Agni Sara for Teens!

Sep 09, 2024

Statistically speaking, you probably know a teen who’s unfocused, unmotivated, directionless or down. Adolescence is a time of dramatic change and the path to adulthood can be long and winding.

This is why one of my many “campaigns” is “Agni Sara for Teens!” When training teachers, I often get fired up about what children need and how yoga can help. A slogan will pop out and I’ll call it a campaign. Another one is “Less Blue Screens, More Blue Sky!”

The reason I get so fired up about agni sara for teens is because they need to stoke the fire in their belly and that’s what this practice does.

Agni is the Sanskrit word for fire. Sara means “essence.”

Solar plexus is a term first used in the 1700s to describe the bundle of nerves radiating from the navel center, like the sun. I wonder if they also understood the energetic qualities of this area.

The yoga tradition has detailed the qualities of, and practices for, this area. It’s our power center, just like the sun is our planet’s power center.

The luminous energy in the navel center promotes clarity and confidence. The sense of sight is based in this area which contributes to clear vision and insight.

Agni sara is reserved for students who have been practicing for a while and have gone through the first phase of puberty. It’s not recommended for children under age 12 without expert supervision. It’s perfect, however, for teens.

To wake up the fire in the belly is to wake up a young person’s vision for their future, the motivation to work towards it and the clarity of discernment along the way.

On a more practical level, agni sara promotes strong digestion. Researchers are now able to draw links between digestive health and mental health.

While it’s not a common practice in yoga classes, it is an important one. We want to empower our community with the deep wisdom from the yoga tradition that does the most good for our students. That’s why I say, “Agni Sara for Teens!”

I’ll leave it to the experts at Yoga International to give you all the details of this practice beautifully laid out on their website.

If you’d like to teach agni sara to teens, begin by practicing yourself. Get to know the nuances and then teach from your own experience.

To give teens the clarity and confidence they need to successfully navigate the twists and turns along the way to adulting, share this powerful practice with them.