CLASSES
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You will find my classes have a little Iyengar and fair amount of Ashtanga yoga influence but I have experience with many styles of yoga and I am open to doing classes in a dynamic way that accounts for students needs.
As we are practising yoga here, there will be some emphasis on breath work (pranayama), sense withdrawal (pratyahara) and concentration (Dhahrana) along with work on postures.
If you can breathe, you can practice yoga.
It is not all about how bendy you are, or if you can twist yourself into exotic shapes. Much of that can be ego, and we are trying to rid ourselves of that part of the mind, at least temporarily!
The physical, external aspect is there to encourage a healthy, balanced and comfortable body. The more important goal of yoga, however, is to still the fluctuations of the mind. We want to shift our consciousness from focusing on the (monkey/automatic) mind.
I would like to help more people to help themselves, by taking up the practice.
Now a yoga teacher for almost 9 years, below is my little story of how I became a yoga teacher and what I’ve been up to until now for anyone that may be interested.
I started practising, actually when I was a child. I remember trying the ‘Lotus Position’ because it looked cool. I also dabbled with meditation as I got older but didn’t really “get it”
Later after a 4-month spell in California, I returned to the UK with a renewed interest in Yoga and Meditation. I had also quit a pretty serious smoking habit and was attracted to a more holistic approach to my health and lifestyle. A friend encouraged me to try a Yoga class with her. I was completely shocked at how hard I found the practice.
In particular, these repeated postures that were forcing me to open in my shoulders, hips and stretch my hamstrings. Also, inversions that highlighted weaknesses in my wrists and hands and exposed a fatter belly than I had previously acknowledged!
I realised my core strength was almost non-existent. But I stuck at it.
At first, it was the physical side that interested me, but pretty soon I noticed it was having a positive effect on my mood. Slowly I became increasingly interested in what this practice was doing for me. It was making my life better/easier. I was more focused. More interested in other people, a happier person.
During a six-month music contract performing in Doha Qatar, in my spare time, I attended Yama Yoga Studios.
This was my first proper introduction to Ashtanga yoga. The teacher Valerie Jeremijenko was inspiring. The practice was remarkably hard. However, I loved it.
Maybe not so much during the class! but the feeling after was amazing. I could feel it transforming me. After this experience, I was now fascinated with yoga.
One time I attended a teacher training class by mistake but was kindly allowed to stay and practice with the other trainee teachers. It was very embarrassing for me as I had no idea what I was doing. Despite this, the first seeds of thought of passing my very limited knowledge to others started to occur to me.
I returned to the UK with a thirst for more knowledge of Ashtanga yoga. However, I could not find any classes that came close to the experience I had found in the middle east.
Needing a deeper immersion into yoga in general, I travelled to India and attended the Himalaya Yoga Valley Training Centre.
My-self and twenty-two others from around the globe, spent twelve hours per day, six days a week training in meditation, pranayama, chanting, anatomy, asana and yoga philosophy. Eating a purely vegetarian diet and living 2 mins walk from a beautiful beach. Sadly, this had to come to an end. But I returned to the UK a fully qualified yoga instructor.
In the UK I also studied and gained a level 3 diploma in body massage and successfully completed an ITEC diploma in Anatomy, Physiology and Pathology.
After two years teaching yoga at Plymouth life centre, Brickfields sports centre and Plymouth’s own dedicated studio The Yoga Loft. It was time for some more travelling.
I moved to Marseille in the South of France and through good fortune ended up with my own class at a dedicated Ashtanga school Yama where I taught for a year.
I was able to attend all other classes and learnt a great deal from my fellow yoga teachers including Vanessa Brouillet, Alexia Galleron and Savitri Igos.
I returned again to the UK where I resumed my classes and had the opportunity of teaching yoga to medical students at Plymouth University, a good chance to brush up on my anatomy. It is great to see that yoga is now being taken more seriously by the medical profession.
Most recently an extended trip (6 months) to Australia and Bali Indonesia has added hugely to my experience. Gaining knowledge from other teachers, schools of thought, different cultures, and seeing how the practice is continuing to rapidly expand and develop. I have experienced almost every style of yoga class, and have learnt so very much. I am excited to resume my teaching in the UK for 2020.
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Steve Osman
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