John Sixpack
For Yoga Industry News
WASHINGTON – In response to complaints from an ever growing legion of Yogis, new guidance from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) will help Yogis select and understand the appropriate Yoga teachers when taking a Yoga class. The document, Yoga Teacher Safety Rating Guide, was released today by the agency. "This guidance document will aid Yogis in the safe selection of a Yoga teacher." said Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA, Edwin G. Foulke, Jr.
Improper selection of Yoga teachers can result in pose failure, misalignment or slippage, which in turn can lead to injuries or death. OSHA accident data for the years 2005 through 2007 show that there were numerous injuries in Yoga studios involving Yoga instruction.
OSHA intends to format the final product for use on the Web. With the document in web format, a Yogi can quickly get information on the type of Yoga teacher he or she is practicing with without having to look through material that is provided on individual Yoga studio websites (which in most cases tends to be exaggerated and totally lacking in credibility).
“We hope that this new rating system will be adapted by studios and that Yoga students will inquire of individual teachers where they fall on this rating scale.” Mr. Foulke said. “In any event, we feel that this Yoga teacher rating scale should go a long way in guiding the student to the proper teacher and thus prevent injuries in the long run,” he added.
The New OSHA Yoga Teacher rating scale:
1. Initiate
2. Novice
3. Ascetic
4. Monk
5. Sadhu
6. Guru
7. Boddhisattva
8. Yoga Star
1. Initiate Skills:
- Can communicate with students and novice teachers about mundane Yoga subjects
- Can adjust students but only once per student per class
- Can hear Yoga gossip from far away
- Can spot and wear trendy Yoga clothes
2. Novice Skills:
- Can apply aromatic oils on the feet and forehead of students during Corpse pose
- Able to silence questions by renegade Yoga students by telling them "Everything is illusion”
- Can detect bad yoga attitudes in their students
- Has training in Yoga teacher BS
- Able to make a moderate income from Yoga teaching
3. Ascetic Skills:
- Can communicate with advanced (Monk and above) teachers
- Can detect Yoga posers in their classes
- No longer has a need for trendy yoga clothes
- Able to detect illusions. If questioned by a student, they can say “some illusions are more illusory than others”
- Can increase in wealth by teaching Yoga workshops.
4. Monk Skills:
- Can lead teacher training classes
- Able to be seated in lotus position for extended periods of time
- Can heal students of their Yoga illusions along with some ham-string injuries
- Will only eat vegetables (or meat from animals that have died of natural causes).
- Can wear elaborate saffron robes
- May be a wanderer or a resident at an ashram
5. Sadhu Skills:
- Has limited clairvoyance
- May teach classes while being naked
- Limited possessions: loin cloth, trident, alms bucket and occasionally, cigarettes and a cell phone.
- Able to teach in the marketplace or other public locations where they exhibit their Yoga skills to the general populace (and, consequently, act as recruiters for certain Yoga studios)
- Able to charm snakes, climb invisible ropes, lie on beds of nails, fire walk and survive burial
- Able to levitate themselves up to a height of 50 feet but are reluctant to do so in public
6. Guru Skills:
- Unlimited levitation of objects
- Able to have sex without karmic ramifications
- Wear white robes which ordinary students are forbidden to touch
- Has an entourage of lesser Yoga (Astetic and below) teachers to teach the class
- Fully clairvoyant
- Masters of illusion and misdirection
- Has the ability to summon gods and demons
- May wear an elaborately feathered hat made in Tibet
7. Bodhisattva Skills:
- Can charm supernatural beings and unruly students
- Can ride a magic carpet or magic yoga mat
- Can perscribe herbs to heal Yoga students
- Unlimited ability to do adjustments
- Has no need to shift illusions but rather can shift the expectations and attitudes of others
- Can acquire immense and unlimited wealth through opening a famous Yoga studio
- May wear virtually anything or nothing
8. Yoga Star Skills:
- Can walk on water
- Able to raise the dead
- Can change water into wine (and back to trendy bottled water)
- Will practice tantric sex with select Yoga hotties in class
= Able to walk through walls
- Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound
- Can turn cheap Yoga clothing into chic versions by lending their name to them
- Manifest unlimited wealth and fame from Yoga classes, conference and ads in Yoga magazines
- Can part major bodies of water
OSHA's Publication "Yoga Teacher Safety Rating Guide"
