As Valedictorian of my high school and top of my Chapman University graduating class, it may seem strange that I have chosen yoga as my fulltime job.

Yet I was immediately intrigued by the art of yoga at age 11 when I stumbled upon a book on the subject. At the age of 14, my mom brought me to a community center where I attended my first yoga class with her. It was Savasana (final resting pose, or Corpse pose) that really got me hooked. As the teacher mentally guided me through my body, I drifted into a state between sleep and dream that I had never before experienced.  Fascinated, I started reading any spiritual and philosophical texts I could get my hands on. I began to save my money to take classes at what was then Yoga Place in Costa Mesa, California (now Yoga Works). The many gifts that my dedicated yoga practice brought me over the years naturally led to my desire to teach others this beautiful practice. By the time I was 17, I had saved up my money to enter a formal yoga teacher training program through Yoga Place, under the tutelage of Karin O’Bannon (dedicated student on BKS Iyengar) and there I completed my National Yoga Alliance certification in 2002, becoming an E-RYT.

As a Social Science major at Chapman University a year later, I investigated the human on a social and emotional level, studying philosophy, sociology, religion, leadership, and psychology. While at Chapman, I was amazed to find that they offered no courses on yoga.  Aware of yoga’s numerous benefits, I decided to create a Yoga club on campus, in which I acted as both president and teacher. In February 2004, I began teaching regular weekly classes at Triad Yoga in Irvine, California, and shortly thereafter graduated summa cum laude with a degree in Social Sciences with sociology, psychology and leadership emphases.

A year later, I went back to school to fulfill a desire to learn more about the science of the human body. I studied anatomy, chemistry, biology, and physics with the goal of obtaining my Doctorate in Physical Therapy, but in my heart I kept oscillating back and forth between wanting to go into medicine or physical therapy on the one hand and wanting to teach philosophy or psychology on the other hand.   

As fate would have it, in 2008 National Yoga Institute heard about me through the grapevine and offered me a position designing the curriculum for, as well as independently teaching, their accredited 200-hour yoga teacher training programs. In these programs, I taught everything required to certify participants as Registered Yoga Teachers at the 200-hour level through National Yoga Alliance. Leading these trainings, I got the opportunity to teach anatomy and physiology (both Eastern and Western systems), the history and philosophy of yoga, as well as both the Sanskrit and English names of yoga poses and breathing exercises, their benefits, modifications, and contraindications, the business aspects of yoga and much more.

Yoga is a very multi-faceted, multi-disciplinary practice and after leading my first training, it was clear to me that teaching yoga truly fulfilled my desire to teach art, social sciences and hard sciences all in one. My teaching style incorporates everything that I love. My strong background in sociology and psychology are apparent from my love and understanding of people. My leadership skills are clear from the ease and confidence with which I lead my classes and retreats. My knowledge of the human body allows me to speak clearly and effectively about the postures.

Having been a yoga teacher for more than eight years now, I have come across people from all backgrounds desiring to learn more about yoga, but the thing that strikes me most is how beneficial it is to people, across the board. Whatever “stuff” they initially come in with, whatever their initial reasons for trying yoga, they all inevitably leave a little better off.