Yoga
Yoga Offerings
Yoga Nidra Seminar The conscious practice of Deep Relaxation. See sidebar for Breitenbush Hot Springs workshop, May 2009! Also available to groups and in private instruction.
Private Lessons: a wonderful option to enhance, customize, educate, refine, and prepare you for your practice, whether at home or in classes. Please see my “Sessions” page for fee scale.
My Yoga Style: My background in yoga was originally from the Satyananda schools in New Zealand and Australia in the early 1980’s. My most recent training is from the Ananda school in California, which is based on the teachings of Paramhansa Yogananda (the author of Autobiography of a Yogi). In 2001 I completed their 200-hour Yoga Teacher Training, and received certification from the National Yoga Alliance as a Registered Yoga Teacher.
My style is gentle to moderate – more about centering, stretching, strength and mobility than about perspiration or power, and very much about stress reduction through breathwork, consciousness and relaxation training. Part of the awareness development practice I offer is through teaching about prana (life-force) and the chakra system, ancient components of yoga which work with the subtle energy centers of the body. I am dedicated to bringing the benefits of yoga to everyone interested, regardless of their physical challenges.
My Yoga History: After five years of taking yoga classes in the mid-1970s, my first serious Yoga Teacher Training was while I was traveling in Australia, New Zealand and Fiji. There I studied at the Satyananda ashrams, (nearly choosing to become a monk, but not quite!). Upon my return to the U.S., I continued to study and teach yoga in Montana. During this time I also trained intensively for five years with a chakra-based program of self-development, which while not taught as “yoga”, has informed my chakra-based yoga practice immensely.
I have taught and studied yoga ever since, in all my locations: New Mexico, Pennsylvania, California, Oregon and Scotland. I have used yogic concepts and practices, along with my other background, in developing several professional seminars, titles of which include The Healthier Healer, The Gift of Touch, and Deep Relaxation. Since moving to the Corvallis area, I have taught at Linn-Benton Community College (in both yoga and relaxation/massage), Timberhill Athletic Club, the Department of Energy and the Oregon School for the Blind, as well as group classes and private lessons.
In the summer of 2001, I completed a month-long 200 hour Teacher Training at the Ananda school, the Expanding Light Retreat Center in northern California, which qualified me as a Registered Yoga Teacher with the Yoga Alliance (YA). The YA is an organization dedicated to establishing standards of safety and competence for yoga instructors, while honoring the vast range of variations in the ancient yogic tradition. I have returned to Ananda for additional courses, including Advanced Pranayama and Yoga For Special Needs. I am passionate about yoga, and about life. I am honored and eager to help guide you on this many-petalled path. I thank you and all my other teachers, and hope that I may be of service to you.