General overview of what I do
I offer pathways to suit your yoga journey…
Be you a beginner, or a more advanced practitioner; an individual, a couple, a family or a small group, there is something for you!
There are general classes for beginners, re-starters and improvers plus chair yoga for medical referrals; And, there are more bespoke individualised sessions designed for your specific needs and wishes.
For the more experienced practitioner Core Yoga strengthens and stabilises the joints, develops the abdominals appropriately for Yoga, engages and grows the correct back, shoulder and arm muscles for balance work, and evolving the deployment of the upper leg and gluteus muscles to help you improve your current Yoga movement and expand your repertoire. Also, for the well established practitioner, the Stretchy Yoga works to lengthen, mobilise and open the back, articulate and extend the leg and arm actions and broaden your repertoire by exploring the different stylistic variations of asanas to enhance your flexibility, mobility and agility so you can work towards the higher level more complex postures with a well balanced suitably prepared Yoga body.
There are specific sessions, too, for runners / sports people, and these can include rehabilitation and theraputic movement. I have also provided yoga programmes for people post surgery and from medical referral groups. Chair Yoga and Wellness Yoga are also offered in order to get people moving properly again by awakening the correct postural muscles and redeveloping your deportment.
At the more escapist, “uber” relaxing or spiritual end of the yoga spectrum I have also delivered Sound Baths, Sound Bath Yoga! and I have occasional flavours of these experiences filtering into my regular classes for a few weeks every year!
I can offer corporate days & half days plus “Stressed Execs” … in an office/space near you! Decompressing the spine, addressing the rounded upper backs and the achey backs from sitting at a desk for years or from years of being sat at the wheel of a car, as well as helping people to calm down, manage anxiety and “breathe”. Incidentally, my early morning “Wellness” classes are designed to address the postural alignment issues of people going to work at a desk/computer.
Yogaman (Yoga for “blokes”) is on offer as a one off class or as individual sessions; And, Wilderness Yoga (in parks, gardens and countryside venues!) including Yoga walks is available for both small groups and individuals.
Find your pathway! Reach out, find your direction of travel and let your Yoga journey begin / continue!
My approach, in what I do …
… is eclectic, drawing on a variety of Yoga practices in order to make the Yoga as accessible as is possible. I utilise a range of styles to match the yoga shapes to the way different bodies move, and I give you the choice as to which version of an asana feels right in your body. To this end I deploy blocks, bricks, straps, bolsters and cushions plus paralettes as well as no props at all!
There is both a gentleness and a challenge in the sessions in order to counter the harshness of life beyond the yoga studio and so as to help people endure, recover and overcome the pressures and consequences of the “rat-race” of everyday living. Decompressing the spine, reducing the tension in the neck and shoulders and re-awakening the postural muscles to address the imbalances that accrue in our bodies as a consequence of years of being desk / computer bound , driving / commuting for many hours and generally sitting. Encouraging you to focus on your body, and what it senses and helping you to become aware of the subtlties of movement as we make the unconscious conscious, is as much a means of redirecting your thoughts and escaping the trials and tribulations of the day as it is moving in order to counter act the poor posture and the mis-shaping of the body that occurs as the day passes by.
I like to ‘peeling away the layers” so to speak, opening channels, and tackling the obstacles that prevent us from moving correctly with the right sequence of nuero-muscular engagement with the correct alignment. To these ends I use yoga props such as straps, bricks, blocks, bolsters, blankets, walls and chairs with a view to progressing towards no props at all.
Yoga is as much about helping people find belief in themselves, developing confidence in movement, discovering how to tune in with their bodies, rekindling connections between the mind and body, as well as to fostering a sense of joy from the body in motion. Yoga also strives to help people find a moment of balance and harmony that they can take away and build on elsewhere in their lives; to this end yoga goes beyond the mat!
““Although yoga has its origins in ancient India, its methods and purposes are universal, relying not on cultural background, faith or deity, but simply on the individual. Yoga has become important in the lives of many contemporary Westerners, sometimes as a way of improving health and fitness of the body, but also as a means of personal and spiritual development.” ”
What can be achieved through yoga?
an awareness, in using the body, the breath and the mind as tools to make us aware of ourselves not just the body, breath and mind, but within our environments and as a part of nature.
an unravelling, unknotting and ironing out the crumples and crinkles both in the muscles and tendons in our body and the blocks and stops in our minds. Thus leading to the expansion of the sensitisation and consciousness which makes us increasingly aware of both our own body’s feedback mechanisms and the physical tension knots that the mind can generate in our bodies.
focusing on the coordination of the breath, the mind and the spinal column as the starting points for observing the connections and interconnections within our whole system of being.
an awareness of consequences and cause and effect: How the movement of the different body parts impacts on our breathing and vice versa. How the movement of our centre of gravity alters our posture. How the movement of a limb challenges our centre of gravity.
a sense that the more aware we are the more we understand. This impacts how we see and appreciate the world around us and we start observing cause and effect, and balance and imbalance elsewhere in the world beyond the yoga mat.
a correcting of the imbalances and a seeing the unseen tensions within ourselves first and impacting on the things we do have control of... our bodies and minds,
providing an antidote or counterpoint for a generation constantly trying to achieve its target, if not in the office, then in the gym. Such aggressive focus on goals makes us forget consequences of our decisions, at work, in life, and on the environment
realising it is not about obsessing over goals and intentions, or targets and standards, or constant measuring and assessing…its about just doing and being! It is about a natural flow and organic evolving of asanas / postures, mind and body; it is about creating a sense of harmony; and, it is about us emerging as our true selves.
tuning in to our internal and external environments - our body-mind and the world outside and about us.
