Teacher
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Saraswathi Vasudevan7Saraswathi Vasudevan, E-RYT 500, YACEP, C-IAYT, Founder of YogaVahini, is yoga teacher, trainer, and therapist in the tradition of Sri T Krishnamacharya. She has over three decades of study, practice, and teaching experience in this tradition, having studied directly with Sri TKV Desikachar for 17 years and continues to study and teach with senior teachers in this tradition.
She has two Masters Degrees in Nutrition and Psychology from the University of Madras, Chennai, and a Post-Graduate Diploma in Yoga Studies from Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram (KYM), Chennai. In 2010, she founded YogaVahini, a Specialised Yoga Training, Therapy and Research Centre along with her husband Sundar, with the aim of making the transformative and healing wisdom of yoga and personalised yoga therapy more accessible to everyone. YogaVahini has centres in Chennai & Hyderabad and presence in other cities in India and around the world. In 2016 she co-founded Yoga Vahini Foundation, a Public Charitable Trust that aims to bring yoga and yoga therapy to rural and under-served populations through yoga camps and awareness programs.
YogaVahini’s study programs offer a strong scaffolding for an aspiring yogi, leading one through every step of learning and teaching using traditional learning methods adapted to the rapidly changing modern context. YogaVahini was the first school in India to receive accreditation for its Yoga Therapist training program (Yoga Vaidya) from IAYT.
Saraswathi currently serves on the Voluntary Board of Directors of Yoga Alliance, the largest international yoga certifying and credentialing body which provides strategic direction that advances the development and livelihood of yoga professionals across the world.
Location
Program Description
One of the greatest contributions of the Yogic tradition to mankind is Pranayama—the application of conscious breathing for achieving optimal health, healing, and as a preparation for deeper transformative practices. The yogis found that the breath has the power to calm, cleanse, stabilize, and direct the mind in a purposeful manner. This aspect of the breath and its role in transforming the mind has far reaching benefits that can touch our life and actions in so many imperceptible ways!
How does this happen through simple, consistent practices, study, and self-inquiry? Pranayama helps us remove the impressions and impurities we accumulate from our consumptions and transactions with the world, as well as that which is self-generated. These impressions impact our perceptions and actions. When there is better clarity, we begin to make healthy choices that lead to lesser entanglement with suffering. Slowly, the mind begins to gravitate towards that which is wholesome, life-giving, and growth promoting. Not only the individual but the space and people around can also be positively impacted, creating a powerful ripple effect in the world we live in.…
In this one-day workshop, we will explore the potential of pranayama practices in a few key aspects of our life:
- Cleansing and healing the body
- Transforming our state of mind from dullness and confusion to clarity and steadiness
- Preparing the senses and mind for meditation
- Pranayama for better relationship with self and others
References will be drawn from Yoga Sutra and a few classical yoga texts. The teachings are based on the tradition of Sri T Krishnamacharya and Sri TKV Desikachar.
Please keep your food light for the day so that we can do a few short practices through the day.
This course is eligible for six hours of Approved Professional Development (APD) credit with IAYT.
This is an in-person program.
