This week has us thinking about…drumroll please…

Valentine’s Day of course!

Valentine’s Day is one of our favorite times of year to teach since love is always a fantastic theme to inspire a yoga class!  If you enjoy creating sacred space, this is a holiday for ambiance…

90 Monkeys co-founder Amy Ippoliti once lined the walkway to the studio with rose petals and put together a playlist of cheesy romantic ballads from the 70s and 80s.  Students couldn’t help but crack up as they filed in and heard Barry White and Barbara Streisand cooing away! Amy lit the studio with dozens of soy tea lights and placed organic chocolate hearts on everyone’s mat as they came up from savasana. This whole approach kept the Valentine’s Day theme lighthearted, fun, and allowed students to feel acknowledged at the same time!

It’s important to take care to choose a theme that will make everyone feel included, and remember that students may be in any number of relationship possibilities.  Some might be happily married, single, recently divorced or broken up, or struggling in long-term relationships.

There are so many ways to interpret love that we can each find something different and still timely in a Valentine’s Day class. 

Here are some fun ideas:

• Instead of the overdone heart-opening theme so often used on this holiday, take it down to the hips where the real emotion of desire resides!
• Offer a therapeutic focus to delve into the great value of self-care as a form of love.
• Create a practice with mats arranged in a circle, to bring to light the love and support of being in community.
• Chose a theme that focuses on using the practice to cultivate self-love.
• Teach on self-irresistibility. When we love and care for ourselves enough, we exude attractiveness in every area of our life – in love, work, family and more.  Romantic relationships become the “cherry on top” of an already fantastic life.
• For those of you who’d like to explore something different at this time of year, you may take inspiration from V-Day, which is a global movement to end violence against women and girls.  With this in mind, you could craft a strong standing sequence to inspire students to stand up for themselves, for others, and for what’s right.  You can switch things up and have students initiate poses to the left, which is considered the more feminine side of the body, rather than the right, known as the more masculine half.  Focus on poses that tap into the creative potential of the feminine in the hips and pelvis, like pigeon pose, frog pose, and Goddess pose.  Hold a V-Day benefit class and donate the proceeds to a local organization that promotes women’s wellness, like a local shelter or clinic, or to larger organizations like Amnesty International, Girls Not Brides, or V-Day, itself.  Use the day to teach a free class at a local women’s organization…there are so many deserving groups it’s hard to pick one.

Victor Hugo wrote:

“Life’s greatest happiness is to be convinced we are loved.”

However you approach mid-February classes this year, find a way to remind your students that they are loved—by their teacher, by their community, and by the whole of existence, itself.  What an invaluable February 14 gift that would be.

Charles M Schulz wrote, “All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn’t hurt.” So don’t hold back on bringing chocolate to class – preferably organic and fair trade!

What about you? How do you use the holiday to inspire your yoga teaching?  Leave a comment below and let us know!