everyday lives. It's wonderful when the class is led by an inspiring personality. That doesn't mean that you have to transform yourself into a person you aren't when teaching. Rather, the class should encourage all participants to be themselves. And how do we do that best? By being ourselves as yoga teachers. Authentically. Sounds simple - but at the same time, authenticity can mean something different for everyone. That's why I have three questions for you that you can ask yourself:
1. What does authenticity mean to you?
2. When are you authentic or when do you notice that you live this value?
3. When are you not authentic or when do you notice that you are not living this value?
Once you have answered these questions clearly and honestly for yourself, you will step into your yoga class with a different presence.
2. Adapt your wording to the yoga class
Depending on the topic of the lesson, you will use different words: Is it a heart-opening lesson, is it a grounding lesson - or are you activating your yoginis and yogis? When preparing the lesson, don't just think about sequencing, but also about your language. Creating different word collections for different lesson topics can actually be a lot of fun. There are no limits to your creativity. But keep your down-to-earth attitude and don't be too flowery so that your message isn't watered down.
3. Use the magic of the break
Let your words sink in and take a break! This will allow your words to have their full effect. Your practitioners can understand what you have said and have space to feel. And you have the opportunity to think about what to do next, instead of filling these pauses with "ums" and "ahs". Interesting to know: The pause always feels shorter to us than to the practitioners. So don't follow the first impulse to keep talking, but the second. There can definitely be silence in the room, because it doesn't seem as if you don't know what to do next - on the contrary: you continue to hold the room with your presence and radiate security. In online yoga, however, where there is no physical presence, you can keep the pauses shorter. Then you hold the room and the contact with your practitioners primarily through your voice.
4. Let your voice come home
Your voice is your acoustic fingerprint: nobody sounds like you. Fantastic! That also means that you don't have to do anything to be unique - and yet many people find it difficult to show themselves and their voice. It's happened to you, it's happened to me: you spoke too loudly! Because you wanted to seem nice and lovable - but it was actually an expression of pure insecurity. Whatever the reason, it doesn't seem authentic. Not confident. Not competent.
Your voice is authentic and at the same time enduring when you speak in its "home", i.e. in the right pitch. You can try this out by humming to yourself in different pitches and feeling exactly: Where is the most vibration in your lips? Where do you feel the resonance in your body? Where does the humming feel "right"? And then make sure that you keep returning to this position when you speak. Also ask yourself what is holding you back from being really visible and audible. When we focus on our voice, it automatically affects our personal growth. Conversely, your self-image will always affect the sound of your voice. Because: voice development is personality development.
5. Repetition is queen
Do you sometimes feel like you're constantly repeating yourself when you're teaching? And do you find yourself thinking that you need to vary things more? I can reassure you: you don't have to explain or teach everything in a completely new way every class. Repetition offers wonderful opportunities. Repetition is great! Repetition is QUEEN! It creates reliability because over time your yoginis and yogis know how you express yourself and what you mean by certain phrases. Repetition helps them to let go and listen to the processes inside them. Sometimes your words resonate with the practitioners when they leave the mat. In situations in their lives, they think of your sentences from the yoga class and are connected to you - even beyond the mat.
Ultimately, that’s what it’s all about: connection and presence!
Dedicate yourself 100% to your yoginis and yogis in the yoga class. When in everyday life do we get people's full attention? Almost never. Just this experience of your presence is a huge gift to your students.
So: let go of the pressure to be perfect and be yourself. Have fun teaching – it will rub off on you! That way, your students will become fans.
Teaching yoga authentically
In the video course "Teaching Yoga Authentically" you will tap into your authentic (vocal) power and easily find new words for your yoga classes that speak from your heart. You will touch your practitioners with your presence, your voice, your words and guide them specifically and precisely through the yoga class with Andine's 5-step method.
Get the 0,00 € WORKBOOK with inspiration for your yoga classes here.
Andean Pfrepper
Andine is an actress, yoga teacher, voice & presence coach and the founder of magic*spell yoga.
Andine has been practicing yoga for 20 years. It has accompanied her through competitive sports and acting studies. In addition to her permanent engagement as an actress in the theater, she completed her first training in Hatha Yoga. In 2021, she completed Yin Yoga training with Helga Baumgartner. In her classes, she combines classic Hatha Yoga with Taoist flows and supportive Yin Yoga. A playful approach with plenty of freedom to explore is important to her.
Andine also has a master's degree in Speech, Communication & Rhetoric from the University of Regensburg and is a certified life coach. As a voice & presence coach, she helps yoga teachers to find their individual voice and thus bring their message to the world courageously and authentically. In her work, she combines her 20 years of stage experience with yoga knowledge, coaching approaches and well-founded techniques relating to voice and language to make your yoga class a magical experience.
Photo credits: Christina Iberl & Stefan Klüter