The word Yoga means “union” in Sanskrit, the language in ancient India where yoga originated. Yoga is intended to unite themind and body.

Many people still think of yoga as just stretching or sitting in meditation. But yoga is much more than just stretching and meditation. Yoga is really about calming the fluctuations of the mind and creating balance in the body through developing both strength and flexibility. This is created by practicing yoga asanas, each of which has a specific purpose and physical benefit.

At One Yoga’s Introduction to Yoga workshop is designed to help you explore the fundamentals of yoga. You will create a foundation based upon breathing techniques, primary yoga postures and universal principles of alignment. This workshop is conducted in one three hour session taught by Mary Bruce.

Over the course of the workshop, individual attention and hands-on adjustments will give you the necessary tools to progress to our ongoing classes. The Intro to Yoga workshop provides the optimal environment for an experienced instructor to become familiar with you and recommend classes that are most suitable to your needs.

Mary Bruce is a registered Yoga Alliance Teacher and Anusara certified by John Friend. She is also one of Rod Stryker's senior students and a leading teacher of Pure Yoga. Mary masterfully combines over 10-years of practice and teaching to create a style of yoga that weaves the best and richest of the ancient and modern traditions. Mary Bruce’s teaching style is both vibrant and accessible. She envisions yoga as a vehicle to guide her students to their own radiant center.

November 2008

Jim Bennit has studied several styles of Yoga throughout the last decade. He now studies and assists with master teacher Rod Stryker in the Para Yoga® lineage. Jim incorporates asana, pranayama, bandha, mudra, elements of Ayurveda, kriya (moving awareness on the breath), pratyahara and dharana techniques into a balanced practice which works on a physical, energetic and psychic level. Expect to leave Jim’s class with the body feeling a little lighter and the mind more clear.

By illuminating the practices, challenges, purpose and potential of Yoga as a spiritual journey, the Sutras map the path to realizing life's most precious treasures.

Man's supreme potential unfolds in the state of Yoga. Yoga is the revelation of perfect clarity, limitless intelligence, lasting peace, and freedom in action. Yoga practice, "culminating in the heights of wisdom and compassion," can be defined as those processes that enable us to become what is in our heart of hearts we aspire to be. Written in 200 B.C., Patanjali's Yoga Sutra is the singular text that illumines the path of Yoga more clearly and systematically than anything before, or after.

The transcendent wisdom of the Sutras integrates the sciences of awakening body, mind, breath, soul, spirit, and creator. The word, "Sutra," means, "thread." The text is called the Yoga Sutra because it threads together all the diverse teachings of Yoga into a single body of knowledge. While the Sutras are intended to be practical, its scope and precision requires the guidance of the highest kind of teacher to reveal its subtle and hidden power. Study of the Sutras accelerates the journey of personal growth as it deepens understanding of the Divine potential of Yoga and life. By illuminating the practices, challenges, purpose and potential of Yoga as a spiritual journey, the Sutras map the path to realizing life's most precious treasures.

This five-day practice and Teacher Training Intensive is open to all interested students. Designed to enrich dedicated practitioners, aspiring teachers, or those already teaching, the training consists of two parts: Open Morning Practices and Afternoon Training Sessions.

Morning practices are open to all dedicated practitioners (participation in the training is not required). These 2 1/2 hour practices, led by Rod, are devoted to unfolding a particular teaching of the Yoga Sutras. Emphasizing direct experience these sessions survey the most relevant and powerful themes of the Sutras by weaving together dynamic Asana, Vinyasa, Pranayama, and meditation practices.

Afternoon Training sessions (open to all interested students, teachers and non-teachers alike) deepen our exploration through lectures, additional practices, and Q & A sessions. Our focus is to outline Yoga's path toward self-mastery, and how Yoga can, if properly understood and practiced, remove those things that keep us from experiencing our highest aspirations. As a whole, the Training aims to exalt teachers and non-teachers alike by providing a vision to see oneself and one's practice (and/or one's students' practice) with sublime understanding, compassion, and crystal-like clarity.

 

One need only hear the soothing voice of Mary Bruce to know where to look for relaxation and renewal. Join Mary for a three-day workshop as she guides you through the physiology of stress and relaxation. Learn how to teach and structure restorative poses for the individual student, including those with special needs. You will practice helping one another into and out of these powerful therapeutic postures using mats, blocks, straps and blankets to create a deeply restorative experience.

A Relax & Renew trainer, Mary brings a wealth of knowledge & gentle strength to her teachings. Mary is a registered Yoga Alliance teacher, is Anusara certified by John Friend, a senior student of Rod Stryker's and a leading teacher of Para Yoga®. She masterfully combines over 10-years of practice and teaching, creating a yoga that weaves the best and richest of the ancient and modern traditions. She will draw from this background to present a nurturing yoga experience that comforts, soothes and inspires.

Please bring props if you have them: 2 blankets, an eye pillow, a strap, and a block.