by Lucinda Staniland, On a rainy Saturday morning in Auckland, I found myself in a packed auditorium, with around 85 yoga teachers and students, and several hundred fitness professionals, listening to renowned international yoga teacher Donna Farhi give a keynote presentation on interoception and kinesthesia. As Donna lead us through ten slow diaphragmatic breaths, the whole audience dropped into deep, yet focused, stillness. There were so many magical moments like this at the Hauora Yoga … [Read more...]
Scott Lyons on What it Really Means to be in Flow
by Lucinda Staniland, Flow. We've all heard about the concept of a 'flow state' - but what is it really? What does it feel like in an embodied sense? And what stops us from experiencing it? Dr. Scott Lyons has an intimate relationship with flow. He's a Clinical Psychologist, a Mind-Body Medicine practitioner, the co-founder of Embodied Flow™ yoga with Tara Judelle, and a voracious learner who has explored many healing modalities. (Seriously, check out his bio - it's off the hook). He … [Read more...]
Hamish Kenworthy on Why He Doesn’t Regret a Single Moment of Opening Up
by Lucinda Staniland, The first time Hamish Kenworthy came onto my radar was in 2016 when The Yoga Lunchbox conducted a search for The Best Up and Coming Yoga Teachers in Australia and New Zealand. We were flooded with hundreds of recommendations from yoga students, but some of the most touching, enthusiastic and sincere testimonials were for one Hamish Kenworthy of Apollo Power Yoga in Christchurch. Hamish's students all described his extraordinary energy, his jokes and sense of humour, his … [Read more...]
Denise Payne on Why She Doesn’t Want Liberation in This Lifetime
by Lucinda Staniland, Denise Payne is a big-hearted yoga teacher with more than three decades of experience on the mat. Most recently, she spent the last eight years in Bali, where she taught at Ubud's favourite yoga studio, The Yoga Barn and also at Bali's most notorious prison, Kerobokan, where she started a yoga program with Myuran Sukumaran, one of the Bali Nine. In today's yoga landscape, Denise has what I consider to be an unusually deep grounding in Yoga, including twenty years spent … [Read more...]
Jennifer Allen on The Dissipation of Expectation in Yoga
by Lucinda Staniland I've never met Jennifer Allen in person, but on watching her video conversation with Kara-Leah Grant, it didn't take me long at all to learn everything I needed to know about her. Google can tell you that Jennifer is the founder and lead facilitator of Jayayoga, a popular yoga studio in Auckland. But perhaps more importantly, and you'll quickly pick up on this when you watch her interview, she has an incredible loving-mama-bear kind of energy, and she's … [Read more...]
Sandey Hoskin & Kylie Rook on Handstands, Creative Sequencing & Showing Up
by Lucinda Staniland Meet Sandey Hoskin and Kylie Rook, two yoga teachers who are committed to doing the hard work of showing up, being seen and constantly learning. They are also part of the team (alongside Fiona Liu) who are leading a brand new 300 Hour Advanced Yoga Teacher Training at Om Yoga Studio in Auckland. Sandey has been a teacher of teachers for a long time, and she's been teaching yoga teachers at Om Yoga Studio for the last four years. She's also been busy bringing some … [Read more...]
Vincent Bolletta on Asana, Movement & Yoga Therapy
by Lucinda Staniland, Meet Vincent Bolletta, one of New Zealand’s foremost yoga instructors and teacher trainers and the founder of hañsa Yoga, a unique style of yoga that integrates both eastern and western thought and methodologies. Vincent's been in the yoga game a long time—he's been practising yoga since 1989 and teaching since 1991—but alongside his considerable knowledge and experience in the field, he still cultivates a beautiful sense of excitement, joy and curiosity towards the … [Read more...]
Justine Hamill on The Process of Unconditioning in Yoga Teacher Training
by Lucinda Staniland Meet the delightful Justine Hamill, co-owner of Wellington's Power Living yoga studio and a Senior Facilitator of the Power Living New Zealand team. With eighteen years of Yoga practice under her belt, as well as training in Gestalt Psychotherapy, watching Justine in action makes it obvious that she brings a very deep level of experience and nurturing care to Power Living's Yoga Teacher Trainings, which she's been involved with for the last four years. Yoga Teacher … [Read more...]
Philip Shepherd on What It’s Really Like To Experience Radical Wholeness
by Lucinda Staniland What is radical wholeness? This is a question that Philip Shepherd has spent many decades exploring and experiencing. As an international embodiment expert and the author of "New Self, New World," "Radical Wholeness," and creator of The Embodied Present Process™, Philip has studied wholeness through scientific, historical and anthropological lenses and through the felt intelligence of his own body. Kara-Leah Grant caught up with Philip to explore his nuanced and, to … [Read more...]
8 Reasons Why Yoga Nidra is the Hottest New Yoga Trend
By Lucinda Staniland By now you've probably come across Yoga Nidra, one of the hottest trends to hit the Yoga scene in recent years. Everyone is doing it, from your trend-setting Instagram-loving best friend to your old-school internet-free great Aunt. But what is Yoga Nidra exactly, and does it deserve its sudden popularity? To the latter, I answer with an emphatic YES, which I trust will quickly become clear in the eight points below. And for an answer to the former, I turned to Swami … [Read more...]