To best understand a teacher one should first know them as a student. Below is the teaching lineage that I am but a small part. I believe in the great history of yoga, one of the important “views” that has come to us through the centuries from the Indian subcontinent. Furthermore, I believe in the future of yoga, the value it holds for people of all abilities from any culture as an effective therapeutic tool for physical and mental self-improvement. 

I am extremely grateful for the opportunity to teach and eternally appreciative of the great teachers before me.  I  received my RYT200 hour certification from Yoga Alliance in January of 2009 from the Yoga School of Covington, LA. I am now actively pursuing my RYT500 certification. Also, I continue to attend as many various workshops and conferences as possible that will enhance my understanding of Yoga and improve my teaching abilities.

My teacher: Becky Gelatt

Becky established the Yoga School in Covington, Louisiana in 1991 and remains the primary teacher there. Her teaching style reflects many years of training in the Iyengar tradition. She has been at the 500 hour level registry with Yoga Alliance since 2000. In July 2006 she completed an additional 500 hour teacher training with Gary Kraftsow of the American Viniyoga Institute and is presently enrolled in the advanced yoga therapy training there. The lineage through which she has been instructed spans the entire tradition of modern Yoga, and I am fortunate that she has accepted me as a student. I strive to reflect her positive insight at all times in my teaching.

Our Lineage:  Gabriella Giubilaro

Gabriella began her practice of Iyengar yoga in 1973. In 1983 she made her first trip to Pune, India, to study directly with B.K.S. Iyengar, and since then she has gone back to study almost every year. Gabriella opened the Iyengar Yoga Center in Florence, Italy, in 1989. Gabriella teaches regularly in Poland, Germany, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia, as well as in the United States.

Our lineage: Gary Kraftsow

Gary Kraftsow has been a pioneer in the transmission of yoga for health, healing and personal transformation for 30 years. He began his study of yoga in India with T.K.V. Desikachar in 1974.  In 1999 he founded American Viniyoga Institute. Gary has successfully developed protocol for two National Institute of Health studies: “Evaluating Yoga for Chronic Low Back Pain” and “Yoga Therapy for Generalized Anxiety” He is the author of two important books: Yoga for Wellness and Yoga for Transformation.

Our lineage: BKS Iyengar

Bellur Krishnamachar Sundararaja (BKS) Iyengar was born in 1918. At the age of 16, he was introduced to yoga by his brother-in-law Sri T. Krishnamacharya.  He lays great emphasis on precision and alignment. His teachings were first published in 1966 as Light on Yoga . This book has been translated into 18 languages and remains one of the most fundamentally important books about yoga.  He continues to practice yoga daily and teach occasionally.

Our lineage: TKV Desikachar

TKV Desikachar, son and student of T Krishnamacharya, had the privilege of living and studying with T Krishnamacharya from 1960 until Krishnamacharya's death in 1989. For over 45 years, TKV Desikachar has devoted himself to teaching yoga and making it relevant to people from all walks of life and with all kinds of abilities. His teaching method is based on Krishnamacharya's fundamental principle that yoga must always be adapted to an individual's changing needs in order to derive the maximum therapeutic benefit.

Our lineage: Sri Tirumala Krishnamacharya

“Whether you practice the dynamic series of Pattabhi Jois, the refined alignments of B.K.S. Iyengar, the classical postures of Indra Devi, or the customized vinyasa of Viniyoga, your practice stems from one source: a five-foot, two-inch Brahmin born more than one hundred years ago in a small South Indian village.” -- Fernando Pagés Ruiz

If yoga is today an important part of the everyday lives of millions of people across the world, T. Krishnamacharya deserves enormous recognition for his pioneering efforts to revive yoga, especially asana practice, in the early twentieth century. Born in 1888 in a remote South Indian village, T. Krishnamacharya was one of the greatest yogis of the modern era even though much of his life and teachings are shrouded in myth. His knowledge spread across the entire spectrum of Indian thought. He was an acknowledged authority on all six branches (darshanas) of Indian philosophy and, in India, he is still better known as a healer than a yogi. In addition to his vast understanding of Ayurvedic medicine, he studied Indian linguistics, astrology, and music.

Through the teachings Krishnamacharya received first from his father and then his great teacher, Yogeshwara Ramamohan Brahmachari, he realized that every person is “absolutely unique”and he felt that the most important part of teaching yoga was that the student must be “taught according to his or her individual capacity at any given time”.

His teachings will continue to inspire the evolution and improvement of yoga. We will never fully recover his great skills, and today, one can barely understand the immense knowledge, sincere compassion, and deep insight this great human had attained.

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