How to select and curate meaningful yoga certifications with Carri Uranga

How many certifications do you need? What makes a good certification? What does being certified tell your clients?  All this and so much more in this weeks Work IN with my guest Carri Uranga!

Carri has been teaching yoga and fitness full time for 15 years. She has led 22 retreats and trainings around the globe, has thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail, spent one year backpacking in Central and South America and lived in Europe for 18 months. She has seen 54 countries and 48 States in her 50 years and stays young in spirit by having as much fun as possible and resting harder than she works. She is a lifelong learner passionate in her study of yoga and continuing education and has literally worlds of experience to share about life and business in the wellness industry.

We discuss...
- How to choose a Yoga Teacher Training
- In person v. online pros & cons of continuing education
-Cultivating compassion and patience through curiosity
-Certification as procrastination
-Translating the letters and numbers after the name
-Carri's introduction to Yin in a trial by fire

And so much more...

www.drishtiyogateachertraining.com
@drishtiyogattc

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It’s time to stop working out and start working IN. You found the Work IN podcast for fit-preneurs and their health conscious clients. This podcast is for resilient wellness professionals who want to expand their professional credibility, shake off stress and thrive in a burnout-proof career with conversations on the fitness industry, movement, nutrition, sleep, mindset, nervous system health, yoga, business and so much more.

I’m your host Ericka Thomas. I'm a resilience coach and fit-preneur offering an authentic, actionable realistic approach to personal and professional balance for coaches in any format.

The Work IN is brought to you by savage grace coaching, bringing resilience through movement, action and accountability. Private sessions, small groups and corporate presentations are open now. Visit savagegracecoaching.com to schedule a call and get all the details.

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Transcript

Ericka Thomas  0:01  

Today I'd like to dive into this topic of certification collection. I've been thinking a lot about this lately because in the fitness industry, of course, we want to have a really fantastic depth and breadth of knowledge to present to our students. And in the quest for that, it's often really easy to kind of fall into this trap of just collecting certification after certification without any real plan, or idea about what it is that we really want to get out of those certifications. Now, the certification industry is big business right? And for many of us when we're looking to scale our business, we shift from being an instructor of general population into becoming a coach for coaches or a teacher trainer or something like that. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. It is actually a great way to scale your business. It's a great way to diversify what you offer. However, sometimes what ends up happening is that we keep collecting certification after certification. And we get lots and lots of letters after our name and it can be very confusing to not just our clients but to ourself about who we are, what it is we do what we want to offer for real and so I wanted to introduce you today to one of my teachers and good friends in the yoga industry. And we're going to discuss curating certifications a little bit more. Cara urunga has been teaching, yoga and fitness full time for 15 years. She's led 22 retreats and trainings all around the world and has thru hike the Appalachian Trail. She spent one year backpacking in Central and South America and lived in Europe for 18 months. She's seen 54 countries and 48 states in her 50 years and stays young in spirit by having as much fun as possible and resting harder than she works. She's a lifelong learner passionate in her study of yoga and continuing education and has literally worlds of experience to share about her life and business and the wellness industry. And we are going to dive into so many of those things. Carrie and I get talking and sometimes we kind of go off on a tangent and that's totally okay because we're really good friends and I want to invite you into that friends circle today. So we are going to start our work and today with Carrie urunga welcome Carrie to the work

Carri Uranga  3:16  

and thank you so much for having me.

Ericka Thomas  3:19  

Thank you for being here. I am a big fan of yours. And today. I wanted to have you on and talk a little bit about continuing education and certifications. You and I both have been around a while in the fitness industry. And I think that there's there's something that for instructors kind of we get hooked into this idea that we need another certification we like to learn and so we may as well collect some more certifications. And I wanted to talk to you specifically because not only are you a lifelong learner, but you actually have embraced this whole teacher training as part of your business model. And so I'd like to get some perspective on both sides of that. So just to start us off, can you kind of give us a little bit of your background in yoga and in fitness. How did you get into this whole wellness and yoga industry?

Carri Uranga  4:33  

Okay, this is going to be a great conversation. So I came to yoga just over 20 years ago after through hiking the Appalachian Trail and I was looking for some cross training. So I had always been involved in outdoor adventures, sports and fitness, and was one of those people that never stretched on my own. And so when I finally went to a yoga class, I was like, Ooh, this is cool. It's like a stretching class. And then also I was intrigued by it because you were working hard at the same time as you were stretching but then you were also relaxed. And so the whole thing was very intriguing to me. So that's sort of what kicked off my yoga journey, I would say in 1999 or 2000. And then it just kind of went from there. I did my first teacher training in 2007. And that sort of came about, I don't want to say as a fluke, but basically what happened is I was traveling for a year and Central and South America. And towards the end of that trip. I had a friend that I had met while traveling and she was going to go on this yoga teacher training and she wanted to know what I thought about it, knowing that I had some yoga background. And so when I was looking at it online, I was like, this is cool. I want to go do this. I'm gonna come with you. And so we did. We went to Mexico together and did this month long yoga teacher training course in 2007. And that's where it sort of set me on the trajectory of just organically immersing myself into the industry.

Ericka Thomas  6:23  

I can totally relate to that. I came from the fitness side too. And I think you and I are very similar in that, you know, we like to do hard things you know we like the challenge of, of being very physically fit physically active. When you've got your first 200 hour training. Carrie was that all at once in one big block of hours.

Carri Uranga  6:49  

Yeah, that was a month. Long, immersive yoga teacher training course in Mexico. And so we were intense. Actually, they were pretty large tents that had a cot. So we were sort of camping and doing yoga. So it was one of those courses where you're on the mat by 6am and done by for the most part 6pm But then we had some nights that were long nights to like 9pm I think we were on sort of that almost like a college schedule where it was every other day was one schedule and every other day was another schedule. So that was kind of interesting. And I believe we had six days on in one day off, which is actually how originally Sara and I, when we started drishti we were also doing six days on and one day off. And I'm sure we'll get to that eventually but at the time I just felt like it was so long, it just seemed to take forever. And when we started calculating the hours and looking we were like you know, if we just add a couple hours here and there, we can actually do seven days on one day off and then finish this much quicker than elongating the whole process to a full month. So

Ericka Thomas  8:12  

yes, so you're talking about compressed, basically compressing that in fewer days, rather than taking an entire month where you're removing yourself from your everyday life for a whole month.

Carri Uranga  8:25  

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Ericka Thomas  8:28  

And so do you feel is that how you do your teacher trainings now?

Carri Uranga  8:32  

Well, now we're online. So So basically I did my first training as a student in 2007. I started teaching immediately, and I was just a 200 hour level teacher for a long time. And it wasn't until 2010 that I started really getting interested in delving more and delving deeper. And that's when I really wanted to go to India. And study Ashtanga and so I did another 300 hour in India and then also in Italy. And it was during those trainings that actually met Sarah, and then once we were done with our 500 hours Sarah was also a 200 hour level teacher at that point. We started our own company drishti yoga teacher training, and we started leading yoga teacher trainings around the globe. In 2012 was our first one. And then in 2018 was our last one and then we kind of went on hiatus. She was having kids, I was just doing my own traveling. And then in 2020 we took it online because yoga Alliance was allowing online whereas in the past they never allowed everything had to be contact hours for the most part. So online was never even an option. That was only an option if you didn't care about yoga Alliance certification. And it's not that we personally necessarily cared about yoga Alliance, but that was always our number one question that we would get when we received email inquiries. Almost always, are you yoga Alliance or yoga Alliance? So yoga Alliance had Oh, Sara and I had both always been registered with the yoga Alliance and so when it was time to do our teacher training course to register and submit, you know, for approval, we just decided that that was probably the best thing to do. So we have always been involved with yoga Alliance as far as an official accreditation. But before 2020 Online was not an option for yoga Alliance, and as of 2020, we have been online.

Ericka Thomas  10:52  

So that must change the schedule for yoga teacher training. I mean, definitely,

Carri Uranga  10:59  

yeah. I mean, I no longer doing a full one month long certification process. No way. Right,

Ericka Thomas  11:06  

right. I did. During the pandemic, I did think it might be a good idea to take advantage of all these online options through through the yoga through yoga fit and some of these other things. I thought that would be a fantastic thing. And so I picked this four day online module and it was excruciating. This information is so good, but why does it feel so different when it's online? Why does it feel so different? I don't know. I just could not imagine I couldn't imagine doing six or seven days in a row, multiple weeks back to back like that. I just could not imagine doing that. Yeah, and I

Carri Uranga  11:50  

think that people's attention span, you would lose people I mean, including the instructor, so we definitely we do have two hour long sessions like on Tuesdays or Thursdays from like 12 to two in the afternoon or whatever. We'll have these two hour long sessions where the students get to practice teach, that's where we're giving feedback on worked well, what could have been better? That's when Sarah's teaching philosophy and teaching anatomy and that is great. We love these little two hour modules here in there. And what we have found is that not a lot of the online programs actually do a whole lot of life. A lot of the online programs are solely online. Watching pre recorded videos. And that's great, but Sarah and I just think that live time with the actual instructors face to face and getting that feedback directly from us is so crucial. And I think the students really get a lot out of it and also just especially in these last couple of years, particularly in 2020 or 2021. It was really a lot about connection and community. And sometimes we were just, you know, spending the first 20 or 30 minutes just checking in and chatting and saying hi and we felt like That was just as important.

Ericka Thomas  13:11  

Absolutely. I mean, that's, that's really the piece when you go to conferences and things like that. That is the most valuable thing. That's that networking piece. And you can't discount that as far as an education. You know, an educational kind of connection with your students, for sure. I mean, that sounds so much more valuable than the pre recorded kinds of things. And this leads directly into my next question specifically about collecting certifications because now that we have opened the door to all of this online opportunity to to pretty much get certified in anything you want. Online. How do you find a good certification? Like what is it that we look for? What should we be looking for? When you want to invest in your education, which I would hope many of us as instructors are looking to do?

Carri Uranga  14:22  

Yeah, you know, it's funny. I have also jumped in there and done tons of online trainings. These last couple of years. I did a trauma informed training. I admitted that pain care awareness training, I did a training with Tom Meyers and Jill Miller. I did an ru VEDA course. So I've done so many trainings these last couple of years. And I would say there's a couple of ways to go about looking for a good online training program. For some people obviously price point is going to be what is the most important thing so there are yoga teacher trainings out there that are like $400 and some of them are still of good quality. I think a lot of people immediately dismiss an inexpensive training and say, Oh, it's cheap, so it must not be good. And that's not necessarily the case. So you know, for some people price point is going to be the number one factor. For me. I like a live component mixed in with the pre recorded. I like the pre recorded because I like to have access to do it in my own time. Whenever works best for me, but I love the live component because of that community time that you were just speaking of. That said there are some people that I could excuse the live component, because there's such amazing instructors, for instance, like Tom Meyers and Jill Miller. Sure. I would love to have lifetime with them. But the reality is, is I'm still going to get a really high quality course and amazing above and beyond information in all their pre recorded content. So I think it depends like I think you should look at what's important to you. Is the Live community time important to you have so you probably want to look for something that has a blend. If price is important, then go for it but I would probably have a couple of names there that I would suggest over others. Maybe not while we're recording. And then obviously some you know, really world class instructors leaving these online courses so there's so many different ways to look at it. Yeah, and

Ericka Thomas  16:58  

it does, it does speak to really taking your time and vetting some of these things before you pull the trigger and give them your credit card. You know, I mean, there's so much information that we have access to through social media through the internet, you know, Google searches, you don't just have to pick the first one that pops up at the top of the screen. And so it's okay to take your time. There's nothing that says you need to take a certification course just because it's right there in front of you. And and I am saying that because I you know even out outside of yoga, we and and with yoga alliance to we have to maintain some kind of continuing education credits, usually. So if you are trying to collect credits sometimes it's tempting to just take the cheap and easy you know, let's just pay 10 bucks for this little two credit thing you know, and now I have like an extra two letters after my name or something you know, like you can get them very cheap. And some instructors that I've I've spoken to will just take another certification because wherever they're working is providing it. It doesn't necessarily fit with what they already do. Nor does it necessarily add anything to what they already are doing. Right. So it's just for the credits, right we're just getting, it would be like it would be like me taking a Zumba certification just for credits when there is no way on God's green earth. You will ever catch me teaching a Zumba class.

Carri Uranga  18:56  

I'm with you there and it is fun. And I have fun when I'm doing it but and I have zero interest in ever learning how to teach Zumba.

Ericka Thomas  19:07  

Exactly. I also have taken Zumba class, they are awesome. They're great, great fun. They are not my kind of format. Like they I just haven't. They're just not I mean, unless you you want to just come and laugh at me like that would be great comic relief but a joke

Carri Uranga  19:27  

and laughter actually, maybe you and I could teach a Zumba class together and we'd all really be dying laughing.

Ericka Thomas  19:37  

Oh my God. Be crazy. Be crazy. So the point I'm trying to make here is that it doesn't make sense to kind of take a take a beat and curate some of those credits that you are trying to collect so that they they are meaningful for you and they can maybe expand your professional credibility a little bit rather than having like multiple all kinds of things that just seem very disconnected.

Carri Uranga  20:08  

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think if it's authentic to you, you know, sometimes I'm taking something for my own personal knowledge just because I truly like to learn. For example, I would love to take some sort of like medicinal herbs of course. And maybe I'm not learning how to make herbal tinctures for a client or patient or something. But maybe I just want to learn and know more about that for myself. But But yeah, some of these like you're saying just if they if they don't make sense for you then I guess always asking yourself the why, you know, why am I doing this? Am I doing it for my own personal knowledge? Sure. That's one thing. Am I doing it because I feel like I should that's something else or are you truly doing it because you want to advance your own your your career and your your knowledge base and in the long run, it's better for your business. So yeah, I think it's always good to ask yourself the why. Why you're doing something you know.

Ericka Thomas  21:17  

Yeah. So let's explore that word, that word should, um, you know, a certification that you should have. And maybe we can kind of tie this in with some of the things you mentioned about yoga Alliance because there's some some pushback against the yoga alliance with some people that I speak with in the in the yoga community. And I don't know how many people know this, but I know I didn't know this. I thought in order to teach yoga, I had to. I had to be registered with yoga Alliance.

Carri Uranga  22:01  

Yeah, I think a lot of people think that and actually, I think a lot of people think that in order to teach yoga, you actually have to be even certified by law at least as far as I know. It's not a law, that you have to be certified to teach yoga. I mean, back in the day, if you think about the older methods of teaching yoga, which was an oral tradition, there was no certification. Process per se. So there's no licensing. And you know, I think a lot of people are under the misconception that first of all, you even have to be certified because actually you don't. The reality is is that most studio owners are not going to hire a teacher who's actually not certified, realistically speaking. But a lot of people do believe that you are required to register with yoga Alliance and you're not we always make it very, very clear that while we are registered with yoga Alliance in our school, is a yoga Alliance accredited school. That it's not a requirement to register with yoga Alliance. And really the main reason Sara and I made the decision to be registered is because both of us have lived in a lot of different places. It's not like we have a home base like some of our friends have lived in the same place forever. They've taught yoga in the same town for 20 years and they have a really solid student base. You know, they, they these people are their yoga homies, you know, and for us, we both moved around a lot in the last 10 years, lived in probably eight different places. So I never really had that yoga at home. And I never had that solid base of students. Maybe for two years. I did. So for Sarah and I both moving around a lot and traveling a ton. It was we just never had that base. So it was important for us, because in a way it gave us some sort of accreditation. Because otherwise, you know, we were really just selling ourselves on the internet to random strangers. It's not like you know, Ericka had been coming to my yoga class for two years and then finally decided to do my teacher training program. It was more like I'm doing a Google search and I want to go to Costa Rica. Oh, cool. Look, here's this Dristi they look fun. Oh, and their yoga Alliance. Great. Let me ask them some questions. So yeah, I always do like to point out that yoga alliance is the is not the be all end all of certifications. It's that's yeah, a huge conversation.

Ericka Thomas  24:58  

Yeah. So also, outside of yoga, there is no law that I'm aware of that requires someone to be certified to teach really anything in the fitness industry. There is no requirement for that. But just like you said, employers will look for some kind of letters after your name, right. So when I started teaching yoga, I was not 200 ry T yet. I was group fitness certified though. And so and I already had many years of experience as an instructor. So I began teaching yoga at level one, from yoga fit right out of the gate. And took me 10 years to do 200 200 hours.

Carri Uranga  25:51  

Today, actually one of our students right now she's a personal trainer, and she has always or always, ever since the womb. She for a long time has taught group fitness. So technically as of this very moment, she does not have her certificate from us yet because she's still in the course and she'll be done by the end of May. But she's a personal trainer. She's been teaching group fitness at her local gyms for a long time. So she's already teaching yoga at her at her to places that she's already involved with. And, you know, she'll have her certificate later, but she's already teaching.

Ericka Thomas  26:32  

Right. Right. Exactly. Exactly. But I think that's important for for instructors to know especially if they're just looking at maybe branching out into another modality like yoga. That was that was actually what was so appealing about yoga to me because I was doing all this hardcore stuff and I felt like if I wanted to balance that if I wanted to find some balance with all of this other activity, yoga would be a good thing to bring in. And that way, you know, I would still be in the fitness and wellness industry, but I wouldn't be hurting myself. With that mode, you know, with that movement modality. But hindsight, you know, I kind of wish that I had done all 200 hours all together at once. Because I feel like that teacher training even if you're not going to teach yoga 200 hour yoga teacher training is really it's kind of like excellent therapy, like really, really applicable everywhere in your life, you would just be a better person for it, in my opinion.

Carri Uranga  27:50  

I always wish that everyone would just do a 200 hour yoga teacher training regardless, like I was for my husband to do one and he has considered it but he has not he'll, he's gone on retreats with me before but he's never done a 200 hour teacher training. But yeah, wouldn't that be great if that was just everyone? Everyone's a trajectory to do a yoga teacher training minimum 200 hours,

Ericka Thomas  28:16  

everything that you do every movement that you do in you know, whether you are a philosophical or spiritual person or not all of the movements that that we do in life they come out of yoga like they are basically yoga if you just strip it down to the physicality of it. All exercise is rooted there. All of our modern exercise is rooted there and and the off the mat practice of yoga is even more. I don't know what the I mean, I just I feel like I practice yoga while I'm washing my dishes like simple little things like that, you know,

Carri Uranga  29:00  

standing in lines at the grocery store or sitting in traffic. Oh, there's a good one. Oh my gosh, Haitians, compassion, awareness. All of these things play into our daily lives on a regular basis for sure.

Ericka Thomas  29:15  

Absolutely. So what would you recommend to a new instructor either new to yoga or someone who's thinking about moving into yoga sir, at some kind of yoga certification? What would you recommend that they do to kind of vet the schools out there because there's a lot of there's a lot of them there's a lot of ways for people to get their hours there to under that are YT and there's and then after that, you know, the 300 level. There the 300 hour to get to 500 You know, you don't have to stick with that same school. You could choose something else but

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Ericka Thomas  30:00  

So when you're looking at all of those choices, what are some things? I mean, we talked about some things that may affect your choices like money and time and all of this stuff but what really should people look for if the yoga Alliance accreditation isn't necessary for schools?

Carri Uranga  30:23  

Well, yeah, I think that right off my my first thought would be that you would need to decide if you want to do an immersion training somewhere like for me, I've always been a big traveler. So I wanted to do my trainings in exotic destinations like Costa Rica or Mexico or India, because the way I saw it was, I could go on an amazing vacation, eat great food, and basically live on a yoga retreat for a month. I do yoga all day every day and then come out of it with a certification. So that really worked for me, but it worked for me because I don't have kids and I don't even have plants and I just have a lot of flexibility in my schedule. So that obviously doesn't work for everyone. So then I would say, Do you are you wanting to do a training in person live at your local studio, that well, it would appeal to me, because I would be with people that I probably know and love. The weekends and evenings thing does not work well for me like I like my weekends to be mine. I like to do a lot of fun things I want to go off and I just I just don't want to be at the yoga studio all weekend and I don't want in the evenings I want to cook dinner and I want to watch my movies. And so for some people, evenings and weekends are great. That doesn't work for me. So the studio model the six month studio model was never my jam. So then I guess you would have to decide whether you want online. Online is you know, we've talked about the pros and cons to online. And like right now we're both studying with an instructor who's in Montreal. We wouldn't get to do that. Right now. If it wasn't for online, you know, so, as annoying as online to be it's also super, super convenient. I mean, how great is it to be like, You know what, I'm gonna put on one of my courses and listen to that while I'm doing stuff around the house or whatever. So I think it just first I think a lot of your selections would be very narrowed down once you decided if you want to go somewhere, if you want to do it at home, online or if you want to do it at your local studio.

Ericka Thomas  32:57  

So can I ask a quick question about the teacher check teacher trainings in general. Do Do they all include the same things as far as what you're going to be learning and that's a great question.

Carri Uranga  33:17  

Yeah. So, you know, if they're a yoga Alliance accredited school, they do have to follow a particular number of hours for the different topics like you have X number of hours for methodology. You have, you know, 30 hours for anatomy. You used to have 30 hours for philosophy, but I'm not sure if it's different now, actually. So yeah, you have some specific set hours for different topics. But then within those topics you have flexibility and freedom. You don't have to necessarily follow a set protocol for how you teach the methodology or exactly what you're teaching like they don't require in within the 30 hours say of philosophy. They're not requiring a special set. You know, you must spend five hours on the sutras you must spend seven days on the chakras or whatever. So, you do have Sarin is call it through form there is freedom. You have a basic outline and structure that a follow but you have some flexibility and freedom within that.

Ericka Thomas  34:30  

Yeah, yeah, that's good to know. That's good to know. And I guess that is the that's the draw for a yoga Alliance accredited school because you know, that there's some some sort of format there that that those schools are following and what they're teaching.

Carri Uranga  34:51  

Yeah, I mean, whether or not they're being checked on that. That's a whole nother. Okay, yes, you do have to fill out a form and submit. Anyone who's a yoga Alliance school remembers the grid that you had to fill out so you had to fill out this special grid and submit that but you know, whether or not yoga Lance goes back and checks anybody on it, that's a whole nother story, but

Ericka Thomas  35:19  

have you guys ever been checked on what you have?

Carri Uranga  35:23  

Not that we know of, but we have had a couple of students in the past that we were like, are they spies? I wonder if they're from yoga Alliance and they're checking on us but now sometimes you have a student where you're like, they're just different and interesting. So you think, Hmm, what's going on here? There's been a couple people within the teacher trainings that you get the feeling that they didn't really want to be there. They were there because they it seemed as if they were being made to be there but but anyway, that's

Ericka Thomas  36:04  

That's fascinating. Now every every course I go to I'm going to keep my eyes open for yoga alliance spies

Carri Uranga  36:13  

they actually really have spies but sometimes you wonder 300 hour I find is the 300 is kind of fun, because you have a lot, a lot more flexibility. For example, week, we can kind of allow our 300 our students to sort of put together their own program in a way and what I mean by that is, for example, if you're interested in prenatal, you can do Sarah's prenatal module. If prenatal is not really for you, you can do my hand module so you can sort of piece together and create your own 300 hour program. And that's pretty cool because then you get to focus on you know, we always say that the 200 is kind of like your bachelor's degree, and then your 300 is sort of like your master's degree, and then you get to really focus and pinpoint where you want your interest to lie. And, you know, we always say that Tinder is the tip of the iceberg. So, you know, everyone does this 200 and then you decide, okay, well, maybe you want to dive into kids yoga, or maybe you're gonna get more into therapeutics. You know, you can sort of pick and choose what you're personally interested in and how you want to create your own adventure so to speak.

Ericka Thomas  37:37  

Yeah, that's that was one of the things that I really liked about the yoga fit. The way they they do their modules because of that. Because you could kind of curate your own specialties, based on I mean, there's just so many options to, to pick from and that's kind of where I kind of found that that path through through trauma informed yoga was through that because there were a lot of ways to kind of stay focused on that. So yeah, yeah, I'd love that. That's, that's awesome. Okay, so what is it? What is your latest focus for continuing education carry and how are you implementing that?

Carri Uranga  38:27  

As far as me as a student? Gosh, well, I am currently in a pain care awareness course. And one of the reasons I wanted to do that course is I had learned that about 20% of your class, or 20% of the population has chronic pain. And so I started thinking about how if you say we're in a class of 20 students, probably about five of those students are in pain. And I know that I myself have had chronic pain and old sports injury and my hamstrings and old neck injury from a headstand on the beach gone wrong. And, you know, students don't necessarily tell their teachers that they're in pain. So, you know, the teacher might ask, does anyone have any injuries? Well, I'm not going to chime in and give you my whole long list of injuries that I've had for various, you know, sports and stuff. So I usually just keep it to myself also, because I have the education and body awareness to know exactly what to do, what not to do and all of that. Anyway, I also on a continual quest for compassion. And so I thought that the pain care awareness course was a really good course for me in just always trying to be a more compassionate person. And that might sound odd, but compassion doesn't necessarily come natural for me. So it's something that I'm always working on. And years ago, I used to always say, at the end of my yoga classes, compassion and patience for yourself, as well as others, and that's still something that I work on today. And I felt like the pain care course would be really good to help instigate more compassion in my life. And I'm also doing a compassion training. And through I think that's called the compassion Institute. So I'll be jumping in that soon actually.

Ericka Thomas  40:46  

That's that's, that's amazing. It's amazing and actually kind of instructive for people, right? Because I think everybody kind of has a thing that they wish that they were better at, you know, like I could probably use a little bit more compassion to but we've talked about this before. Because it's mostly on the inside of my head like the inner the inner  mean girl that comes out every every once in a while, but usually not in front of other people. She She doesn't usually come out in front of other people, but she lives there. And so sometimes it feels like a little bit more compassionate.

Carri Uranga  41:26  

Just be a little nicer. Now, people are surprised sometimes they think, Oh, you're so nice. I mean, we all have lots of facets to us, right? So yes, I have always been a very I've been in customer service for a long time. But whether it was working in retail or working the front desk at a studio or a gym, I love making people feel welcome. And I love making people feel comfortable. Because I can't imagine if you're the type of person that's intimidated to walk into a studio, which I'm not at all so that's hard for me to even understand. I'm not shy, and I don't really have a sense of hesitation I guess. And so sometimes that's hard for me to to envision, but I know it's out there. So I can imagine if someone is intimidated to walk through the doors of a studio, and then the person sitting at the front desk is acting a certain way, like what are you doing here? Or have you done yoga before? We're kind of condescending or being mean to them? Oh my gosh, like, that is just gonna make some people want to turn around and walk out the door and never come back to yoga. Studio ever again. And it might be that they never return to the yoga studio. Or it might be that it takes them 10 years to finally step foot in another yoga studio. So I've always been really big on making people feel comfortable making people feel welcome. I sort of treat wherever I'm working, whether it's a retail store, or a gym, almost like my home. And I want to welcome people into this space. And I've always been super friendly with the people that are coming into the studio because I find it so important. That said I think that's why some people would find it surprising that I'm mean inside. Because they're like, no, they're so friendly and nice, but it is it's a practice, right just like everything else. compassion and patience is a practice and I'm hard on other people because I'm so hard on myself. And you know, I know all that. So I expect a lot of myself and well sometimes I have zero expectations of other people because I actually know how humans are I also at the same time have really high expectations of people. So I'm a walking contradiction. I want to

Ericka Thomas  44:11  

I want to circle back real quick to a little bit more about collecting certifications. Do you think that there's there's a point where there's there's too many like not training for education purposes, not training to make yourself better, but like, the certifications? Because, you know, there's there's something to be said for being really intentional. About the education that you bring in. And I think we can find kind of fall into this trap of well, I'll just get another certification. And that will give me more ideas and then I can that will pull me out of this you know, borderline burnout or whatever it is, you know, that'll re energize my business or re energize my, my practice. So do you have any thoughts on that?

Carri Uranga  45:05  

I do I think sometimes that whether people know it or not, sometimes I think people might be using the certification process. As a method of procrastination. When I get this certification, then I'll be ready to fill in the blank. Then I'll be ready to do this then I'll be ready to do that. Oh, hold on. Let me just do this other training. I really feel like I need to be trauma informed in order to serve my clients. So I do wonder if some people subconsciously are doing training after training after training in order to sort of, you know, procrastinate or put off the the thing that they know that they have been wanting to do, you know, and for me, I try to limit my mind is like a little more intentional. I usually say two trainings a year, say like one in the spring one in the fall or something like that. That way I keep myself in check. I'm not just like, Oh, there's another course. Oh, there's another course. I'm gonna do that one. Now do that one. Because that can be really easy to do, right? Especially with all these online courses, and especially with some of them that are, you know, really inexpensive. It's very tempting to click, click, click and collect them all. But I do wonder sometimes if some people are just using this as a way to keep from having to do something else. And also sometimes I think people just like to see that those numbers and those letters after their name. I've seen someone's email before where it's like they listed everything they've ever it's like a 1010 bullet points list of and this and that and it's like, okay, like, I don't list everything you know, I might say, try to 500 our yoga instructor, but I'm not going to list and I mean, all listed on my bio link on my website, for instance, but I'm looking at this sign my email signature with every single certification I've ever done. And to me if you're doing that you kind of have to step back and wonder, Am I just collecting these for the sake of collecting or say, being able to say, Well, I'm trauma informed or oh, well, I yoga nidra or, you know, whatever. Yeah.

Ericka Thomas  47:39  

Yeah. And you know, when they're just a big long list of letters, most people aren't going to know what those letters stand for anyway, I mean, I have seen the same as well, and I kind of look sideways at this person. And I was just like, what are all of those? I mean, it's literally the whole alphabet, like

Carri Uranga  48:01  

or maybe that's just the mean girl coming out.

Ericka Thomas  48:04  

That was totally made a girl totally, totally. We're just judging. I was curious. I'm like, wow, you have really gotten a lot of training. No, I mean, it's a lot.

Carri Uranga  48:18  

And actually, some people don't even like it. Some people I know don't even care about the whole RYT like, What does that stand for? In regards to yoga Alliance? So I'll answer that even though you didn't ask RYT stands for registered yoga. Teacher. And when you seeRYT200. That means, or do you just see RYTthat means there are 200 our level yoga instructor when you see RYT 500 that means there, they've done 500 hours of training. Now you start to see the E and that means experienced registered yoga teacher. So for example, after my name, I do have E-RYT500. And that means experienced registered yoga teacher and what that means is that I've done 500 hours of training, plus 2000 hours of teaching. So, you know, to yoga Alliance people that means something, but to the average everyday person, they could care less they don't know what those letters mean.

Ericka Thomas  49:25  

Right? Right. And just to be clear, that that letter E is is that that 1000 I think, for 200 R YT. It's 1000 hours, and then, but you can't start collecting those until after you've completed the 200 hours. So So, even if you started teaching prior to getting that 200 RYT certificate, none of that counts until after you have that certificate. None of that counts to to to yoga Alliance. I should say that it does count to the universe.

Carri Uranga  50:11  

And that's the same now. Back in the day a long time ago, like I was probably grandfathered in actually for my e r y two status. Back in 2010 or 2011 When I did my 500 hour, but now you definitely have to teach for 2000 hours after you get your 500 hours certificate. And I believe they do allow for a certain exemption but you have to apply for that fill out a lot of paperwork and also get letters of recommendation from other people in order to have that exemption. So it's a little technical.

Ericka Thomas  50:54  

Yeah, it is. It is interesting. But like you said, I mean, most, most regular people aren't going to know what those letters stand for.

Carri Uranga  51:06  

And there's YACEP What does that even stand for? Yoga Alliance continuing education provider, which I am, but honestly now I don't even remember what is required to be a YAC EP. I just know that I am one of those letters after my name, and I do provide continuing education hours to people which yoga Alliance requires. Typically I think it's 75 hours 45 hours have to be teaching and 30 hours have to be your actual taking of a course like as a student and that's every three years so I am a YACEP but when I first became that I think that was probably in 2016. I don't even remember the the process that was required to become that. Probably review that at some point.

Ericka Thomas  52:15  

We have touched on a lot of certification related topics. What has been your most valuable training or investment in your overall certification?

Carri Uranga  52:32  

You're rushing? That's a great question. I mean, I I loved all of my destination trainings that I took as a student, the 200 was in Mexico and then the 300 and did half in India and half in Italy. And those were great because they were on vacation, basically. But one of the trainings I feel was a moment of a pivoting moment for me was my yen training that I did 12 years ago now. I did a yen teacher training, the way I was thrown into yin yoga I always like to tell the story. I was working at a yoga studio quite often worked the front desk at a yoga studio while at the same time simultaneously teaching there. So two different things happening. And I remember I was taking a class and when I came out of the class, the girl from the front desk, the woman ran up to me it was like, Oh my gosh, can you teach the next class? The instructors car won't start or whatever. And I was like, Yeah, sure. And she was like, It's yen. And I was like, Oh, I don't know anything about yen and she was like, that's okay. Just hold poses for longer. This was in 2010, so 12 years ago, and I was like, okay, so I did I held downward dog for five minutes. I held art about Padma to NASA for five minutes, which is a, I have an Ashtanga background. So Arvato Cogito tenascin That is opposed where you're standing on one leg, the other leg is in a half lotus. Your arm is wrapped around your back and you're holding those toes that are in the half luminous and then you're in a standing forward fold with your hand beside your standing foot. So we were in that post for like five minutes, because, you know, you just hold poses for longer. So I went home, Google yin yoga, and I was like, Oh, my God. And, of course, as a training was going to be happening at the studio shortly thereafter, so I took the train fell in love with the style. And I actually started that class became mine. So what I

Ericka Thomas  54:52  

okay wait wait, so just pause for a second. So now explain to people what yin yoga really is?

Carri Uranga  54:58  

Yeah. So Yen is a passive practice that stimulates the connective tissue and the joints. So unlike are more dynamic, young practice that you might be familiar with in your vinyasa class we're working gauging in the muscles. We want to release the muscles and hold poses for I usually say like, you know, three to five minutes in a more relaxed state. So certainly not doing a downward facing dog for five minutes, because you actually would be very engaged in your muscles there. Because as we all know, downward facing dog is not a resting pose. And certainly not arta but a primer as a Standing Forward call with one leg and half lotus, so I think it was pretty funny actually, I always tell that story. During my yin yoga teacher trainings, I always tell it right away like First off, it's sort of my icebreaker, like, here's how I was introduced to the in yoga. And then ever since then, it has become a passion of mine because like you I am also very much about like, I love fitness and working out and I love all the hard stuff, you know, and people think that I am always going, going going and I'm always doing all of this like intense, you know, crazy, hard stuff. But the reality is, is the only way in which I can maintain I mean, I'm 50 years old. The only way in which I can maintain this lifestyle is to rest just as hard as I play. So the yin yoga, the yoga nidra, the restorative yoga, all of these more passive practices. I have always I say always, but at least for over half of my yoga career has been also just as passive as it is super active and dynamic. And I really believe that I can maintain my lifestyle because I take care of myself because I rest because I restore and you know revitalize my nervous system.

Ericka Thomas  57:34  

That's that's such a valuable piece of advice. And I hope people really hear that because we can only go go go for so long before we can't

Carri Uranga  57:45  

anymore. Yeah, I mean, I think that it only makes sense. If anyone who's listening knows anything about weight training. We for the most part, we know that the gains are made during rest, so you're not getting bigger and bulkier and stronger during that moment that you're lifting the weight. You're gaining strength during rest. And it's just like everything else I mean took them to me it only makes sense. It totally makes sense that gains are made during the rest so and I think also, I have to give some credit to Sage Rountree. I never met her personally, but she has been a yoga instructor for many, many years. And she wrote a book called The athletes guide to recovery. And she, you know, was a yoga instructor and an athlete and really did a great job at merging these two worlds. And I think I found her. I was an athletic sponsored athlete in 2012. And I believe she was either the year before or a couple years before I was and so I had found her through Athleta. And it really kind of, I think, once I read that book and just saw that, between that active, more dynamic yawn, it just only made sense to have this balance of Yin and when I say yen I'm not necessarily referring to the actual practice of yin yoga. Yes, I do practice that. And I do lead a yin yoga teacher training. But when I say yin I'm thinking about it more as a concept of yin and yang. You know, everything has yin and yang. Nothing is just yen and nothing is just young. Everything has a balance. And so when I say Yin, Yin could be anything from yin yoga, yoga, Nidra, restorative yoga, taking a nap just sitting and resting, meditation, chilling out watching Netflix, hanging out and chatting with a friend of Marco Polo. Yeah, just like having fun allowing yourself to let go and not be so on all the time and not be so goal oriented and go getter and all of this stuff, which definitely has a place in our society and I'm all for that. But I'm not only that.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Ericka Thomas  1:02:24  

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. 100% So Carrie, if people wanted to connect with you, where can where can they connect with you? Where can we find Carrie?

Carri Uranga 1:02:36  

They can find me on Instagram two handles Of course. drishti yoga TTC is our drishti yoga, teacher training Instagram. And then my personal Instagram, which I actually haven't been very active on these days is vicarious with two R's. Yeah, that's right. Two R's. Vicarious or I will definitely

Ericka Thomas  1:03:01  

put those in the show notes. And do you have anything going upcoming coming? Coming soon through drishti or personally or anything like that

Carri Uranga  1:03:12  

we are currently involved. Our trainees are, for the most part revolving so we have a 200 hour training that's going on right now that anyone could jump in anytime. Same thing with a 300 hour training. Our yen training is more seasonal. So I did one of those in February and then Sarah has a prenatal training coming up in April. So some of our trainings we do have set dates for and then the 200 and a 300 are revolving and you can jump into those anytime.

Ericka Thomas  1:03:48  

That is awesome. I need to check that out. Hold on hold on just a second. My dog is having a nightmare over here. Can you hear? I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. He's it looks

Carri Uranga  1:04:02  

it sounds like he's chasing something. Yeah.

Ericka Thomas 1:04:06  

Squirrels in his dreams or something. So I always asked all my guests to share something that is their own work in

Carri Uranga 1:04:17  

I think should go back to the compassion and patience base because that is something I'm always working in. I'm not a patient person and I know it. But I catch myself. I'm very aware of it. And so I tried to instill a little more compassion and I think compassion and patience goes together.

Ericka Thomas  1:04:39  

I agree. I agree. That's awesome. Carrie, thank you so much for taking this hour out of your day. I really love talking to you. I know everyone is going to really like this conversation. Such great stuff. 

Carri Uranga  1:04:53  

Thanks for inviting me.

Ericka Thomas  1:04:56  

All the links to get in touch with our guest will be in the show notes and you can find them at savage Grace coaching.com along with other free resources to support a growing movement of fit pros on the path back from stress, tension and burnout to radical resilience and results. Thanks, everybody. See you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai