Posts In: teacher training

by Olivia Cecchettini

“Living Your Yoga: Finding the Spiritual in Everyday Life”

by Judith Hanson Lasater

Summary: You don’t have to go to a mountaintop in order to have a spiritual experience. Living Your Yoga makes it clear that spirituality can be encountered anywhere, at any time. I appreciate that this is the biggest lesson Judith Lasater wants to share because it is simple and profound.

Lasater provides examples of everyday situations that become the basis of lessons, learning and growth. Honoring the wisdom of the Yoga Sutras and the Bhagavad Gita, Lasater shares off-the-mat practices to guide you into deeper relationships with yourself, your family, friends, and the world.

Why I Love It: Living Your Yoga is a beautiful reminder to slow down, stay present and practice gratitude. In our fast-paced world, life can so easily feel overwhelming. It is more important than ever to meditate and discover the place of wisdom within. This book reminds the reader that there is nowhere you can physically go to find that place. Instead, you can use the tools of meditation and present-moment awareness to rediscover what is already within you.

Recommended For: This book is a great foundation for individuals starting the yogic path; someone ready to cross the bridge from the mind of yoga into its heart.

Living Your Yoga was given to be by a friend during my first Vinyasa 200 hour teacher training and I absolutely loved it. It opened my eyes to new ways of being compassionate with myself and taught me how to access a place of spirituality more readily in my everyday life.

I hope you enjoy it and I invite you to pass it along when you’ve finished. Just the same way it came into my life, let’s keep the spirit of giving going. Ciao!

Olivia Cecchettini
Contributing Writer

Olivia’s yoga journey began in 2003. She is certified in Vinyasa, Hatha, and Aerial Yoga and holds a Masters degree in Spiritual Psychology. She believes the mind, body, soul connection is sacred and encourages her students explore and expand within their own bodies and consciousnesses.

guest post by Dina Weldin

“Your husband is in the military?!”

I hear this question all the time. I get it. You think, yoga teacher and military man, how does that work?

The truth is that yoga and the military go together quite serendipitously.

I’d been practicing yoga for about five years when I met my husband. We met, we dated, he went off to training, we got married, and before I knew it, he was leaving for deployment. Along with the pride, love, and honor I feel being a military spouse, there is also the worry, uncertainty, and fear.

Is he alright? When will I hear from him again? How long will it take the mail to deliver his package this time?

As month three of deployment arrived, I took a giant leap of faith and did something I’d always wanted to do but had never “found the time or the money” before – I enrolled in Yoga Teacher Training at Yoga One.

I learned so many things during the weeks of teacher training but what I didn’t expect to learn was something I will treasure beyond time. I learned I am so much stronger than I knew. Not a physical strength, but an emotional, mental, and spiritual strength I didn’t know I possessed. The challenges of deployment, though always looming, were not insurmountable. My yoga practice and the beautiful community of yogis in teacher training were always there to support me.

Here is what I found to be true:

Breath is life and life is breath. We don’t often get a chance to just listen to ourselves breathe. When was the last time you stopped, felt your heart beat, and actually listened to yourself inhale and exhale? This is such a powerful tool when going through worry and stress of any kind, especially in the military world. On the days I felt my world was collapsing, all I had to do was stop and listen to my breath. It was always there for me, every single time. Calm your breath to calm your mind.

Life is about right now. I felt victim to living in a constant state of “what if?” What if I can’t do this alone? What if something happens to him? Instead of “what if?” try “what is?” What is happening right now? What is true is what is in front of us in this very moment. Yoga teaches us present moment awareness which creates gratitude for what is right now: Life, Breath, Connection.

Community is everything. The last five letters in that word – unity – this is the literal definition of the word yoga. To be united with our breath, with our community, with our friends, and with our family, whomever you choose to call your family, this is truly what yoga is all about at its very core. Whether I am alone on my mat in my home, or in a class full of 100 yogis I have never met, we are united. And having my fellow trainees, Yoga One family, my amazing sets of parents, my beautiful friends, military community—that is where I find strength as a military spouse.

When I think about the military-yogi connection, it all makes perfect sense. Feel present in your life. Live it for what it is, not what it should have been or what it could be. Draw energy from your community on days you don’t have any of your own. And finally, find your breath every single day. It can be as simple as that, just breathe. You are exactly where you need to be. 

Are you a service member or military spouse interested in yoga? 

Yoga for Vets offers a listing of classes around the country for free or reduced rates for current service members. 

MyCAA is an excellent resource for military spouses looking to gain portable career training, one option is to become a yoga teacher! Yoga One Teacher Training proudly accepts MyCAA candidates.

Dina Weldin
Guest Writer

Dina fell in love with yoga ten years ago on the east coast and currently teaches all over San Diego in many unique environments. She has a diverse yoga background and incorporates attention to mindfulness, breath and alignment in her teachings. When not practicing yoga, she can be found on doggie beach with her husband Will and dog Mar.

We are one month away from our Yoga One Teacher Training Summer Intensive!! Wohoo!! There are still spots available, call 619-294-7461 to reserve yours today. The course dates are August 13-30, 2014, more information at Yoga One

Our teachers are getting ready to welcome the new class of aspiring yoga teachers and yogis who simply want to deepen their understanding of this amazing practice –

will YOU join them?

Our Yoga One Teacher Training Graduates of 2013 are already leading students and sharing the joys and benefits of yoga with others! Congratulations again yogis and thank you for your great energy! Here is Part 2 of their post-training reflections. Click here to read Part 1. 

What excites you the most about teaching yoga to others?
Do you have any fears? If yes, how do you move beyond them?
If you don’t plan on teaching, how did YTT deepen your personal practice?

Monique: 

I love seeing the light turn on behind my students’ eyes when they tune in to themselves or realize their true inner strength. I do have fears; the fear of not knowing enough mainly. I face the fear by trusting in myself and pushing the edges of my comfort zone consciously, just like in yoga. I’d like to teach communities that can’t afford yoga and aren’t as exposed to yoga but could benefit greatly from it. YTT has deepened my own practice externally and internally in powerful ways. My practice will never be the same again, and that’s a good thing.

Kim: 

I don’t plan to teach but I will continue to attend several classes a week at Yoga One. The teacher training has been so comprehensive in its scope from philosophy to anatomy and the business of yoga, too. I especially appreciate the detail that Diana and Amy gave to every pose, the alignment and their benefits. I’ll have a much more thorough approach in my own practice when I’m led by any of the great Yoga One instructors. I’m also more confident with partner practice after all of our experience throughout the training!

Sabine: 

It’s amazing how much of what I’ve learned so far about alignment, yoga philosophy – the balance of opposites, mindfulness and being present in the moment – has infused my daily life and has already changed how I feel and how I handle challenging situations. It is as if yoga is everywhere! I feel so blessed to have such inspiring and amazing teachers: Diana, Amy, Michael and Rachel and Wren. You can feel that they are teaching from a place of truth, inspiration, integrity, love and grace. All of us teacher trainees form this kind and supportive community that fosters the emergence of wonderful future yoga teachers; each with special gifts to share. I am so grateful to be part of this experience.

Corinne: 

I’m most excited about the people I’ll get to meet through teaching yoga! I’ve already met so many fantastic people just being at Yoga One for two months and I know there’s a whole wide world of amazing people out there already practicing yoga or wanting to begin! If I can bring even half of the love, kindness and support to my teaching as Amy and Michael and the teachers at Yoga One have shown me through their teaching, then I’ll be doing something right!

When I started teacher training my biggest fear was that I wasn’t flexible enough to be a yoga instructor and that I couldn’t twist myself into a pretzel. As it turns out, flexibility is only a part of the yoga practice and can be increased with time and dedication. The most valuable lesson I learned throughout the training was that nobody’s practice looks the same and that everyone’s bodies are constructed in different ways. Over the course of the these 8 weeks, my fears have been replaced with the knowledge of proper alignment, linking my breath to movement and listening to what my body needs.

It’s the end of our 2013 Yoga One Teacher Training course and we’re so proud of our new graduates! They not only have the technical knowledge to begin their next journey teaching but also the mental and emotional strength and awareness needed. Teacher training is such a vast experience, filled with learning and growth both on the mat and off. We wanted to honor this place of newfound knowledge and their first eager steps of teaching others by checking in with our recent grads for their thoughts on the following questions:

What excites you the most about teaching yoga to others?
Do you have any fears? If yes, how do you move beyond them?
If you don’t plan on teaching, how did YTT deepen your personal practice?

Janssen: 

What excites me most about teaching yoga is the opportunity to take something so amazing, weave myself into it, and then take this wonderful combination of wisdom, love, and openness and show others how they can make it something they love as well. It will never just be me teaching because there is always something to be learned, and I love learning!

I am plenty scared that I’m not good enough or prepared enough or that I’m going to put myself out there and fail. But what always stays with me is the quote, “shoot for the moon, even if you miss you will land among the stars.” That has never been more true or more applicable. 

Dina: 

Do I have fears? Absolutely! What if I forget what pose comes next in my sequence? What if my students don’t like me? What if I can’t demonstrate a pose? What if nobody shows up? Or worse, what if a pregnant woman shows up? Ah!  The list of “what ifs” goes on and on. The best way for me to overcome these fears is to breathe, practice, be present in the now, not what could happen in the future, and enjoy the ride. Enjoy the ride of guiding yogis through a beautiful, safe practice. Everything else will follow.

Romy: 

I’m not still sure if I will teach, there is so much information to learn and to feel confident about. If I decide to teach, it excites me to be the channel for others to find their inner strength, happiness, and peace. I would like to help others in their transformational path to balance, freedom and awareness.

Of course I have fears, but I diminish them by moving into the “fear'” itself. Not letting my mind over-think the “fear” so it doesn’t get bigger and stronger with my own thinking of an unreal result. It is much easier to conquer the fear than to live with it, you just need to take that first step and move into it.

My personal practice has benefited greatly with the training. Not just with my practice on the mat being conscious and aware of my movements, breath, alignment and how differently I was doing things; but with my yoga practice off the mat as well by taking all the good to my daily life (just being, breathing, being aware, balanced, patient, tolerant, healing… so many things). This journey has helped me conquer areas of myself that I was afraid of, healed my emotions, and allowed me to know myself better, to accept myself and to be a better person. There is so much room for being a better person, and this training is just the beginning. I see things in a different way, in a better way.

This will be a two-part series, check back next week to hear more from our amazing graduates.

Since I’m working through the same postures multiple times a day, I get to observe my attitude and attention (or lack thereof) each time. I am seeing my limits reached and then asking myself what I need to do to last a little longer, to dig a little deeper, to honor my present moment more fully.

Surprisingly, there is something new and untapped every time I return to my mat. My legs are tired, but my standing poses have never felt more solid. My body is achy, but every down-dog feels like the first one ever. My mind is so alert from the accelerated learning that stillness has never been more clearly defined, and when there is silence I hear it more loudly than the sounds.

And so it happens that Patience invites me into my own body. Have a seat, she says. Everything you need is here.

The Path

Through this teacher training I’ve come to appreciate on a new level that yoga is not about how it looks on the outside. It’s about what’s happening on the inside.

To this end, one of our teachers pointed out that as teachers we will often need to give different people different instructions to get to the same place.

The path we take to a pose is our own. The so-called end result is more about how we inhabit it than how we form it.

Throughout our lives we will find at times we can access our asana or meditation practice easier than other times. Our bodies and our minds change as our lives change. It will always be slightly different conditions we travel in, and our path will never be the same as someone else’s.

To travel our own path with our eyes and hearts wide open delivers us to our pose or our place of choice fully alive and fully lit up. We will all arrive at the same place through different processes. The place we arrive at is called Here.

Once we get Here, all we have to do is breathe. It doesn’t matter if you got here faster or slower than anyone else or what you look like on the outside. We are all breathing on the inside, and we are all Here.

Welcome. Take your seat. Settle in. Light It Up. This is it.

Read Monique’s full article here. 

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to take a yoga teacher training course? We’re excited to bring you another installment of stories, hopes and reflections from Yoga One’s class of 2013. (You can read the first post here.) Do you have a burning question about teacher training? Send it to us in the comments!

Amy P.  

How am I growing? I’m surprised by the anxiety I feel over having my teaching evaluated. Confused by my insecurities and doubts, and proud of myself for being willing to grow and ask for help. It is humbling and inspiring to have teachers and to be a student among students. My practice is moving towards the unknown – using my breath to open the back waist and soften the adrenals to prevent depleting myself, allowing the back of my body to receive the support it needs.

Anna W. 

My intention for Yoga Teacher Training is to begin the path towards becoming a yoga teacher. I love moving my body and I love meditation (although the latter is harder to make time for!) so I’m excited to blend both practices and share that experience with others! One amazing thing I’ve learned so far is that yoga meets you where you are. I don’t have to worry about making my body conform to one perfect pose, each day I can do exactly enough for my body and enjoy that experience.

Janssen J. 

When I started my yoga journey I had no idea that I would ever want to teach. I wanted to keep this amazing feeling to myself and use it for my own growth but eventually I outgrew the confines of my own experience. I had the choice to stay with what I had cultivated or to continue growing and expanding out to the rest of the world.

Every discussion we have during Yoga Teacher Training about the philosophy and history of yoga changes things for me at a deep, deep level. The idea that we are constantly creating this existence made the biggest impact on me. Even though the tradition and history of yoga are important, we are not limited to only experience what has already been experienced. We create something completely new every time we step onto the mat. Every time we open to grace, we open our ability to see the world through new eyes.

Ask anyone who’s been through the process and they’ll tell you that Yoga Teacher Training is a unique experience. You walk into a room full of people who love yoga, eager to learn and deepen their practice and whether it’s three months or years later when you get your certification, you say goodbye knowing that you’ve come to the true beginning of your journey.

We’ve just embarked on Yoga One’s seventh annual teacher training course led by Amy Caldwell and Diana Beardsley. Everyone involved is very excited and they all have such marvelous stories – we can’t wait to share some of them with you here on the blog!

One of our students, Monique Minahan, will be blogging about her experience over at Intentblog.com, you can check out her first post here:

THE STORIES

It’s a fairly large group of yogis (about 20 or so) participating in this training. On our first day we were asked to share our story. Why we were there, what brought us to yoga.

I’ve had my own experience with the healing powers of yoga and have read about how it can cure everything from heartache to backache, but I’ve never heard a real person, sitting a few feet away from me, express how yoga had kept them alive or healed their body or become their “religion.”

Everyone had a different story. Some had been practicing for years, others not so long. As everyone told their story, we all felt there was something we could relate to in it. It was all human and all heart, and that is one strong common thread.

Listening to the stories reinforced to me the power of listening and the power of being heard.

Has anyone ever asked you for your story?

The How did you become who you are story. The Where do you want to go story.

The one where you spill your guts and free your mind.

Have you ever asked someone for their story?

While holding on to our stories can trap us, releasing our stories can free us. Releasing takes many forms, but I believe a healing component is to feel heard and to feel seen.

We cannot always fix someone’s problem or make them feel better, but we can listen to them and we can see them, as we would love to be seen and heard. When we do, we honor both the human and the being in them, and we tap into both aspects in ourselves as well.

THE PRACTICE

We all learn basic alignment from our yoga classes. The longer we practice, the more we start to think we’ve got it down pretty good. We know our yoga, we know our body.

The detail I’ve learned in just a few days has already improved my practice. Concepts that I thought I had a good grasp on before are being broken down in all their intricacies, allowing me to see their many parts in sharp relief.

They say the best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else. I guess that’s the process I’m going through here. Learning how to put what I feel in my body into words serves to highlight subtleties and nuances I had overlooked before.

THE PROCESS

Now that I’ve started this journey, I can’t believe I ever contemplated not starting this journey. It’s that amazing, informative, mind-blowing, and completely worthwhile.

It’s an intense but invigorating process. As we dive deeper into all aspects of yoga, external and internal, I expect to face my own mental walls, tight spots, stubborn areas, and fears. I hope to experience a breaking down of old patterns and a breaking through to what awaits me on the other side of this journey.

Check back soon for another installment and more fun inspirational stories!

Get excited! Our 2013 Yoga Teacher Training is right around the corner! Be sure to come to our free info meeting THIS Sunday, December 2, 4:30-6:30pm. Check out this awesome video with interviews from our recent graduates:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRPvm3ut-Vk&feature=youtu.be]

As any nine year old will tell you, turning double digits is a pretty big deal! This year marks Yoga One’s 10 year anniversary and we are so grateful to all of our students, instructors and everyone who has helped make Yoga One into what it is today. THANK YOU for supporting us! Please join us for a complimentary yoga class this Sunday at 9am on the rooftop of the Porto Vista Hotel. After class there will be a short awards ceremony for the summer challenge winners followed by brunch at The Glass Door downstairs. Check out our event page on facebook or go to our website for more information about our regularly scheduled 9am rooftop class. We look forward to celebrating with you!

In the early 2000’s, Yoga One was nothing more than a dream shared by Amy and Michael Caldwell. They followed their common interest in healthy eating to a passion for healthy living and along the way established a community of like-minded yogis to share in Yoga One’s ever-growing outreach to help others live happier and healthier lives. Keep reading for an inside look from co-founders Michael and Amy at how Yoga One came to be and where it’s headed in the next ten years!

What sparked the leap from being a student of yoga into being a business owner?

We got into yoga über-organically, initially from making a dietary change. We became vegetarians then vegans and were reading Fit For Life by Harvey and Marilyn Bergman. At the time, we were living in Stanthorpe, Australia, picking apples to make extra money for back packing around the world. The book suggested we do yoga and there were 5 super simple poses listed. After picking apples for ten hours a day, ten days at a time, a few stretches felt phenomenal and that was how we started practicing yoga. But in retrospect, we had already begun our practice by becoming conscious of our diet and lifestyle; asana was just a further physical manifestation.

Once you turn on to something you often see it all around you. As we traveled from country to country, we found yoga “instructors” who expanded our knowledge and appreciation of the practice. We say “instructors” because we doubt many of them would have considered themselves teachers – they were practitioners who knew more than we did and joyfully shared their passion with us. By the time we got to India, we knew yoga was something we wanted to embrace more fully and we began an earnest practice, study and discipline.

When we moved to San Diego, Amy started offering donation classes in the park and around town. She built up a following and the rest, as they say, is history.

What excites you the most about watching Yoga One grow throughout the years?

We’ve often said that Yoga One is the eldest of our three children. There is no separation between Yoga One and our family or between Amy and Michael as spouse and business partner. When Yoga One needs our love and attention, we respond accordingly. There are times we wish we could separate and compartmentalize the “business” and our life but it doesn’t really happen and we’ve kind of made a tentative peace with that reality. In the end, we’re doing something we love so why would we want to separate it? It is who we are.

Time and time again we come back to the wonderful people that are part and parcel of the Yoga One family. Yoga One exists because of the amazing students that share their practice at the studio, period. If the students weren’t wonderful people we would have gotten into another field a long time ago. We have and continue to make dear friends. Though we don’t know everyone equally well, we do know that the students who are attracted to Yoga One are the kind of people we want to be with and that’s a great feeling!

What’s next? Dedicated, charismatic people like the two of you always look ahead for the next step – where do you see Yoga One 10 years from now?

We have so many projects in the works and we’re excited to see Yoga One grow even more! We’re working on a new website to seamlessly connect everything Yoga One under one virtual roof: studio and offsite classes, massage therapy, workshops, our retail store and more. Our longtime student, Yoga One Teacher Training alumni and webmaster, Erin Ferguson has been working with us on the new website for a long time and she is so patient and skilled.

We’ve collaborated in creating a super cool iPad/iPhone app tentatively title I-Yoga with a Scottish company called 3D4 Medical that Apple seems to like, so hopefully this will make a splash in the market. The app will show which muscles are engaged in each pose. Amy was a super star and did about 150 poses in a suit with electrodes attached and they motion captured her movements from 360 degrees. We’ll keep you posted on the app’s development and when you’ll be able to hit “download” and literally take yoga off the mat!

Our upcoming Yoga One Teacher Training starts this January and we can’t wait to lead such a fulfilling and transformational experience for the 7th year. It gets better every year and we truly feel we’re enhancing people’s lives. We hope one day to expand our training to an international location and student population.

We are really adept at bringing the joys and benefits of yoga to corporate environments. We continue to expand our off-site classes and hope to have Yoga One at every business and school in San Diego by 2022. If you work somewhere, let the Powers That Be know they should contact Yoga One about offering classes in the workplace. Our corporate students are happier, healthier and more productive and their employers reap the benefits, all from the convenience of a lunch-time or after-work class on location. Everyone wins.

We also look forward to expanding our online offerings. We may open up another location and offer unique specialties. We want to be leading seminars and workshops around the country and abroad. We want to offer music, art and community events weekly. The big question is: where do you want to see Yoga One in 10 years? After all, it’s you, the students and staff, that make the magic happen.

This month brings you the fabulous and hardcore Janike Robinson who teaches Thursday’s noon class, Ashtanga-inspired Vinyasa. Seriously, I dare you to read her answer to question #7 then go take her class and not be inspired by her arms alone! Check out our full schedule here, no reservations required for class.

1. What is your favorite style of yoga?

Ashtanga!!! As a type-A, pitta, high-energy, athletic person, I naturally gravitated toward Ashtanga.  It is physically demanding but very meditative once you are acquainted with the series. You move and breathe through the poses and there is little time to look around. I’ve greatly benefited from the Ashtanga tradition of a mysore practice – a self-study in which you practice whatever series you are working on at your own pace. It is not led, but there is a teacher present to give you adjustments and personal attention. I love that Ashtanga is very direct and traditional. We usually practice pranayama, meditation and the spiritual aspects of the practice outside of class, so once you roll out your mat – class begins!

2. What first attracted you to yoga when you began your practice?

My first class ever was Bikram, and I immediately felt like I was home – I’d found something that came naturally and began to explore other styles until I alighted upon Ashtanga.

3. What is your favorite yoga pose right now?

Viparita dandasana (inverted staff pose) because it combines an inversion, an arm balance and a backbend.

4. What pose is still the most challenging?

Mayurasana or peacock posture because it requires whole-body strength. Mayurasana is a challenging arm balance in which your upper arms support under your solar plexus and your legs are raised straight out behind you. Many people “cheat” by putting their chins on the mat and raising their legs at a diagonal toward the ceiling. To perform this posture fully requires significant upper body strength and control.

5. If you were an animal, you would be: a tiger (one of my nicknames is ‘Tigger’)!

6. Describe what yoga means in your life using just 6 words: Moving to a special place with breath.

7. What might your students be surprised to learn about you?

I do NOT lift weights! People always assume I work out at a gym but all my muscle comes from my Ashtanga practice!

8. Do you have any words of wisdom or advice for new students?

“Do your practice and all is coming,” said Sri K. Pattabhi Jois. Practice at least 4 times a week and give yourself at least a year for amazing results. Yoga is not something you ‘do,’ it’s a life-long practice. One day down dog will become a resting pose! At first you will be sore, fatigued and maybe even frustrated, but if you are consistent, your practice will become the most important part of your life!

Also, consider taking a teacher training even if you don’t want to teach – it will deepen your practice tremendously.

This weekend, the one and only Diana Beardsley will be down from Los Angeles for a special workshop: Backbends, Hips & Shoulders, Explore and Celebrate Embodiment. You may have heard her name around the studio before because she co-leads the Yoga One Teacher Training. Diana has trained with Ganga White, Anna Forrest, Shandor and John Friend and she’s taught thousands of students herself during a teaching career that spans three decades. We think Diana ROCKS and trust you will, too. Keep reading for a sneak peek into the thematic elements of her workshop this Sunday, May 27th from 3:30-5:30pm and be sure to register online to reserve your spot!

When asked to define “embodiment,” Diana Beardsley wrote, “embodiment is when spirit and matter are recognized as One.” She took the time to share with us her thoughts on embodiment, yoga and how the two practices will work together in her workshop to create one incredible experience.

“Being a body is such a gift! That’s something we often forget as we deal with the challenges of living. Our responses to difficulty, disappointment and pain can lead to the belief that we are alone, that life is hard and that our bodies are alien and a source of suffering. Through Yoga, we realize our wholeness and our connectedness. Our bodies become an expression of nature and a connection to spirit. Through them we experience our connection to all of life and the energy that flows through the body is essentially joyful. When we lose touch with our bodies and our breath, we lose touch with our connection to all of nature and to the present moment.

“During the workshop, we will reclaim and enhance our connection to who we truly are, with what is already present, which is an expression of all existence. Yoga is a “what” but also a “how.” The “what” are the poses that help us open to the bigger flow of energy. The “how” is the culmination of the attitudes we hold and the way we receive our experience moment to moment, which ultimately defines our experience. The workshop on Sunday afternoon will be a full spectrum class designed to open up the entire body to pranic flow, with an emphasis on the shoulders and hips in preparation for backbends. We will examine the breath, moment to moment awareness and the ways in which our habitual attitudes may diminish our daily experience. Through our yoga practice, we will release those negative attitudes and restore the natural joy of embodiment to fully experience being alive.”

Diana is a true inspiration, please join us for this special treat. $35 in advance, $45 at the door.

Yoga One’s next teacher training starts January 27th. To find out more about the eight week, two hundred hour course, I sat down with Hillary Trevett, a 2010 alumna of the training. For more information on dates, times and pricing go here or email info@yogaonesandiego.com.

It’s impossible to put Hillary down in words, so from the start, this is a failed mission. She’s the kind of person you notice the instant they walk into a room, even if your back is turned, the energy of her presence is so bright. A young woman who radiates confidence, vitality and happiness. Her sense of self is so strong, it’s hard to believe there was a time when Hillary wasn’t a yoga teacher or a time when she wasn’t sure of her direction in life.

We met at City Pizzeria right next door to the studio. Unsurprisingly, Hillary knows the owner and does a little dance while asking about the last time he got out on the water to surf. She orders a slice of ranch chicken pizza. “Yes, I like ranch and I’m not a vegetarian,” she confides to me.

Hillary grew up in Phoenix, Arizona, the fifth of six children. Her family didn’t have much and she decided that if she made a lot of money, everything would work out for the best. At SDSU, she studied Business Finance, made the dean’s list, signed up for clubs and accepted invitations to honor societies. In May of 2009, she graduated summa cum laude, poised to launch into the business world and make her mark. But this isn’t where her story starts.

It really begins in 2005, when Hillary took her first yoga class. At the end of class, the instructor led them through a guided savasana, bringing attention to each part of the body and relaxing it in turn. “My first savasana changed my entire life,” she said. It was the first time Hillary felt totally present in the room. When she woke up, she thought, “what was that?” knowing something had changed. In that moment, she felt the first small tug on her heart that would lead her down a different path.

How did you get to Yoga One?

“This is where the magic happens,” she responds with a big smile. The summer after graduation, Hillary traveled to Australia and the Great Barrier Reef. While there, she felt a growing resistance towards the trajectory of her life. It felt like a role she was ready to take on, but her heart pulled away. “I just want to be happy,” was her realization as she stood on a beach halfway around the world with the sun shining in her eyes.

When she got back to the States, she pulled out a file of magazine clippings and photos she had saved for years as inspiration for the things she would do ‘one day.’ The kind of ‘one day’ everyone has in their minds that never gets pinned down to a date on the calendar. She found a clipping from four years before, a music review for Yoga One’s CD. In a series of events that now feel predestined, Hillary listened to the CD, found the studio and signed up for an inversion workshop. It was there that she heard about yoga teacher training and sat down with Michael and Amy Caldwell to learn more.

What changed for you over the course of Yoga Teacher Training?

“Midway through the course, I realized I can let of go of where I was going. That it’s okay to shift your course in life. Just by doing what makes me happy, I can really help other people. I began to trust that I could pay my bills and build a life for myself by teaching yoga.”

“Which I still struggle with sometimes,” she admits with a laugh. “In college, the world made me think that [business finance] was what I was supposed to be doing. After I signed up for yoga teacher training, I really grabbed my life by the balls and brought it into alignment.”

Now that she teaches yoga, she sees people with office jobs and loves helping them feel better in their bodies. She appreciates the people who choose to work in the business world even more now that she’s found her passion. “If I were working a corporate job, I think I would ask myself everyday, ‘okay, when does my real life get to start?’”

Hillary bounces on her chair, so excited to talk about the city she loves and the yoga she loves even more. “Open your heart,” she exclaims, spreading her arms out wide. “Breathe, smile, OPEN!” The last word comes out somewhere between a cry of joy and a commandment.

What would you say to people on the fence, who aren’t sure if Yoga Teacher Training is right for them?

“If you have some interest in yoga, you should do YTT because it’s the most powerful personal transformation – it affects your body, mind and spirit. Even if you never want to teach yoga, it will deepen your practice and your whole experience of life.”

“Follow the tugs on your heart,” she advises. If you’re even remotely interested in yoga teacher training, follow that spark, find out more, be open to kindling a new passion in life.