Yoga as a full path and scope of practice offers everything one needs for a contented heart, peaceful mind, healthy body, and a well-lived life. Yoga as a life practice is to align with the felt sense of what's happening in any given moment, and to bridge the gap between one's inner and outer life. Most of what is offered in the United States Yoga scene is the physical practices, often amped up to fast paced, and fitness based, with little discussion of the depths of the spiritual side or subtleties of the practice. There are some teachers and studios out there bringing the balance of softer practices, stillness practices, and illuminating the studies of subtle body work, somatics, gentle movements, restorative, and yin style practices – but those are in the minority! If none of these words make sense, then keep googling! Or give me shout and we can make time to chat about it all.
Yoga is not a religion, or a physical fitness program, but an entire scope of disciplines, values, and inquiries that connect one with the felt sense of who and what they truly are. While Yoga is a philosophy, it is one that lays its trust in the Divine. It can be included in any religious tradition and simply asks of someone to find, strengthen, and reside in one's true nature. Easy to say, simple in concept, and the difficult work of a lifetime. : )
"Asana" is the name for the poses of Hatha Yoga, the movement (and stillness) practices of Yoga. Most yoga classes in America are a modern postural movement experience that grew up in the fitness culture. That has it's own value, and leaves a lot out. The asana classes I teach always have a philosophical and spiritual teaching woven throughout. I often call the movement classes I teach...
...as a way to set my style apart from the typical vinyasa or flow style classes out there. My classes are not predictable and everyone is welcome to do whatever they need or want at any time! I move slow, offer precisioning, and vary the intensity. I pull from many styles and modalities to keep the movement inspired, challenging, and interesting. The word "vinyasa" is often presented as synonymous with "flow". This is inaccurate. It actually means, "to place in a certain way". Combining that original meaning of vinyasa and playfully replacing the "vin" with "yin" I feel captures the essence of my classes as slow, deliberate, feelingful, potent, grounded, and offering a space to play way outside the typical predictability of modern postural Yoga in America. Ultimately you'll have to try my classes to find out.
Yoga Therapy (YT) is a fast growing field today, and was little known when I became an accredited Yoga Therapist in 2015. YT is all inclusive of what Yoga is, and makes room for a particular need being illuminated, met, transformed and healed. That need can be working with injury of the body, of the psyche, or heart, or all three -- as they are not separate. Yoga therapy can offer refinement in relationships with self, one's parts, or other beings. Maybe someone wants to understand a particular movement of the body, a family of poses, or a part of one's body that doesn't feel totally connected or whole. Yoga Therapy is digging into questions in the interest of connection, understanding, learning and growing. Anything applies and it's all valid!