So many different styles of yoga - why then Katonah yoga? What makes this style so unique?

Katonah Yoga offers a practice which uses the intelligence of the universe, mother nature, the writings of ancient philosophers, to underscore the guidance system that really serves as the GPS for our souls. The body. We live within this micro-universe, which at best, serves as a pleasure center and worst case scenario, a cavern of torture and for some is merely reduced to a transportation system, to get their minds to the next meeting.

What if you could reorganise, reposition yourself, literally, to allow the entry for more data? Learn to filter when your feelings are something to listen to and when they are using ancient technology to keep you safe from something that no longer exists (like running from a sabre tooth tiger). Ultimately we are talking about having a more joyful and fulfilling experience in the journey of life. 

I believe the accumulation of diverse practices, lineages, beliefs and disciplines that Nevine Michaan has created and compressed into a series of diagrams, maps and glyphs gives us a means to calibrate our own personal vessel, our soul’s house, to position ourselves correctly, to interpret and understand what our body, our navigation system, is nudging us toward or away from.

How and why do you think one would become a Katonah Yoga teacher?

There are a lot of seekers in the yoga industry. You hear stories about professionals becoming disenchanted with their lives and opting for something a little more simple, or meaningful. Within the industry you find the same. The disenchantment of the inevitably unreachable nirvana, or enlightenment. Whatever lineage you’re talking about. It’s not translatable into our modern society. It’s definitely not usable for a mother of three. I’m not a Guru sitting on a mountain top contemplating life. I’m IN IT. My body created three other human beings. I have feelings about that. I’m confronted with personalities in my family that were created by the union of my husband and I, a harmonious pairing, and I still have these challenging moments with these newly hatched humans. 

There is a required 200 - hour path in Katonah Yoga. You need to be certified in another lineage. A teacher of another tradition. So that you bring all of that into what you learn from Katonah, in order to create something completely new. Nevine wants that intersection to happen. The discernment of the teachers to pick and choose what matters to them and weave it into who they are and what they teach. 

Attending certified and approved teacher’s trainings is the first step. Finally as part of the 200 hours, a 20 - hour training with its founder, Nevine Michaan wraps up your certification.