A yoga ashram usually offers very basic but clean accommodation and is located in a natural environment. It can be the perfect place to go on a yoga retreat or to follow a yoga teacher training course. It helps to completely dissociate from attachments to modern luxuries and to focus only on yourself and your learning process. There are many yoga ashrams in India. Below you can find some of the many benefits of life at a yoga ashram.

1. Focus only on your studies and personal development

The word Ashram literally means a place to study. Ashrams often offer the possibility to follow a yoga retreat or a yoga teacher training course. Following a teacher training course at an ashram is very beneficial both for your studies and your spiritual growth. Since it offers very basic living conditions and usually also limited internet possibilities it really helps to dissociate from your life at home and to focus only on your studies. This simple lifestyle can also change your way of experiencing life and help you to grow spiritually. Studying at an ashram also increases your credibility as a yoga teacher because it means you have experienced the yogic lifestyle and you have lived according to the yogic principles.

2. Experience the true yogic lifestyle

The yogic lifestyle is a very simple lifestyle without many luxuries. It usually follows a strict schedule, waking up early in the morning for morning meditation and or yoga practice. The yogic lifestyle follows the 5 principles of yoga which are proper exercise, proper breathing, proper diet, proper relaxation and positive thinking and meditation. These 5 principles are usually practiced at a yoga ashram by following daily yoga and meditation classes, practicing pranayama or breathing exercises and eating a healthy vegetarian diet.

3. Learn to be free from attachment

Without realizing it we are very much attached to our cell phone, our long warm showers or baths, extensive meals, etc. Living in an ashram means to take a step back from all these things and to realize what really matters in life. Meals are healthy and simple and often there is no speaking allowed during the meals. This may seem a bit strange since eating together is considered to be a very social event. However having a meal with other people without talking helps to concentrate only on the eating and allows your body to save its energy for the digestion of the food rather then using the energy for talking. Living a few days without Internet, phone, TV is also a very good experience to realize how much we depend on these luxuries and to be aware that we actually don’t really need all these things.

There are many famous ashrams in India offering both teacher training courses and yoga retreats such as the Sivananda Ashram in South India and the Arhanta Yoga Ashram in Central India. Sivananda Ashram has several ashrams all over the world and Arhanta Yoga Ashram has an ashram in India and in the Netherlands, Europe.