www.keenonyoga.com | @adam_keen_ashtanga 

Adam explores the concept of emotions in the body in the context of yoga. He discusses the origins of yoga asana as a steady seat for meditation and the use of asana as an ascetic practice to hold the body still against the changing world. Adam explains how yoga, particularly Hatha Yoga, can help change neurological pathways and transform states of mind. He emphasizes the importance of balancing the active and passive aspects of ourselves and the role of the diaphragm in breathing techniques.

Support Keen on Yoga

👉 Buy us a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/infoRf

👉 PayPal: https://paypal.me/adamandtheresa

👉 Subscribe, like and share our videos, it helps us a lo

 

Key Points

·      Yoga asana can be used as a steady seat for meditation and as an ascetic practice to hold the body still against the changing world.

·      Hatha Yoga is a science of the body that uses the body to change the mind and affect neurological pathways.

·      Balancing the active and passive aspects of ourselves is important for emotional well-being.

·      Breathing techniques, particularly using the diaphragm, can stimulate the nervous system and affect states of mind.

 

 

 

www.davidgarrigues.com | @davidgarriguesyoga

In this conversation, David Garrigues discusses his journey as a yoga teacher and the challenges he has faced along the way. He emphasizes the importance of being authentic and real as a teacher, even if it means admitting to struggles and imperfections. David also talks about the need for structure and specificity in teaching, while also recognizing the importance of individual interpretation and exploration. He shares his love for Ashtanga Yoga and the joy it brings him, and how he has evolved his teaching style over the years.

 

Key Points

·      Being authentic and real as a yoga teacher is important, even if it means admitting to struggles and imperfections.

·      There is a need for structure and specificity in teaching, while also allowing for individual interpretation and exploration.

·      Finding joy in your practice and teaching is essential for staying motivated and connected to the practice.

·      Ashtanga Yoga can be a powerful modality for teaching and practicing yoga, but it is important to adapt it to the individual needs and abilities of students. Structure and repetition can be beneficial in a yoga practice, providing comfort and allowing for deeper exploration.

·      The existing sequences in Ashtanga yoga offer a wealth of knowledge and experience that can be thoroughly explored.

·      Anatomy and physicality are important aspects of the practice, as they provide a foundation for bandhas and breath control.

·      Engaging with the ritual of yoga can lead to self-discovery and a deeper understanding of oneself.

·      The interplay between movement and stillness, becoming and being, is a fundamental aspect of yoga.

·      Teaching yoga requires balancing the sharing of knowledge with empowering the student and avoiding the misuse of power.

·      The practice of yoga can be physically and mentally demanding, requiring rest and recovery.

·      Students and their dedication to the practice can be a great source of inspiration for teachers.

·      Generosity and the joy of giving are important qualities to cultivate in the practice and teaching of yoga.

www.keenonyoga.com | @adam_keen_ashtanga

Adam explores the topic of community in the context of yoga, specifically Ashtanga yoga. He discusses the importance of community and belonging, as well as the challenges and drawbacks that can arise within a community. Adam also touches on the role of the teacher, the need for autonomy within a community, and the balance between a firm center and expanding edges. He emphasizes the importance of open discussion and the preservation of individuality within a collective.

Support Keen on Yoga

👉 Buy us a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/infoRf

👉 PayPal: https://paypal.me/adamandtheresa

👉 Subscribe, like and share our videos, it helps us a lot 

Connect

👉 Website: www.keenonyoga.com

👉 Instagram:  @keen_on_yoga | @adam_keen_ashtanga

👉 Work Enquiries: info@keenonyoga.com 

Key Points 

Community is essential in yoga, providing a sense of belonging and support.

However, communities can have drawbacks, such as strict rules and a lack of autonomy.

The role of the teacher is important in creating a healthy community dynamic.

Balancing a firm center with expanding edges allows for growth and dialogue within a community.

Preserving individuality and autonomy is crucial within a collective.

Open discussion and the ability to question and express doubts are essential in a community.

The modern yoga center can play a role in fostering inclusivity and community.

Community should extend beyond the yoga class and into daily life.

The concept of sangha, or community, has always been important in spiritual practices.

 

From the very young age of 13, Doug Swenson began his study of yoga in 1964. He has studied and practiced with many amazing teachers including Ernest Wood, the highly respected British Yoga Master, theosophist, and Sanskrit scholar. Doug’s other mentors include Pattabhi Jois, Ramanand Patel, BKS Iyengar and Swami Satchidananda. Many of Doug’s students have become highly celebrated teachers, including his younger brother, David Swenson.

Doug is a master yoga practitioner, philosopher, poet and dedicated health advocate. He has incorporated influences from several different yoga systems along with his passion for cross-training, elevated nutrition and healthy lifestyle.

Over the years he has authored four books and 23 videos on Amazon. The book list includes: Yoga Helps, Power Yoga for Dummies, Mastering the Secrets of Yoga Flow, and Pioneering Vinyasa Yoga.

His educational videos, for all levels of practice, include topics of Yoga practice and philosophy, enhanced nutrition, and cross-training between challenging and more restorative yoga styles. 

Doug’s Sadhana Yoga Chi is a holistic balance between learning and teaching, power and softness, intellect and fitness.  The goals of Sadhana Yoga are achieved by striving to create a body of enhanced health and fitness, a mind with pure clarity, true intellect and focus, all woven together with a heart filled with peace and harmony.

Sadhana Yoga Chi does not restrict your intelligence, or put limits on expanding your knowledge. Instead, we encourage the freedom to study and practice positive aspects of other different holistic techniques. This includes other systems of yoga and alternate body and mind expansion concepts.

Doug is one of the original yoga teachers in the West and has quietly been living as a yogi for decades.  You can find him on his website

 

 

The Dalai Lama befriended Bob in 1964, ordained him as a Buddhist monk, then later forgave him for returning to lay life.

Bob Thurman is known in the academic circles as Professor Robert A.F. Thurman. He is a talented popularizer of the Buddha’s teachings.  In addition, Bob is the first Westerner Tibetan Buddhist monk ordained by His Holiness the Dalai Lama,

He is a charismatic speaker and author of many books on Tibet, Buddhism, art, politics and culture. Bob was named by The New York Times as the leading American expert on Tibetan Buddhism. In 2020 he was awarded the prestigious Padma Shri Award for his help in recovering India’s ancient Buddhist heritage.

Time Magazine chose him as one of the 25 most influential Americans in 1997. They  describe him as a “larger than life scholar-activist destined to convey the Dharma, the precious teachings of Shakyamuni Buddha, from Asia to America.”

Bob served as the Jey Tsong Khapa Professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies in the Department of Religion at Columbia University for 30 years, until 2020. A very popular professor, students always felt his classes were “life-changing”.

Tibet House

Bob is the founder and active president of Tibet House US, a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation and promotion of Tibetan culture. And of the American Institute of Buddhist Studies, a non-profit affiliated with the Center for Buddhist Studies at Columbia University and dedicated to the publication of translations of important artistic and scientific Tibetan treatises.

His own search for enlightenment began while he was a university student at Harvard. After an accident in which he lost the use of an eye, Bob left school on a spiritual quest throughout Europe, the Middle East and Asia. He found his way to India, where he first saw His Holiness the Dalai Lama in 1962.

After learning Tibetan and studying Buddhism, Bob became a Tibetan Buddhist monk and the first Westerner to be ordained by the Dalai Lama. Some years later, however, he offered up his robes when he realized he could be more effective in the American equivalent of a monastery: the university, returning to Harvard to finish his PhD.

Long-term Commitment

As part of his long-term commitment to the Tibetan cause, at the request of H.H. the Dalai Lama, Bob co-founded Tibet House US in 1987 with Tenzin Tethong, Richard Gere, and Philip Glass, a non-profit organization based in New York City and dedicated to the preservation and renaissance of Tibetan culture.

Inspired by his long-time good friend the Dalai Lama, Bob takes us along with him into an expanded vision of the world through the prisma of Tibetan Buddhism. He shares with us the sense of refuge in the Dharma, which unfailingly helps us clear away the shrouds of fear and confusion.  He sustains us with the cheerfulness of an enriched gift, and opens a door to a path of realistic hope for a peaceful, kind, and wise future.

Bob has a prolific podcast of 287 episodes to date, which you can find on his website

Instagram @bob__thurman   @tibethouse.us  @menlaretreat 

 

 

 

 

 

Tara has been a dedicated practitioner of yoga for over 18 years. She has been blessed to practice with some of the most dedicated ashtanga teachers in the world.

Studying with Johnny Smith, Tim Miller (completing both his primary and intermediate series trainings), R. Sharath Jois & R. Saraswathi Jois. She has apprenticed with only certified teachers (6 years) with R. Saraswathi Jois for 4 of those years in her very busy Mysore shala where she assisted up to 200 students a month for nine months of the year. Tara has a special bond with Saraswathiji and is one of the few students authorised by her to teach. 

Tara is also a Certified Yoga Therapist in the tradition of T. Krishnamacharya & his son T.K.V. Desikachar in Chennai, India. Her interest in yoga therapy is a focus to help heal others from injury and imbalances within the body. She has helped many students learn to understand their bodies while bringing back health and stability through yoga therapy, diet and lifestyle changes. 

She has studied Pranayama with Sri O.P. Tiwari, Philosophy with Prof. Nagaraja Rao and Vedic chanting with Dr. Vigneshwar Bhat and Madhavi Kotha in the lineage of T. Krishnamacharya. 

Tara has been studying ritual, chanting and Vedic chanting for the last 7.5 years and is a long time Vipassana Meditator. Both R. Saraswathi Jois, Saraswathi Vasudevan & Vigneshwar Bhat have given her blessings to share the teachings as taught to her through parampara. 

Other interests

Tara’s curiosity for understanding the mind and body led her to study psychology (since 1993) and nutrition (since 1999). 

She is a trained Chef, has worked with many healing modalities, and has recently spent 5 years living in Mysore, India in order to seek and learn pure knowledge directly from the source and continues to visits India every 6 months to be with her teachers. Tara has also studied classical Carnatic music with two of Mysore’s greatest teachers and she has and continues to study Ayurveda with Dr. R. Padmini.

Tara believes that to be a good teacher one needs to be a good student. Therefore, she continually expands her knowledge on the subjects of yoga, health, nutrition and healing through sound and other methods. She teaches in a traditional yet playful manner incorporating the teachings of her teachers.

Tara now lives in Sicily with her husband Dr. Rob Lamport of @morethananatomy 

You can find Tara on Instagram @taramitrayoga and on her website.

Yan Ong tested at the top 2% of worlds IQ at the age of 16. Joining the Mensa Society, sparked an interest to discover the purpose of intellect. She sought out to gain knowledge through university degrees in science graduating with honours in Biotechnology from the world's 5th ranked university. In attempt to balance both left and right brain function took a second university course in the arts.  Although she found solving problems and creating ideas fun, there was still something that corporate life was not fulfilling. 6 years of working in business and I was over it, there had to be more to life.  She hit the road for 2 years of backpacking on her own from South America, Africa and ending up in Bali.

She discovered Ashtanga yoga in 2001 with a book and a class for 4 years.  In 2008 everything fell into place and the Ashtanga Yoga became her life. In 2010 she found her teacher, Paramagruru Sharath Jois and moved to Mysore.  Living in Mysore for 4 years Yan practicing under his guidance and privately studied sacred texts constituting the Upanishads and Yoga Sutras with renowned philosophy expert Professor Najarajao Rao.

Yan and Mysore

In 2012 she was authorised by Paramaguru Sharath Jois to teach Ashtanga Yoga and was fortunate to have the opportunity to travel and teach across the globe in Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Brunei, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines & more. I’m blessed to be Malaysia’s first Level 2 qualified Ashtanga Yoga teacher.

In the 20 years since she found Ashtanga Yoga, she has learned to heal her own spinal, ankle and wrist injuries, manage stress and hypothyroidism within the practice.  Thus having a more thoughtful, accepting and compassionate approach towards asana and its ability to be therapeutic.  

In conjunction with having dealt with both physical and health struggles during her journey, 10 years study of yoga philosophy scripture which the practice is built upon, has given her understanding of the practice from a deeper yet wider perspective.

Yan is also largely influenced by non-denominational spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle. She has time with him on retreat and completed his 6-month advanced School of Awakening course. 

She teaches with her husband Manuel and now plans to spend time between their native countries, Malaysia and Portugal. 

You can find her at @yanyoga or on her website https://www.yanong.me/

Ross Stambaugh is an Ashtanga yoga teacher who is Authorized Level 2 by Saraswati Jois. He has made many annual trips to India to continue his studies and has assisted Saraswati on multiple occasions.

Ross seeks to preserve the traditional Ashtanga method by maintaining a daily practice and teaching his students with the same integrity and patience that was taught to him by his teachers. 

Ross teaches Ashtanga yoga workshops internationally and welcomes a chance to work with you and your yoga practice.   Ross is a 20+ year veteran of the Ashtanga lineage.

Apart from having a daily Ashtanga yoga practice, Ross has been a collegiate swimmer, judoka, and mountain climber. He is a public school teacher and holds a post-master’s degree in education. He enjoys walking his dogs, Kali and Brie and is an avid motorcyclist.

You can find him on Instagram @ashtanga.yoga.ross

The "Yoga Doc" - Dr. Ronald Steiner is the founder of the AYI method. This method links traditional Ashtanga Yoga with innovative Yogatherapy.

Body and mind connect with each other and together create a harmonious balance. Ronald is a sports physician, researcher with focus on prevention and rehabilitation as well as one of the most well-known practitioners of Ashtanga Yoga.

Ronald Steiner is one of the very few yoga teachers authorized in the traditional way by both the Indian grand masters Sri K. Pattabhi Jois and BNS Iyengar.

You can find more about Dr Steiner on his website https://www.ashtangayoga.info/

Listen to the Keen on Yoga Podcast via link in bio, all usual outlets & now on YouTube.

If you enjoy our show and would like to support continued free content click Donate link in the Instagram bio or visit our website https://keenonyoga.com/donate/

Stephen W. Porges, Ph.D. is the author of The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation (Norton, 2011).

In 1994 he proposed the Polyvagal Theory, a theory that links the evolution of the mammalian autonomic nervous system to social behavior.  This emphasizes the importance of physiological state in the expression of behavioral problems and psychiatric disorders.

The theory is leading to innovative treatments based on insights into the mechanisms mediating symptoms observed in several behavioral, psychiatric, and physical disorders.

Stephen is the creator of a music-based intervention, the Safe and Sound Protocol ™ , which currently is used by more than 1400 therapists to improve spontaneous social engagement, to reduce hearing sensitivities, to improve language processing and state regulation.

Also written by Stephen: The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory: The Transformative Power of Feeling Safe, (Norton, 2017) and co-editor of Clinical Applications of the Polyvagal Theory: The Emergence of Polyvagal-Informed Therapies (Norton, 2018). 

Stephen is Distinguished University Scientist at Indiana University where he is the founding director of the Traumatic Stress Research Consortium.

In addition, he is Professor of Psychiatry at the University of North Carolina, and Professor Emeritus at both the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Maryland. 

He served as president of the Society for Psychophysiological Research and the Federation of Associations in Behavioral & Brain Sciences and is a former recipient of a National Institute of Mental Health Research Scientist Development Award.

Your support of the Keen on Yoga Podcast is greatly appreciated. 

https://keenonyoga.com/donate/

 

 

 

David Jackson a Master Instructor with the Oxygen Advantage and a breathwork coach. He is a former professional rugby player, accredited UKSCA Strength & Conditioning coach, NASM performance enhancement & corrective exercise specialist. His mission is to make breathwork a normal part of our everyday lives. David retrained his own breathing after a brain injury in 2013 forced him to retire from professional rugby.  He’s passionate about helping others change the way they breathe to improve the way they feel, move and perform. He believes that there is something for everyone in breathwork. David has worked with professionals seeking better stress management or those suffering with anxiety to professional athletes looking to improve performance and everything in between. He knows how your breath can impact all areas of our body and mind. This is the reason he is so passionate about helping people use breathwork to fulfil their true potential. Having felt the benefits personally, he wants to share it with others.

Find more about David:

Website: https://www.rootedlife.co.uk/

YouTube: David Jackson

Instagram: @ jackohumanflag

 

Ana  Forrest is  an inspiration and has been changing  people’s lives for over 45  years. She  is an internationally recognized  pioneer in yoga and emotional healing.

She is the Creatrix of Forrest Yoga, a mystic, visionary, philanthropist, author, and Medicine Woman. Ana crafted Forrest Yoga while working through healing from her own life’s traumas – abuse and addictions, the feeling of helplessness around the addictions, and the ongoing suffering from chronic injuries & illnesses.

Ana took her first yoga class at age 14 and became a certified instructor in 1975. Ana used yoga and Native American ceremony to save her own life. It is her intent to pass that lifesaving ability forward.

The process of healing herself inspired her to teach others to heal themselves physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. Forrest Yoga is a powerfully physical, internally focused practice that emphasizes the integration of  transformative experiences from the mat into purposeful daily life. 

Ana is at heart a woman of the wilderness. She has spent many years in the mountains and forests learning from the animals, trees, rocks, water, and the seasons. Prior to becoming a yoga teacher, Ana spent her early years training horses, dogs, cats, birds, and the occasional snake. She brings her deep understanding of the animal kingdom to her teaching with humans.

Jose Calarco is Ana’s co-director of Forrest Yoga. Jose comes from a long history of shamanism, the arts, music and healing, bringing his decades of experience as an artistic prodigy to Forrest Yoga.

He is also Director of the legendary Australian  Indigenous company Descendance Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Dance Theatre www.descendance.com.au. Descendance won the UNESCO (United Nations) competition as the world’s best Indigenous live show.

Jose Calarco is a bridge to the spirit world. As Ceremonial Leader for Forrest Yoga and co – teacher with Ana Forrest, he creates and teaches ceremonies, tells creation stories from the traditions of the First Peoples of Australia and other shamanic traditions and weaves these into the yoga practice

His experience as a faith healer and Medicine Man spans over 30 years. He has collaborated with Indigenous wisdom keepers like Medicine Woman and Australian cultural treasure Kathy Marika of the Yirrikala People of central Northern Australia, and he co-created Descendance Aboriginal with Indigenous elder and Song Woman Imelda Willis of the Yidinji and Kandju tribes. Imelda is Jose’s Spiritual Mother, and was a rare woman who had been fully initiated. She adopted him as an equal into her tribes in Far Northern Australia, sharing knowledge and hope with each other and with the world.

Also available on YouTube

 

 

 

Sir James Mallinson, 5th Baronet of Walthamstow (born 22 April 1970) is a British Indologist,  writer and translator. He is recognised as one of the world’s leading experts on the history of medieval Hatha Yoga.

Mallinson became interested in India by reading Rudyard Kipling’s novel Kim as a teenager; the book describes an English boy travelling India with a holy man. Mallinson is described as “perhaps the only baronet to wear dreadlocks. He let his hair grow out from 1988 on his first visit to India during his gap year.

He is the co-author with Mark Singleton of  Roots of Yoga. Penguin Classics. (A commented collection of translations of yoga practice texts from the Sanskrit traditions).

Currently Dr Mallinson is Senior Lecturer in Sanskrit and Classical and Indian Studies at SOAS, University of London. His interest in yoga grew out of a fascination for India and Indian asceticism. He spent several years living with Indian ascetics and yogis, in particular Rāmānandī Tyāgīs.

Background

He took his BA in Sanskrit and Old Iranian at the University of Oxford, followed by an MA in Area Studies (South Asia), with Ethnography as his main subject, at SOAS. His doctoral thesis, submitted to the University of Oxford, was a critical edition and annotated translation of the Khecarīvidyā, an early text of haṭhayoga.

Dr Mallinson has published eight books. All of which are editions and translations of Sanskrit yoga texts, epic tales and poetry. His recent work has used philological study of Sanskrit texts, ethnography and art history to explore the history of yoga and yogis.

Projects

Between September 2015-2020, Mallinson was the Principle Investigator of The Haṭha Yoga Project (HYP), a five-year research project funded by the European Research Council and based at SOAS, University of London which aims to chart the history of physical yoga practice by means of philology, i.e. the study of texts on yoga, and ethnography, i.e. fieldwork among practitioners of yoga.

From January 2021, Mallison has been the lead on three year project entitled “Light on Hatha Yoga: A critical edition and translation of the Haṭhapradīpikā, the most important premodern text on physical yoga” funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and the German Research Foundation Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).

He has been interviewed on yoga for BBC Radio on Beyond Belief and for the Secret History of Yoga.

More information about Dr Mallinson’s work, his CV and publications, many of them downloadable, can be found here, and on his website: www.khecari.com

If you enjoy the Keen on Yoga Podcast and would like to support us you can share this post, subscribe and give us a review on Apple or Spotify or make a donation . 

We appreciate your help to keep this going.

www.rodneyyeeyoga.com/ | @rodneyyeeyoga  

Rodney Yee is an American yoga instructor who rose to prominence in the mid-1990s when he was featured on the cover of Yoga Journal magazine and starred in some of the first-ever yoga instructional videos and DVDs with Gaiam/Living Arts. After his interview with Oprah in 1999, both Yee personally and yoga were catapulted into the mainstream spotlight.

Support Keen on Yoga

👉 Buy us a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/infoRf

👉 PayPal: https://paypal.me/adamandtheresa

👉 Subscribe, like and share our videos, it helps us a lot 

Connect

👉 Website: www.keenonyoga.com

👉 Instagram:  @keen_on_yoga | @adam_keen_ashtanga

👉 Work Enquiries: info@keenonyoga.com

 

Key Points

From dance to yoga

Starting with Iyengar yoga

Working with Richard Rosen

There was no such thing as a yoga career in those days

The need to study yoga

Creating Gaiam yoga videos

On Oprah in 1999

Sold a million videos the day after

Fulfilling the map of your skin

Being in a place where there is no you

Yoga and self reflection

The pyramid of yoga

Giving a touch of the yoga landscape

Even in a bad asana class something else happens

Staying relevant in yoga teaching

Questing for meaning

Teaching this new generation

It was easy for us to out do our parents

I’m inspired by anyone who is enquiring deeply

 

Stephen Cope is a best-selling author and scholar who specializes in the relationship between the Eastern contemplative traditions and Western depth psychology. Among his seminal works in this area are: Yoga and the Quest for the True Self, The Wisdom of Yoga, and The Great Work of Your Life.  His most recent work, Deep Human Connection, is an examination of the psychology, neurobiology, and spirituality of deep human connection, and the imperatives of human attachment—an issue of great importance to both the Eastern and Western traditions. For almost thirty years, Stephen has been Scholar-in-Residence at the renowned Kripalu Center—the largest center for the study and practice of yoga in the Western world. Kripalu hosts almost 50,000 guests a year in its many yoga, meditation, and personal growth programs. It is located on a sprawling 200 acre estate in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. In addition to his role as Scholar-in-Residence, Stephen is the founder and former director of the Kripalu Institute for Extraordinary Living—one of the world’s most influential research institutes examining the effects and mechanisms of yoga and meditation, with a team of researchers from Harvard Medical School, University of Connecticut, University of Pennsylvania, and many more.

Stephen is the recipient of both a Telly and an Apple award for his work. In its twenty-fifth anniversary edition, “Yoga Journal” named him one of the most influential thinkers, writers, and teachers on the current American yoga scene.

Bryan Kest has been practicing yoga since 1979 and has been teaching since 1985. He developed his unique, distinctive style of yoga, called Power Yoga, in 1979. Over the years, this style, an amazing workout for the body, mind and spirit, has made him a well-known, popular teacher across the country and around the world.

His mainstream popularity is matched by an authentic foundation in the ancient practice of yoga and a long path of development as a yogi (a practitioner of yoga). At age 15, Bryan uprooted from his native Detroit home to make a life change in Hawaii. He moved to live with his father, a doctor, who understood the benefits of yoga. Like many of us, Bryan originally thought yoga was nothing more than strange contortions, but that changed when his father introduced him to a physical style of yoga called Ashtanga. This appealed to him immediately, and he soon observed great changes in himself, both physically and mentally. Yoga quickly became his passion, one that would take him to India for a year to study with one of the greatest yoga masters of the world, Pattabhi Jois. He has been continuing on his yoga path ever since.

Bryan founded two studios in Santa Monica, CA. He also teaches at workshops and retreats around the world; provides an intensive Teacher Training program; and is featured in his own Warner Brothers video series from 1995, as well as a newer video series and audio CD series. His most recent endeavor is Power Yoga Online. This online tool features streaming videos of Bryan’s classes, along with programs and series including a Teacher Training meant to help support and deepen one’s yoga practice. These are usually recorded live and streamed to students around the world.  For articles by Bryan and more information about Power Yoga, visit Power Yoga.

Edward Clark is the creator of Tripsichore, the London-based yoga performance group that has delighted audiences around the world. The performance company was created to explore the possibilities of a form of theater that would celebrate yoga philosophy and extraordinary physical prowess. Edward began studying yoga in 1978. Notable among his teachers are Narayani and Giris Rabinovitch, but he also admires Ashtanga vinyasa, Sivananda, Iyengar, and viniyoga practices. The Tripsichore group has practiced daily for the past 20 years. Constantly devising and refining its techniques for asana, pranayama, pratayahara, dharana, and dhyana. Edward fuses his keen artistic vision with a deep understanding of the essential pursuit of yoga practice. His classes are entertaining, demanding, and exhilarating.

Vinyasa Applied to Yoga Philosophy

Edward says, “The concept of vinyasa as applied to yoga philosophy could either be considered very ancient or radically new. In either case, vinyasa seems to be one of the great contributions to yoga of this particular generation of yogis. VINYASA in our definition, is the evenly metered flow of movement, breath and thought. This resulting in a smooth, uninflected state of being. The vinyasa techniques are pursued to bring about clarity and stability to one’s thoughts and actions. Tripsichore endeavours to do this in class and onstage. Most yoga discipline has worked on refining one’s self in the direction of greater stillness – an absence of movement in the mind and body. Superficially, vinyasa would seem to contradict this. However, the mental focus and physical technique needed to bring about continuous fluid movement can also bring one to a “seat” of great stability and clarity. The stability is not only in the posture. It is in addition in the transition between postures – to the point where there is no distinction between movement and stillness.

Yoga Choreography

Tripsichore began in 1979 as a company devoted to creating full length dance narratives.  They explored a variety of stylistic forms including punk ballet, conventional modern dance and strict neo-classical technique.  They used masks, performed with rock bands and did pop videos.  While yoga was always a part of their training, it wasn’t until 1992 that they realised the expressive potential and choreographic viability of yoga postures.  Once they began to devise works using yoga asanas, their extraordinary artistic logic became evident.  Surprisingly, it would seem that there has been no orthodox tradition for using yoga technique to create dances in the 5000 year history of the discipline.  The postures are the ideal vehicle to express the themes of harmony, balance, spirituality, ecstasy, bliss and mysticism because they are exactly about these subjects in and of themselves. 

See more about Edward and Tripsichore on the website here.

Bessel van der Kolk MD is author of the seminal book The Body Keeps The Score. He spends his career studying how children and adults adapt to traumatic experiences, and has translated emerging findings from neuroscience and attachment research to develop and study a range of treatments for traumatic stress in children and adults.

In 1984, he set up one of the first clinical / research centers in the US dedicated to study and treatment of traumatic stress in civilian populations, which has trained numerous researchers and clinicians specializing in the study and treatment of traumatic stress, and which has been continually funded to research the impact of traumatic stress and effective treatment interventions. He did the first studies on the effects of SSRIs on PTSD; was a member of the first neuroimaging team to investigate how trauma changes brain processes, and did the first research linking BPD and deliberate self-injury to trauma and neglect in early childhood.

Much of his research has focused on how trauma has a different impact at different stages of development, and that disruptions in care-giving systems have additional deleterious effects that need to be addressed for effective intervention. In order to promote a deeper understanding of the impact of childhood trauma and to foster the development and execution of effective treatment interventions, he initiated the process that led to the establishment of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN), a Congressionally mandated initiative that now funds approximately 150 centers specializing in developing effective treatment interventions, and implementing them in a wide array of settings, from juvenile detention centers to tribal agencies, nationwide.

He has focused on studying treatments that stabilize physiology, increase executive functioning and help traumatized individuals to feel fully alert to the present. This has included an NIMH funded study on EMDR and NCCAM funded study of yoga, and, in recent years, the study of neurofeedback to investigate whether attentional and perceptual systems (and the neural tracks responsible for them) can be altered by changing EEG patterns.

​His efforts resulted in the establishment of Trauma Center (now the Trauma Research Foundation) that consisted of a well-trained clinical team specializing in the treatment of children and adults with histories of child maltreatment, that applied treatment models that are widely taught and implemented nationwide, a research lab that studied the effects of neurofeedback and MDMA on behavior, mood, and executive functioning, and numerous trainings nationwide to a variety of mental health professional, educators, parent groups, policy makers, and law enforcement personnel.

You can find out more about him on his website here.

 

It actually strikes one as quite funny, that despite Zoe’s reputation, she is hardly unruly. Actually, during this podcast she and Adam spend a good majority of their time praising Mysore and Sharathji’s ability to make the general rule specific to individuals.

In fact, neither of them are ultimately rebellious. They like the system, its traditional aspect (respecting the sequences); what they are both outspoken on is the kind of dogma and polarity Ashtanga yoga often enters into when it makes its way out of Mysore, which treats individuals as generalisations, to be fitted into ideal structures.

When, instead, what they really require out of yoga is a practice that serves one’s life and doesn’t cause injury. One that respects the demands of your own circumstances. That is, real life, when we have jobs, families and health issues, as opposed to the idealised picture painted of how Ashtanga should be practiced and taught in Mysore.

Adam and Zoe talk along these lines then. Having met many years ago in Mysore, they re-connected in the online world through their similar opinions

 Zoë is a US based cynical observer, writer, and comedian. After a decade of Ashtanga practice in Mysore and around the world, she now directs the sharpness of mind cultivated by the method toward critiquing the policies and politics of the community on her Instagram account, @unrulyascetic. 

This is the first part of Ashtanga Yoga 2021 & Beyond online panel webinar held in June 2021. We brought together two groups of teachers spanning decades of teaching to discuss the future of Ashtanga yoga. Hosts Adam Keen and Eddie Stern moderated the issues. Discussion was around the best way to move forward from various points of view.

The aim of this panel discussion was to look to the future. As any living tradition, Ashtanga Yoga must also evolve as a living and working method. A skillfull look to the future, does not demolish the past, the smarter move is to build upon it. We are brought together respected voices of Ashtanga yoga into dialogue with a newer generation of teachers. Those perceived to be taking it into the future. Bringing the experienced and new together for the first time in the Ashtanga community to share and learn from one another.

The discussion was a most exciting and ground breaking one touching upon issues such as inclusivity. Culturally and individually, the role of the teacher and the meaning of tradition for current times to name but a few of the fundamental topics that now require our further, collective reflection.

In order that each teacher’s voices was properly heard, the panel was divided into two groups with a short interlude. The event will be of respectful and thoughtful tone, and promises to be unique in the history of Ashtanga so far in offering such an open and collective, communal reappraisal.

To watch a recording of the full webinar click Ashtanga Yoga 2021 & Beyond

Russell is one of the most interesting characters I’ve interviewed. Sometimes painfully self-aware, the discussion gives you a good idea of the nuanced world of yoga in utter technicolour honesty as Russell is well known for now as co-host of the Finding Harmony Podcast with his wife Harmony Slater.

Russell was one of the fairly old batch of student who studied directly with Pattabhi Jois. We chat about the yoga scene back then, amongst other things as well as his own evolution as a student and a man. We discuss his practice now as he deals with the results of pushing his body too hard over the years.

Russell has been practicing and teaching Ashtanga yoga for more than 25 years. He is a humble and refined teacher, he was given Authorization by Sri K Pattabhi Jois in 2005. Case is known for his joking spirit, and his perpetual eye toward social justice work. When Pattabhi Jois invited him to his pranayama class in 2007, he considered this distinction to be the highest grade. 

Russell has been teaching Ashtanga Yoga in the Mysore Method since 2001. He has taught programs in NYC, Brighton - England, Taipei - Taiwan, San Francisco, and was Director of the Ashtanga Yoga Mysore program at Stanford University for nine years.

He worked as the Director of Partnerships for the Pure Edge Foundation, a non-profit company that brings yoga-based exercises and mindfulness programs into schools throughout the USA. Russell is known for his creative delivery of experiential presentations on neuroscience for social and emotional learning.

Russell Case brings to life the teachings of yoga and mindfulness in a very colorful and scientific way that makes it easy for students to understand the deeper dimensions of why yoga works and how.

Follow Russell on Instagram @russell_altice_case

Kimberly Ann Johnson is a Somatic Experiencing™ Practitioner, educator, and author. She helps women heal trauma, awaken their power and feel at home in their bodies. So they can then start living life on their own terms.

She’s always had a deep knowing that she was in this world to change things for the better. All of that came into sharp focus when she became a mother. Her whole life changed completely in that moment. She had to learn a new way of being in the world.

She believes that if you can learn to speak your body’s language, and transmute trauma into positive, reparative experiences in the present, if you can make the shift into acting from a stance of your deepest, truest self … everything changes.

Your relationships, sex, and love get infinitely better. Your decisions come from a place of true agency, rather than fear and conditioning. And you tap into a level of power inside yourself that’s deeper than you would have ever believed to be possible.

She is the author of two books.

Call of The Wild, It’s not just you — women all around the world are experiencing record levels of stress, anxiety, depression, and autoimmune issues.  The truth is, many women are stuck in a cycle of trauma, with no idea how to heal from it. What’s worse, most of the resources out there for healing trauma are written from a male perspective, which makes them ineffective for women, because they heal differently. Call of the Wild is the answer. 

And The Fourth Trimester, a holistic guide that offers practical guidance for women making the physical, emotional, relational, and spiritual transition into motherhood. Deeply impactful on both the individual and global level, it’s shifted the experience of motherhood for women all over the world — and helped make this universal, yet widely-ignored experience of postpartum healing a priority in national policy.

See more about Kimberly Ann on her website

 

In this Keen on Yoga Podcast Adam talks to Carlos Pomeda.  Originally from Madrid, Spain, Carlos has been steeped in all aspects of the yoga tradition during more than 40 years of practice and study. He spent 18 of those years as a monk of the Saraswati order, under the name Swami Gitananda, including 9 years of traditional training and practice in India. 

During this time he learned the various systems of Indian Philosophy and immersed himself in the practice of yoga, becoming one of the senior monks of the tradition and teaching meditation and philosophy to tens of thousands of students around the world.

He combines this experience and traditional training with his academic background, which includes two Masters Degrees: one in Sanskrit, from U.C. Berkeley (where he has taught) and another one, in Religious Studies, from U.C. Santa Barbara. He is currently working on a book on the topic of “Karma and the Journey of the Soul”, as well as a new translation of the Śivasūtra, an important Tantric text of the Kashmiri tradition . 

Carlos currently lives in the US, and travels extensively around the world conducting a variety of retreats, courses, seminars, workshops and lectures on the Wisdom of Yoga and related subjects. 

As a teacher, Carlos is renowned for the breadth of his knowledge and the clarity with which he conveys it. His great love of the Indian yoga traditions, his insight, his humor and his deep connection with his audiences give him the ability to transmit the deepest scriptural teachings in a way that is clear, meaningful and applicable. Studying with Carlos is an enjoyable and transformative experience. 

You can see more about Carlos on his website.

If you would like to support the Keen on Yoga Podcast you can share this post, give us a review on Apple or make a donation at www.keenonyoga/donate

Adam discusses the concept of short forms in Ashtanga Yoga. He explains that while the traditional practice involves doing the entire series every day, it is not always practical or beneficial. 

Key Points

Short forms in Ashtanga Yoga can be a sensible approach when time, energy, or inspiration are limited.

Variation in practice is important to prevent stagnation and maintain enthusiasm.

Short forms should still incorporate the principles of posture, counter posture, building, and vinyasa.

Grounding and ending the practice with a focus on the parasympathetic nervous system is essential.

Practitioners should listen to their bodies and make adjustments to their practice as needed.

 

 

In this Keen on Yoga Podcast Adam talks to Dr Yogi (Andrew McGonigle)

Andrew attended Medical School at The University of Newcastle Upon Tyne but struggled with the non-holistic approach often adopted by western medicine.

He graduated in 2005 at the young age of 23 and worked for a brief period as a junior doctor in Sunderland Royal Infirmary. However, for many reasons he knew that this career was not suited to him and he finally made the decision to leave the medical world.

In 2004 he started to practise Transcendental Meditation as a coping mechanism for stress and this had opened a gateway into spirituality. He began a new life in Sydney in 2006 working for the British fashion brand Paul Smith and regularly attended hatha yoga classes. After a few years of dedicated practice I decided to embark on an Ashtanga Yoga teacher training course at Yoga Thailand with Paul Dallaghan.

Teaching is in his blood and is something that has always come naturally to him. His parents were both keen teachers during their working lives and early on in his life he set up an after school homework club to help younger students with their studies. 

Having moved to London in 2009 he started working at the Triyoga headquarters where he remained in a Managerial role for almost 9 years. He began to set up my own small yoga classes in a local church hall and completed a holistic massage diploma. While assisting on a massage course someone asked why he wasn’t teaching anatomy and he had had a true light bulb moment!

From that point onwards I focused all his attention on establishing himself as an anatomy teacher. Having studied anatomy in great detail during Medical School he now needed to look at this incredibly vast subject from a completely different angle and create ways to make it relevant to yoga. 

He enrolled in hands-on dissection classes that focused on fascia (a word that he had never come across at Medical School!) and spent all of his spare time re-reading anatomy books, listening to podcasts and talking about anatomy to anyone who would listen.

In recent years he has become a keen writer contributing chapters to the popular Yoga Teaching Handbook: A Practical Guide for Yoga Teachers and Trainees and Yoga Student Handbook: Develop Your Knowledge of Yoga Principles and Practice.

His new book, Supporting Yoga Students with Common Injuries and Conditions, was published in March 2021. And his second book, focusing on yoga physiology, will be published in early 2022

Above all, Andrew is one of the most humble yogi’s Adam has interviewed and a really nice guy. 

Enjoy this Keen on Yoga Podcast with Dr Yogi.  If you would like to support us please like, share and review the podcast.  We gratefully accept donations in any amount you choose on our website at Keen on Yoga.

Jimmy started meditation as his life enjoyment was crippled by insomnia. he heard that meditation was a scientifically valid way to treat that problem. He had already tried to fix it with courses on mindfulness, books and guided meditation CDs, but nothing got me to that deep place I'd heard about. Then he found a teacher from the ancient Vedic tradition.

After four days of meditation training in a little room in London, his life was on a new path (and he was sleeping like a baby). Since then he’s been hooked. He has spent years training, exploring and testing meditation techniques. Jimmy is fascinated by the science and philosophies of these ancient practices. Now he teaches busy people the most powerful technique he knows for connecting to deep inner silence and stillness.

The technique is an ancient one from the Himalayas that is scientifically proven to deliver transformative benefits. This is completely different from mindfulness and other styles of meditation which you might have tried before.

He shows how to get into a deep state of meditative absorption in just 20 minutes. This melts away stress and leaves you feeling happy, energised, and clear-headed. A skill for life you'll be delighted to practice. 

It takes you beyond the thinking mind into a place of peace, stillness, calm and silence. Life becomes easier when you delve into this altered state each day.

It doesn't involve focussing on your breath or body sensations. It doesn't involve witnessing your mind or visualising anything. Nor does it involve mindless chanting. The technique leads to an altered state of consciousness.

This shows up as highly organised and synchronised alpha waves in both hemispheres of your brain. This is a sign of deep relaxation for the body and rejuvenating rest for the mind. This is the mechanism that delivers the benefits of meditation.  

It's a marvellous stroke of luck that getting into this state is fairly quick and extremely enjoyable once you know how to do it. 

You can find him at Delve Deep 

If you would like to support the Keen on Yoga Podcast please give us a review, or make a donation. 

 

 

Simon Borg-Olivier is a polymath of the movement world. A forerunner of yoga in Australia and a teachers' teacher. He also holds two BSC's an lectures regularly for a number of University science departments. 

This is his second time on our podcast, expressly this time to talk about the impact of breath upon movement in preparation for an upcoming workshop on breath at Keen On Yoga to accompany this podcast.

In this conversation Simon gets quite technical as to how to utilise the diaphragm for the sake of connecting breath to the inner functioning of the body. Not exclusively referring to the yoga-model he synthesises modern science with the yoga-perspective in a way unique to him.

Equally, he explodes yoga myths - such as bandha with a hard abdomen and how this actually freezes the diaphragm and hence the prana in the body.  All this is done with characteristic energy and lucidity and Simon himself in his early sixties is a living example of the power of a breath-based practice.

Liz Koch comes from an academic background as a teacher of sculpture. However, her speciality in this is the spacial element of sculpture. One day she happened upon a yoga class and realised this was what was actually being denied in the dissemination of yoga.  The space for one’s own experience of being, outside notions of alignment focussing on the rigid column of the spine.

Soon after Liz was asked to writing for yoga journal, and these articles ended up turning into the book Core Awareness. This was really the first serious discussion of the psoas, published in the 90s when hardly anyone had heard of it. We covered this  in our 1st podcast together, episode 59.

More recently, Liz has released Stalking Wild Psoas.  This is by way of an answer to the mistaken attempts in the yoga world after helped bring the psoas into general awareness here. Liz feels the yoga students are busy again dominating, essentially ­re-colonising their bodies.

Here we spread out from the physical body.  We look at our attitudes to our own individuation to our socio-economic attitudes to the world, and others in it. Having reduced our own experience of ourselves to something we can isolate, know, control and often commoditise.

This is why I really wanted to do a second session with Liz as the implications of her work on the psoas go deeper than the body. In embodying ourselves in this more visceral, non-linear manner, we notice the kind of narrative of repression and restraint we – generally in the West – have been living under.

I found our talk highly inspiring. There is no time when we might not better look for other perspectives – non colonial established and patriarchal narratives on our own experience than now!

In this Keen on Yoga Podcast Adam talks with Bettina Campolucci Bordi, wellness guru, retreat chef and creator of Bettina’s Kitchen.  She is the author of Happy Food and her second book 7 Day Vegan Challenge, out now, enables anyone to include as many plant based recipes into their repertoire as possible.

Over the last few years she has appeared on Saturday Kitchen, has had recipes featured in the Telegraph and Sunday Times, been endorsed by Jamie Oliver and Conde Nast.

Born in Denmark to a Bulgarian/Danish mother and a Norwegian father Bettina spent her first 11 years in Tanzania and after that in Sweden.  In Tanzania she learned from her mother how to pick the best quality fruits and vegetables from the local markets.  They would also visit a farmer with just a few cows for fresh milk that her mother would magically turn into butter, cream and yogurt.

Her father also cooked and would spend hours preparing his ingredients and making sure each element of the dish was cooked properly and just right.  From these experiences she learned that good things take time.

Holidays spent in Bulgaria included time with her grandmother and auntie who were both amazing cooks.  She recalls sitting at the kitchen table at her auntie’s house watching her make pineapple upside down cake, creme brulee, stews, and breads baked from scratch.

Other summers were spent in Sweden with her paternal grandmother in a tiny summer house in the woods. Also a keen cook with green fingers who had all sorts of wonders growing in her garden, cordials and pickling were her specialty.

The Beginning of Bettina’s Kitchen

Following struggles with personal health issues including PCOS and endometriosis, she soon discovered that what she ate made a significant impact on her physical health.  She found that she was able to manage her conditions and discovered a profoundly positive effect on her mental wellbeing, too.

For Bettina, cooking is a way of inspiring people to include and cook with ingredients that can sometimes be daunting. Her aim is to show others how food can be inspiring, where it comes from and that cooking from scratch is the single most powerful thing you can do for yourself and your family.

In 2011 she entered into the wellness industry running health retreats in Spain as a way to spread her message. She began sharing recipes on Instagram and slowly but surely people wanted more and Bettina´s Kitchen was born.

Food Philosophy

Everything Bettina does is aligned with her philosophy around food and wellness: that we should eat seasonally, locally and from farm to table as much as we can. We should support small businesses within our communities; we must use roots, shoots and all! Cooking waste free is particularly important to her; and above all the best plant food is fuss-free, simple, easy, inexpensive.

Find Bettina

Combining healthy cooking with travel and wellness worldwide and you can find her cooking on and training local kitchen teams with Reclaim Yourself Retreats. Reclaim Yourself speciality is introducing people to remote, magical places including Mongolia, Iceland, and Zanzibar.

She also hosts retreats in her favourite place in the world, Bali as well as her Retreat Chef Academies where you can cook with learn from her experience.

Mariela Cruz is quite a force.  She has been a student of Sharathji Jois since 2003. She first arrived in Mysore to Gokulam and there was no internet so she simply knocked on the door and Pattabhi Jois opened and invited her into the family terrace. 

That same day she met her Guru Sharath and he asked her to stay for one month only. Busy with children and family responsibilities back in her then country Costa Rica she was not able to stay but tasted the honey and could only think about going back to India. 

Mariela's favourite quote is practice and all is coming. She feels our lives will be completely transformed because our minds are made new with our practice. Our lives in samsara will be completely dismantled yet something precious it’s on its way.

She has been to Mysore many times and finished third series in November 2019 with her Guru. She has also assisted him in his shala. Mariela is a lawyer with 3 masters and was appointed Ambassador of Costa Rica to India 2016-2018.

Since then she is lucky to live in India close to her Guruji. Mariela is the mother of Hernan, Adriana, Ariel, Gabriel, Gael, Theo and Matias. She is blessed beyond the beyond with the magic of “Seventh Series.”

She has plenty of experience sustaining the practice of Ashtanga through pregnancies and post partum and the creativity to raise a family and yet hold the demands of practice.

She loves playing the piano. Her favourite composers are Bach, Beethoven, Debussy and Chopin.

Wambui Njuguna-Raisanen is a Kenyan-American based in Finland, passionate about making wellness through yoga and meditation seamlessly engaged in equity and justice so that more people of the global majority can live well and thrive.

Wambui is deeply inspired by spiritual teachers and communities that seek ways to apply the insights from wisdom traditions to situations of social, racial, political, environmental and economic suffering and injustice.

She would like to see wellness spaces engage more in social justice and collective change and activist spaces learn to breathe deeply and practice sustainable self-care in the midst of dismantling systemic oppression. This is her definition of community care. 

Creating wellness spaces that feel more welcoming, inclusive and accessible is of utmost necessity and importance to Wambui. Together with her massage training (Chavutti Thirumal) and meditation advocacy, she strives to work at the intersection of social inclusion, equity and wellness.

Wambui has an easy-going, unassuming way and demonstrates a willingness to be vulnerable and “less than perfect”; which makes others want to exhale deeply and release the pressure of what a spiritual life should be. She shares her life stories and struggles, triumphs and obstacles with an openness that makes you want to examine and tend to your own seeds of greed, hatred and delusion with care, honesty and acceptance.

To learn more about Wambui and her offerings, visit wambuinjuguna.com and  @wellnesswithwambui (IG).

 

Tyson Yunkaporta is an academic, an arts critic, and a researcher who is a member of the Apalech Clan in far north Queensland. He carves traditional tools and weapons and also works as a senior lecturer in Indigenous Knowledges at Deakin University in Melbourne where he currently lives.

His book Sand Talk was published in 2019 to resounding acclaim.  The paradigm-shifting book brings a crucial Indigenous perspective to historical and cultural issues of history, education, money, power, and sustainability - and offers a new template for living.

As an indigenous person, Tyson Yunkaporta looks at global systems from a unique perspective, one tied to the natural and spiritual world. In considering how contemporary life diverges from the pattern of creation, he raises important questions. How does this affect us? How can we do things differently?

In this thoughtful, culturally rich, mind-expanding book, he provides answers. Yunkaporta's writing process begins with images. Honoring indigenous traditions, he makes carvings of what he wants to say, channeling his thoughts through symbols and diagrams rather than words. He yarns with people, looking for ways to connect images and stories with place and relationship to create a coherent world view, and he uses sand talk, the Aboriginal custom of drawing images on the ground to convey knowledge. 

In Sand Talk , he provides a new model for our everyday lives. Rich in ideas and inspiration, it explains how lines and symbols and shapes can help us make sense of the world. It's about how we learn and how we remember. It's about talking to everyone and listening carefully. It's about finding different ways to look at things. Most of all it's about a very special way of thinking, of learning to see from a native perspective, one that is spiritually and physically tied to the earth around us, and how it can save our world. 

Liz is an international teacher and author with 43 years of experience working with and specializing in the psoas. Educating both laypersons and professionals around the world, Liz is recognized by colleagues in the movement, wellness, and fitness professions as an authority on the “core muscle” of the human body. Stalking Wild Psoas is her passion and changing the language of body is her mission.

Liz Koch is the creator of Core Awareness,™ a somatic approach to deepening the experience of the human core. Beginning with the core muscle, the psoas, Core Awareness™ focuses attention on sensation as a means for maturing and developing the proprioceptive nervous system, which is responsible for skeletal alignment, balance, and orientation. Liz is the author of The Psoas Book; Core Awareness: Enhancing Yoga, Pilates, Exercise & Dance; Unraveling Scoliosis CD; The Psoas & Back Pain CD; and she is a contributing author to Maiden, Mother, Crone: Our Pleasure Playlist and Stalking Wild Psoas: Embodying Your Core Intelligence. Her writing has been featured in Yoga Journal, Positive Health, Massage & Bodywork, Massage Magazine, Yoga & Health International, Midwifery Today, Vegetarian Times, and The Doula as well as numerous small health and wellness publications.

Liz Koch is approved by the National Certification Board for Therapeutic Massage and Bodywork (NCBTMB) as a continuing education Approved Provider.

The psoas is considered such an unknown muscle yet so important and powerful. Liz first discovered the psoas while attending a human potential class in Boston over 45 years ago. At that particular moment, the teacher, Robert Cooley, was fascinated with the psoas muscle. Having previously been a dancer, he was exploring how injuries and a lack of movement might be tracked back to the midline or core issues expressed in the iliopsoas complex. Between Liz’s in-depth inquiry and Bob’s encouragement, she eventually shifted my career from being a conceptual artist and sculpture instructor at the Boston Museum School of Fine Arts to the healing arts profession.

While working with her psoas, Liz discovered that she had released years of back pain and emotional distress which awoke within her a deep sense of pleasure. She became passionate that people should know what an extraordinary role the psoas plays in recovering health and gaining a sense of wholeness. When she moved to California in the 1970s, her personal explorations of the psoas catapulted her into her current profession. She began by teaching courses on the psoas muscle for local community colleges, dance departments, and massage school programs.

Her vocation not only evolved throughout the years but also expanded into wider spheres of influence which included being a keynote speaker at two international conferences as well as teaching both national and international workshops and retreats. What began as a personal journey has continued as the psoas is no ordinary tissue, but a profound segway into the rich interior and exterior world of awareness.

 

David, at 78 looks back over his rich life, already having outlived his prognosis with a terminal form of cancer. This episode was therefore extra special for us; deeply poignant and touching at moments, joyous at others, and, if nothing else, seriously thought-provoking.

After growing up gay in a Georgia, USA, where it was not a welcome choice at the time, he escaped from military school (where his step father sent him – to make him a man), by faking a broken-jaw in a compulsory boxing match he was forced to undertake.

From then on, he pursued his main love of dance. Studying under the foremost disciples of Martha Graham in New York, he became a professional dancer and then a teacher , finally moving to Adelaide, Australia where he ran the dance department.

After deciding to marry and have a family, he finally stumbled upon Ashtanga late in the day – at 48 years old. This makes him probably one of the oldest teachers ever to achieve certification. For many years he travelled and taught – he was one of the first teachers to go on the road, His teaching incorporates the lessons gleaned from his career as a dancer, choreographer, and, artist.

More recently, needing to settle down, he headed up the Jois Yoga Shala in Sydney whilst still visiting Mysore each year for 3 months (up until last year), to study and assist Saraswati teach. David is a highly sensitive and thoughtful individual, quite unique to this modern age, and it has been a pleasure to spend this time with him. We, in fact, recorded this episode twice, after technical issues got in the way of our first attempt.

Daniela Bevilacqua, a research associate at the University of SOAS in London, speaks about the Hatha Yoga tradition, the past lack of research and the recent surge of interest in the subject. 

https://www.yogicstudies.com/ys-103 | @dhanya_83

Key Points

·      Hatha Yoga texts have been overlooked in the past, with more focus on the philosophical side of yoga.

·      The recent surge of interest in Hatha Yoga is due to scholars and practitioners addressing the textual sources with a different curiosity.

·      Tapas (austerities) and Hatha Yoga are closely connected, with tapas being a form of inner heat produced through austerities.

·      Sadhus practice extreme body modifications for various reasons, including spiritual devotion, burning karma, and the well-being of society.

·      Further research is needed to explore the historical development of Hatha Yoga and its connection to tapas. Sadhus claim to possess various supernatural powers, such as mind reading and walking on leaves.

·      Teachings and initiations within the sadhu community are often reserved for Indians and not foreigners.

·      Certain sadhu groups have a militant nature and have historically been involved in mercenary activities.

·      Female sadhus face challenges in a patriarchal society and often have to fight against societal norms and expectations. Women from educated, middle-class families are slowly gaining positions in Sadhu society.

·      Being fluent in Hindi and an outsider helped Daniela connect with the Sadhus and gain their trust.

·      Hatha Yoga in the Sadhu society has different layers of meaning, including tapas and manipulation of the subtle body.

·      Modern technology, such as smartphones and social media, has impacted the lives of Sadhus.

·      Daniela formed friendships with some Sadhus and continues to stay in touch with them. 

 

Shanna Small is a writer and Yoga teacher who speaks to the intersectionality of Yoga and social justice.  She has practiced Ashtanga Yoga and studied the Yoga Sutras since 2001. She has studied in Ashtanga in Mysore with Sharath Jois. Shanna studied Sanskrit, the Yoga Sutras and the Hatha Yoga Pradipika with Laksmish in Mysore, India.  

Shanna finds joy in making the Ashtanga practice accessible for all.  She studied with Amber Karnes and Dianne Bondy and is Yoga For All certified. She is a regular contributor for Yoga International, OmStars and the Ashtanga Dispatch.    

She teaches diversity and inclusivity, Yoga Sutras as well as accessibility trainings and workshops. She is a founding member of Yoga For Recovery Foundation, a non-profit that helps those recovering from addiction, trauma and systemic oppression.  Shanna is also certified in the Trauma Conscious Yoga Method.

Shanna is a graduate of Georgia State University and holds a bachelor’s in business with a concentration in marketing. Before becoming a full time yoga teacher, Shanna was a recruiter and ad account executive. 

Dr. Robert Svoboda is the first Westerner ever to graduate from a college of Ayurveda and be licensed to practice Ayurveda in India. During and after his formal Ayurvedic training he was tutored in Ayurveda, Yoga, Jyotish, Tantra and other forms of classical Indian lore by his mentor, the Aghori Vimalananda. He is the author of twelve books including Prakriti: Your Ayurvedic Constitution and the Aghora series, which discusses his experiences with his mentor during the years 1975 – 1983. (Information on all of his books can be found here)

Dr. Svoboda was born in Texas in 1953, and in 1972 earned a B.S. from the University of Oklahoma in Chemistry with a minor in French. After being ritually initiated into the Pokot tribe of northern Kenya as its first white member in June 1973 he moved to India, where he lived from 1973-80 and 1982-86, receiving his Bachelor of Ayurvedic Medicine and Surgery (Ayurvedacharya) from the University of Poona in 1980. In his final year of study at the Tilak Ayurved Mahavidyalaya he won all but one of the University of Poona’s awards for academic excellence in Ayurveda, including the Ram Narayan Sharma Gold Medal.

The Aghori Vimalananda also owned thoroughbred race horses, and Dr. Svoboda served as his Authorized Racing Agent at the Royal Western India Turf Club in Bombay and Poona between 1975 and 1985. He later served as Adjunct Faculty at the Ayurvedic Institute in Albuquerque, NM, and at Bastyr University in Kenmore, WA.

In the years since 1986 Dr. Svoboda has traveled extensively, spending three months per year on average in India. He often speaks on Ayurveda, Jyotish, Tantra and allied subjects in locales across the world. 

Nea established Ashtanga Yoga Dubai in 2013 and the yoga shala Nilaya House in 2017, a yoga studio offering a full range of yoga classes which she runs and teaches from. She received level 2 authorisation from Sharathji Jois in 2010.

She also is an avid student of yoga philosophy as well as running an ethical textile business working with local Indian woman to ensure fair conditions and pay.

In this podcast Nea and Adam are discussing the female menstrual cycle. As a man, you may notice him floundering at points. However, as a teacher of many women he thought it an extremely important subject to learn about.

Nea has been personally involved in charting her own cycle for a number of years now to her own benefit. She discusses the importance of honouring her cycle and the natural ebb and flow of life it suggests.

Therefore, instead of trying to gloss over these cycles, to homogonise our lives it makes more sense to use these natural, biological patterns of the body accordingly and follow their guidance. As they say, there is a season for everything. It appears through our conversation, it is only when you respect and even embrace the winter and spring, that you can also then enjoy the summer.

Nea is currently completing a three-year Yoga History and Philosophy program (Traditional Yoga Studies) and one-year certificate in Ayurveda (American Institute of Vedic Studies). 

Her aim is to empower and inspire students to learn, explore and grow along their own very personal path of yoga, uncovering what brings balance and joy and keeps the flame of yoga burning bright.

 

 

 

Rupert Spira came across the poetry of Rumi at the age of fifteen, in 1975, and soon after this met his first teacher, Dr. Francis Roles, at Colet House in London. Dr. Roles was himself a student of Shantananda Saraswati, the Shankaracharya of the North of India.

Under his guidance Rupert learnt mantra meditation and was introduced to the classical system of Advaita, or non-duality, which formed the foundation of his interest and practice for the next twenty-five years. At the same time he also learnt the Mevlevi Turning, a sacred Sufi dance of movement, prayer and meditation.

During this time he read everything available by the Russian philosopher P. D. Ouspensky and learnt Gurdjieff’s Movements. In the late 1970s he attended Krishnamurti’s last meetings at Brockwood Park, close to his childhood home, and was deeply impressed and influenced by his intellectual rigor and fierce humility. Throughout these years Rupert also studied the teachings of Ramana Maharshi and Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj on a continuous basis.

In the same year that he discovered the poetry of Rumi, Rupert saw a retrospective exhibition of a well-known studio potter, Michael Cardew, at Camberwell Arts Centre in London, an event which was to change the course of his life. Already disenchanted with the scientific path on which he had embarked, he found that pottery provided a new avenue of exploration and experience, and one that was completely consistent with the questions evoked by his encounter with the non-dual understanding.

As a result, in 1977 Rupert left school and enrolled in the Ceramics Department of West Surrey College of Art and Design, under Henry Hammond. In 1980 he moved to Wenford Bridge in Cornwall, where he lived and worked with Michael Cardew, then aged eighty, for the last two years of his life.

Rupert once said that he was completely re-educated during the time he spent with these two founding fathers of the British Studio Pottery Movement, combined with his regular attendance at Colet House. In 1983 Rupert opened his own studio, and over the next thirty years he made pieces that are to be found in private and public collections around the world.

A turning point in the mid-1990s led Rupert to the American teacher Robert Adams, who died two days after Rupert arrived in the US. However, on this visit he was told about another teacher, Francis Lucille, whom he met several months later. The first words he ever heard Francis say were, ‘Meditation is a universal “Yes” to everything’. Although it was the kind of statement anyone might encounter on the spiritual path, this moment was pivotal in Rupert’s life: ‘I realised that I had arrived home, that this encounter was the flowering and fulfilment of my previous thirty years of seeking’. When Rupert asked at that first meeting what he should do next, Francis replied, ‘Come as often as you can’.

Over the next twelve years Rupert spent all the spare time that work and family commitments would allow with Francis, exploring the sense of separation as it appears in the mind in the form of beliefs and, more important, how it appears in the body as feelings of being located and limited. Francis also introduced Rupert to the Direct Path teachings of Atmananda Krishna Menon and the Tantric approach of Kashmir Shaivism, which he had received from his teacher, Jean Klein.

Of the essence of these years, Rupert writes, ‘The greatest discovery in life is that our essential nature does not share the limits or the destiny of the body and mind. I do not know what it is about the words, actions or presence of the teacher or teaching that seem to awaken this recognition of our essential nature as it truly is, and its subsequent realisation in our lives, but I am eternally grateful to Francis for our friendship.’

Rupert lives in Oxford, UK, with his wife, Ellen Emmet, a therapist and yoga teacher in the non-dual tradition of Kashmir Shaivism, and his son, Matthew. He holds regular meetings in the UK, US, Netherlands and Italy, as well as online webinars and Retreats at Home.

 

This is my second interview with Alexander Medin.  Alex has had many incarnations, many lives. However, the common thread I feel running through his history has always been the striving for self-understanding - nothing less than yoga.

I would suggest, this was evident in his younger, unsettled years getting into trouble with the police, becoming Norwegian champion boxer, the professional ballet dancer, actor and finally a Certified Ashtanga yoga teacher.

But, this episode focuses particularly on his most recent work; setting up “Back in the Ring”, a foundation teaching yoga to Norwegian prisoners; many of whom are serving long-term sentences.

Even by Alex’s standards, what he has achieved with this is remarkable, leading to government funding to provide yoga teaching across the board in Norwegian prisons.

In this podcast we discuss the practicalities of this, the difficulties and the achievements. Many of the prisoners have gone on to become yoga teachers in their own right. Some are employed in the running of Alex’s yoga hotel ‘Nosen’ high up in the Norwegian fjords.

Robert Sankara Moses has 50 years’ experience as a teacher of yoga and advaita vedanta.

Born in South Africa, Robert studied architecture, travelled abroad and, in 1972, discovered yoga in the tradition of Swami Sivananda of Rishikesh, India. He served in the International Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centers for 22 years, teaching yoga teacher training and advanced training courses worldwide.

He founded and continues to co-publish Namarupa: Categories of Indian Thought, a magazine about the philosophies and arts of India. Robert leads annual pilgrimages to sacred places of India. 

Since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, Robert has been teaching Pranayama and philosophy courses on Zoom to students from around the world.

Keen on Yoga Podcast with Peg Mulqueen, the forerunner of the Ashtanga podcast and blog with Ashtanga Dispatch. Starting in 2009 I would credit her for providing a general exposure of many of the well known Ashtanga teachers unique to the time. For, most of us, not lucky enough to attend their workshops, this was a democratising of the scene. Moreover it encouraged an unprecedented sense of community spirit.

Peg is also a mother, teacher and dedicated student of Ashtanga in her own right. She has been practicing for almost 20 years. At the same time, bringing up her daughter and spending time as a writer for Yoga Journal. Living on a farm in rural Montanta, she presents to me the picture of a well-rounded, furthermore, accomplished individual.

Peg has interviewed by now all the well-known ashtanga teachers. In addition she is a voice to be listened to in her own right. She is adamant about presenting the practice in a realistic and approachable light. Moreover to women and mothers who are all too often side-lined in their needs, or assumed to be taught the same as men.

Meghan, Peg's daughter “officially” joined her work in 2017. Though she had always been a part of Ashtanga Dispatch, 4 years ago, she really because her right hand and often better half.

Of course, also in this interview Peg shares a few anecdotes about her time running Ashtanga Dispatch. And we talk about the take home points from running a yoga podcast and how it has affected our own practice.

Welcome to the Keen on Yoga Podcast with Angela Jamison. Angela is the founder and director of Ashtanga Yoga Ann Arbor, located in Michigan, USA. 

She grew up on an isolated farm / intentional community in rural Montana, a remote mountain area of the northern US. From there, she was lucky to receive a scholarship to attend college to study Philosophy and Journalism in Oregon. In the year 2000 Angela discovered ashtanga in Seattle. The primary series helped her to heal from severe intestinal parasites acquired while living in Central America. 

In 2001 she moved to Los Angeles to attend grad school at UCLA. Soon afterwards she was hit by a car in a crosswalk. This near fatal accident resulted in a day of full body paralysis. Subsequently her commitment to ashtanga to heal from that trauma was firmed.

She spent the rest of her 20s studying two very different topics with equal intensity – the sociology of American empire, and the practice of ashtanga yoga. It was a wonderful time and place for ashtanga. Of the many practitioners and teachers who helped her, the strongest influences were Maty Ezraty and Chuck Miller. In addition, their student Heather, now Radha Carlisi. However, Dominic Corigliano is the teacher who most impacted her during that time. He taught her to assist him in 2007.

Mysore

In 2009, Angela moved to Ann Arbor for a visiting assistant professor position at the university there. In the same year she travelled to Mysore for the first time to study with R Sharath Jois. After strong encouragement from him, she finally left the university and started teaching yoga full time in 2011. She spent her 30s slowly building community and teaching, with 2-4 months each year in India studying the yoga tradition. Sharath gave her his blessing as a certified teacher in 2017.

The best preparation she had for directing a shala was working a variety of jobs. Including union organizing, waiting tables, administrative positions at Amnesty International and a library, and teaching undergraduates at UCLA. This background led her to see her work both as directing a school – just as our teachers in India model  – and also as a form of community building. Growing up “off the grid” surrounded by survivalists has shaped her idea that ashtanga can be a key resource during times of social upheaval. This is because it helps us cultivate both robust physical health, and robust communities. Thereby allowing us to learn complex forms of empathy and cooperation, which help us in difficult times.

Online Covid Impact

During Covid, her work has mostly migrated online – to a digital platform students built to facilitate ongoing connection and learning. Dozens of students from the early years of the  her work have found their way back to what they call the shadowshala. In addition, new people have found it too. The chance to re-connect with early students who now live around the world, and see people learn to sustain a home practice in the midst of great challenges, has been extremely meaningful. But she is eager to return to the sort of real-live practice that can only happen in a Mysore room with everyone breathing and moving together. 

You can find out more about Angela on her website.

Santina’s journey from suffering to awareness and understanding through yoga has led her to a rich and real study of yoga as a living practice. She holds degrees in Law/Arts from the University of Melbourne as well as a Master of Gestalt Therapy. Santina was given her Level 2 Authorisation to teach Ashtanga Yoga by KPJAYI in 2016.

She believes there are many pathways into and towards healing and inner transformation. After years of anorexia, bulimia, heroin and other substance abuse, she came to understand that these compulsive behavioral patterns were just a means to escape the boxed-up feeling of terror, rage, shame, despair, grief and unworthiness deep within her psyche and physicality.

San has developed an intimacy with the physiology and spirituality of our human form. Her commitment to a life of process, practice and courage cultivates rich soil from which to provide meaningful guidance as an Ashtanga yoga teacher. Her practice embodies the Ashtanga Yoga system, and she has diligently completed the Primary, 2nd and 3rd series of this method under the guidance of Mark Togni.

Both Ashtanga Yoga and Gestalt methods helped her to realise that whenever she wanted to escape herself through compulsive behaviour, what she was really hungry for was a deep and abiding connection with herself that brings forth the joy of being comfortable in her own skin.

It is through Santina’s theoretical and applied educational background that enables her to insightfully and compassionately work with students of all experiences and skills.

“Personal Philosophy of Life, Practice and Process” 

Santina believes that with each breath and in every moment we are in a process of evolving from who we have been to who we are becoming.  Blending yoga asana and the Gestalt Method, she works using an experiential, dialogical and integrative approach to self-discovery and embodied awareness.

Through compassionate understanding, confirmation to present-moment experience and heightened awareness, we can complete what is unfinished from the past and open pathways to our emerging creative selves.

Understanding how our inner processes can function to sustain disruptive patterns, as well as challenge and support the possibilities for creative problem solving, can lead to deliberate actions that transform our relationship to ourselves, to others and to life!

Breathing practice has become increasingly popular, partly at least, as we look for ways to help lessen the anxiety of these most uncertain times we are living through. Harmony is uniquely positioned to guide us in this having studied what she terms as ancient breathing (the subject of a new course she is soon to launch), with both Pattabhi Jois as well as the renowned Sri O.P Tiwariji; the then head of the Kaivalydam Institute for research on yoga near Mumbai in South India.

In this interview, we discussed how best to build up a practice, what breath to start with and the signs or symptoms that we are doing it effectively.  We also talk about the fact that – even without dealing with anxiety – pranayama is most helpful to balance of the intensely stimulating affects of our ashtanga practice on our nervous systems.

For, the practice itself often stimulates the sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight), which can be helpful in resolving trauma. On the other hand, we also need to balance this with tapping into the calming effect of the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest), which is not adequately found addressed in the way most people practice, and want to practice (ie. with a certain speed and dynamism that is invigorating, yet, also needs balance for this reason).

Finally, Harmony shares some of her own experience with using pranayama to fight inflammation, fatigue and digestive-issues. Here, we delve into the science behind it regarding oxygen and Co2 exchange, as well as considering how to commence breathing if you find yourself resistant or even frightened by the prospect of sitting quietly and focussing on your breath.

Dr. Ian Baker discusses the connection between Tibetan yoga and modern postural yoga, specifically Astanga yoga. He explores the origins of postural yoga in Tibet and the Himalayan world, highlighting the common elements and different emphases between traditions. He also delves into the practices of Tibetan yoga, such as Hatha Yoga, Tantra, and the subtle body, which focus on the circulation of prana and the transformation of metabolic heat into mystic fire. 

Connect with Ian Baker

👉 Website: https://ianbakerjourneys.wordpress.com 

👉 Instagram: @ianbaker108 

Connect with Keen on Yoga

👉 Website: www.keenonyoga.com

👉 Instagram:  @keen_on_yoga | @adam_keen_ashtanga

👉 Work Enquiries: info@keenonyoga.com 

Key Points

Tibetan yoga and modern postural yoga share common elements and different emphases.

The practices of Tibetan yoga focus on the circulation of prana and the transformation of metabolic heat into mystic fire.

Tapas (heat) is an important aspect of yoga practice, burning away afflictive emotions and expanding our sense of self.

The origins of postural yoga can be traced back to Tibet and the Himalayan world. Tantric Buddhism originated from the exchange of knowledge along ancient trade routes, such as the Silk Roads.

The cultivation of inner fire, or tummo, is a common practice in various traditions, including the Wim Hof method and ancient Chinese Yangshen traditions.

Transformative heat is associated with powerful goddesses in both Hindu tantra and tantric Buddhist texts.

Tantra embraces a body-positive approach, celebrating sensory awareness and the potential of the human body.

 

Welcome to the Keen on Yoga Podcast with Luke Jordan.

Always feeling that there was something more to life, Luke first began formal study of Eastern mysticism in the 1990s while at University. He plunged headlong into the practise of Ashtanga Yoga in the year 2000.

This began the on-going journey that would take him around the world seeking out experts, gurus and teachers in the field of Yoga and spirituality.

Luke is always seeking to ground his practice and teaching in the wider Yoga philosophical tradition. He holds a Master’s degree in Indian Religion (his main focus being the deeper meaning of the Yoga philosophy).

He remains an avid student of mystical spiritual traditions and peppers his ‘teachings’ with insights drawn from his readings of the worlds spiritual traditions and mythologies.

We are sure you will enjoy this yoga podcast with Luke Jordan, you can find out more about him on his website.

Welcome to the Keen on Yoga Podcast with Max Strom. A 3x TEDx speaker, author, and global breathing teacher, known for teaching breathing patterns for personal transformation worldwide. Max developed a groundbreaking system of breathing techniques designed to alleviate crippling anxiety, depression, PTS and sleep problems. His field-tested method focuses on the causes rather than the symptoms and is known to produce rapid results.

Max has had a career as a lead singer in his own band, and then a screenwriter. He was 38 when I took the first step on his path as a yoga teacher. Pushed into it by friends he was still very insecure as he taught his first few classes. He's come a long way since then as a speaker and teacher and he credits this to the inner work he has done.

Through breathing techniques, meditation, inspiring spiritual teachers and writing, Max has reconnected with his inner child and learned how to give him the love and understanding that he so desperately needed.

Max has now found his voice. From feeling like an odd and insignificant loner, he has found the teacher, leader, and the storyteller in himself. Sharing his personal stories with people from different cultures, religions and backgrounds creates understanding and connection. Ultimately, we’re not that different from each other. Max believes that when we learn to understand one another, we learn to understand ourselves. We are all teachers in our own way, and we all matter.

We hope you enjoy the Keen on Yoga Podcast with Max Strom. You can find out more about him on his website.

Grischa was a hard-working young software architect in the exciting early days of the world wide web and raved through Berlin’s legendary techno scene on the weekends.  He was almost 30 when he dropped into a Shivananda Yoga class and confused his physiological fitness and flexibility with yogic qualities. Blessed be his ignorance!

His hunger for more drove him to the only Aṣṭāṅga class in Berlin which left him sore for a week and completely hooked. He soon stopped partying and drinking and started teaching ashtanga to friends. He eventually gave up his IT career and opened Berlin’s first Aṣṭāṅga Yoga Shala. For the first years his excited ego kept rushing him “up” the ladder of the Aṣṭāṅga Yoga series’. However, he started to wonder if it was taking the right path. As he questioned the real meaning of yoga he began to question teachers’ techniques of strong adjustments etc.  He felt the unhealthy power structures did not meet traces of yogic ideals.

Ready to give up on Aṣṭāṅga, Grischa met Richard Freeman whose unique teaching approach opened his eyes for the mind-blowing world of the ancient scriptures. In addition he saw how egotistical motivations taint our actions, even Yoga practice. Paradoxically he also realized the Aṣṭāṅga method needed to appeal to my ego to keep him engaged on the path towards self-inquiry. All this fundamentally changed the way he lived his life, practiced, and taught Yoga.

Grischa loves the Aṣṭāṅga Vinyāsa Yoga method. Mysore Style could easily make it the safest traditional Hatha Yoga practice system. However, he feels this yogic toolbox has not always been used wisely. Injuries are the most obvious symptoms of an ego-driven practice and teaching approach.

Just like learning to play an instrument well for music we must practice posture, breath, philosophy etc. with good technique. Yet, both music and Yoga can only arise from effortless concentration and introspection, not from blindly following rituals and rules.

Yoga Sutras & The Environment

Above all, two factors have initiated the most fundamental and most challenging transformation of all. Grischa started using Yoga Sūtra’s Sadhana chapter as the reference of all Yoga practice and teaching principles.

Even more importantly the birth of his two children broadened his perspective on literally everything. He realized that an infinite number of beings will have to live with the effects of our collective war against the planet. Karma is unfailing.

Yoga means looking at all our actions without filters, without ignoring or justifying any of it. He realized he had been fueling global warming with tank loads of kerosene for an obscene yogic self-improvement trip for decades.

Grischa decided to completely stop air travel and started to fight against our collective irresponsibility. His dream is that all Yogis on the planet wake up and become models for a sustainable and selfless lifestyle. Preserving the planet for our children is more important than all yoga poses that have ever been practiced together.

We hope you enjoy this yoga podcast with Grischa Steffin. You can find more about his on his website.

 

Actions speak louder than words, and Adam Husler (E-500RYT) uses both to understand universal balance in the practice of yoga.

Adam draws experience from a variety of lives lived off the mat, from law school, the boxing ring, the ultramarathon path and the non-profit sector. He brings a unique perspective to those who seek more from yoga than making pretty shapes.

He offers creative, effective and clearly-sequenced teachings that focus on balancing flexibility and strength; physically and mentally. Inspired by a fascination with anatomy, Adam specialises in Alignment-Based Vinyasa Yoga, informed by years of study and with Jason Crandell, and assisting him on a number of advanced teacher trainings.

Being further influenced by; the spiritual wisdom of renowned meditation teacher Michael Stone, the dynamic teachings of Cameron Shayne and the anatomical knowledge of Tom Myers, Adam consistently refines his teaching method both as instructor and student.

Adam specialises in a signature style of Alignment-Based Vinyasa— fuelled by a fascination with anatomy and a desire to ask ‘why?’. Classes are less focused on dramatic postures as an end in themselves, but on becoming more engaged, attentive, integrated and focused in asanas, as we explore our breath, mind and body at our individual threshold.

Each month, Adam’s public classes have a different theme and each week a difference sequence, all featuring; long holds, controlled yet dynamic movements, intelligent alignment, anatomical precision, non-absolutism and a focus on integrity, over depth, in postures. They’re also dogma free!  Adam seeks to remind all that an asana practice is a very subjective experience, and whether you are a yoga teacher or new to the practice, there’ll be plenty of options to challenge all in their journey of self enquiry.

Early Roots

Raised in Birmingham, Adam found his way north to the chilly hills of Durham to continue a path to a lucrative legal career. However, legal books soon got put aside and Adam began to work with underprivileged teens,  young offenders institutions; occasionally in other countries too, like Nepal and Hounduras.

• Managing 2 brand new youth-hubs and event spaces in Central London. Including theatre, recording studios, commercial catering business, event space, gym, dance studios and more.
• Specialising in Youth Leadership and Life Coaching for 13-25 year olds with Changemakers. Clients including Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital
• Agreed to run 5 marathons and an 100km ultramarathon in 3 months.
• Has a black belt in Shotokan karate.
• Physically ‘peaked’ as a 110kg weight lifting boxer with mutton chops.
• Doesn’t often read books twice, unless they’re by Albert Camus.
• Was briefly the face of Samsung Portugal.

We hope you enjoy the Keen on Yoga Podcast with Adam Husler. You can find more about him on his website.