Chair Yoga Certification at Kripalu October 30 – November 4, 2023​

Do you have students, clients, patients, or family and friends who are unable to practice yoga on the floor due to age, weight, disability, or inflexibility? Would you like to teach yoga at hospitals, senior centers, nursing homes, or online…just to name a few places?

Join world-renowned trainers and yoga therapists Lakshmi Voelker and Liz Oppedijk, coauthors of Get Fit Where You Sit: A Guide to the Lakshmi Voelker Method and learn how to adapt traditional yoga poses to a chair with multiple levels of flexibility. These joy-filled, dynamic chair yoga classes bring the benefits of yoga to everyone, on any chair, anywhere!

In this certification program, learn to teach an accessible hour-long chair yoga class using the Lakshmi Voelker Method.

In this certification program, learn to teach an accessible hour-long chair yoga class using the Lakshmi Voelker Method. You will learn to

• Practice single and double chair yoga.
• Use levels of flexibility for wheelchair yoga.
• Use light weights in chair poses to build bone and muscle mass.
• Discern levels of flexibility and identify precautions and contraindications.
• Choose postures and breathing techniques according to individual needs.
• Understand anatomy and alignment for chair asanas.
• Incorporate meditation, relaxation, and breathing techniques to improve health and well-being.

This training is suitable for anyone interested in teaching chair yoga including healthcare professionals, yoga teachers, yoga teachers-in-training, and mat yoga practitioners.

NOTE Upon completion of the training, you earn a certificate in Lakshmi Voelker Chair Yoga worth 25 CEUs. Tuition includes a teacher development manual and access to online training videos.

Prerequisites Students with little or no yoga experience must complete 15 hours of yoga classes with a certified yoga teacher either live or online prior to the training.

Teachers

Lakshmi Voelker, E-RYT 500, C-IAYT, YACEP, AYC Ambassador, has more than 50 years of experience in yoga and the fitness industry, specializing in office, senior, and adaptive/disabled fitness. She founded Lakshmi Voelker Chair Yoga™ in 1982. Lakshmi has certified more than 2,600 teachers nationally and internationally, including healthcare professionals at the Mayo Clinic, Veterans Affairs, and the New York City Department of Education. She regularly runs trainings at Kripalu and offers online teacher trainings worldwide. Her new book, Get Fit Where You Sit: A Guide to the Lakshmi Voelker Method (available September 2023), is a practical guide to her pioneering Lakshmi Voelker Method, offering 40 active and restorative poses with 250 instructional photos.

Liz Oppedijk is co-founder of the social enterprise Accessible Chair Yoga CIC and a leading expert on chair yoga. She is passionate about bringing yoga to those who may not think it is for them, and has taught accessible and chair yoga to people with a wide range of abilities, including those with Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis, stroke, cancer, and other conditions, as well as those with dementia or learning disabilities, and to their carers. Liz’s special interests are training a community of chair yoga teachers to bring yoga to care homes across the country and carrying out research into yoga’s effectiveness in the social care and healthcare sectors. She is a qualified yoga therapist and regularly lectures on accessible and chair yoga, yoga for Parkinson’s and dementia, and yoga in care homes for The Minded Institute and other organisations. Liz is an official Lakshmi Voelker Chair Yoga teacher trainer and a regular facilitator for Jivana Heyman’s Accessible Yoga training.

Lakshmi Voelker and Liz Oppedijk have co-authored a book on chair yoga, titled ‘Get Fit Where You Sit: A Guide to the Lakshmi Voelker Chair Yoga Method‘, due to be published by Shambhala Publications on September 26th, 2023, and it can be pre-ordered now at Amazon. Learn more about the book here.