YOGA IS QUIET. LOUD. HARD. EASY. FUN. WORK. EXHILARATING. SOOTHING. ATHLETIC. SOFT. PLAYFUL. RIGOROUS. HOT. COLD. LEFT. RIGHT. UPSIDE DOWN. RIGHT SIDE UP. BREATHING IN. BREATHING OUT.
CELEBRATION OF LIFE. REMINDER OF IMPERMANENCE.
IT IS ALL OF THESE THINGS AT ONCE. AND IT IS NEVER BORING.
I started practicing yoga in graduate school in 2010.
A friend convinced me to buy a two week beginner special at Wake Up Yoga in West Philadelphia. Yoga was a major stretch for me. I was a bookish toe-walker. Definitely not an athlete. Deep in the thicket of grief from losing my father to a heart attack when he was 53 and I was 24 years old. Overwhelmed by the demands of the life of the mind.
I found that by turning the volume down on ideas and turning the volume up on my breath a few times a week, I was a better scholar, teacher, friend, and partner. Yoga offered the tools to take up space in all directions, soften my Achilles tendons, and keep writing.
Since then, I’ve practiced and taught yoga on three continents.
I completed my first 200 hour training in London in 2018 and another in Point Reyes in 2021. I’ve had the pleasure of learning from a variety of teachers who bring their own unique approach to this practice.
I teach a smooth and steady vinyasa flow to stretch, strengthen, and clear the body and mind. I also teach yin classes that work with gravity, time, and introversion to soften and find ease. I’m less concerned with how any one posture looks in the body and more concerned with how it feels in the body.
A daily yoga and writing practice informs the teaching practice.
At home, I approach the mat as a space to feel whatever needs feeling. On some days, that means a celebration of the raw pleasure of being a body that moves and breathes. On other days, the practice is visceral, intense, strong, and tuned into working with different energetic registers to unbind the bonds of sorrow. Sometimes practice is ten minutes of Legs Up The Wall or finding five minutes of stillness.