What I like most about this studio is that it's not just for fit hipsters. This studio is for people who care about their bodies regardless of what condition they are in. What you won't find here is a room full of willowy women who want to sweat like gym rats. What you will find is an incredibly rigorously trained teacher who knows more about each and every body that walks in that door than most yoga teachers do.
What I don't like about this studio is the gossip based business model and the slavish, one might say childish, imitation of all things Pune (where the original Iyengar studio is). I would rather value someone's autonomy and self respect.
My criticism is not with the Iyengar style either. My criticism is with a few teachers and how this particular studio is run. When you quit being a member of the studio (the best payment plan available), they ask for a review. But since everything I ever said to anyone, often in response to a question from a teacher, seems to have circulated to every single ear with the worst possible interpretation, I was a bit nervous about this email review process. There is no guarantee that it is anonymous. Heather (the owner) wouldn't even answer that question when I asked about it in regards to my exit survey. How very uncomforting.
I have only studied with a few of their teachers so please make up your own mind. As I said, Iyengar is a quality practice and I know there are really good teachers here. I'm particularly fond of Sarah who knows her stuff but isn't stuffy about it. Ditto Anneke. I don't think either Annekke or Sarah would knowingly let anyone hurt themselves and there are prolly a lot of other teachers here who wouldn't either. I haven't taken classes with everyone.
Heather sounds shrill to me so there's no point in my even trying to relax in her class. She has said things in her class that I found helpful so if you can stand her voice (and you can work on your voice just like you can work on any other part of your body Heather), by all means take her classes. But she has said things I felt were just cruel to students in front of everyone and at length. It felt to me more like an unrestrained rant than anything remotely resembling a teachable moment. I fail to see why the exact same points couldn't have been made in a simple, respectful conversation before or after class so everyone else didn't have to struggle during the tirade to keep their own personal consciousness raised while someone else's was being torn to bits.
Iyengar teachers work really hard to get their credentials and they have to go to Pune to do it. Anyone can call themselves a yoga teacher (entirely unregulated market dontchaknow) but for an Iyengar teacher just to get to intermediate level 3 (which doesn't sound all that advanced, does it?), it takes a lot of work. This studio is right to be proud of the level of training each and every one of their teachers has achieved. I have often said that there is a lot of bad yoga out there and you have to be careful about where you go. It's such a pity that it applies to this studio as well.
Yoga is a fantastic practice and no one should be made to feel silly, inadequate, stupid, or lazy in front of others. Even if a student is not practicing with the effort a real yoga practice requires, and yes real yoga requires real effort even when you're not sweating buckets, but You The Teacher Do Not Know what, Exactly, is going on in that body or that mind regardless of all your special training. That person may a have nutritional imbalance that, yes, believe it or not, manifests as an alignment issue. And no amount of stretching and deep breathing will change a nutritional imbalance. Or, alternatively, that student may not have ever used their body as physically as the rest of us take for granted. Or they may find it hard to focus on all those specific, sometimes truly odd, sometimes wonderfully specific, instructions. But simply blasting them out loud, in public, and at length is, to me, remarkably disrespectful of humanity as a whole and that individual in particular and if they can't figure out how to address someone with the respect every single human being deserves, they don't deserve to be in front of a class, any class, full stop.
I have taught some thoroughly annoying people in my time (and in another line of work) and I would never call them out by name and berate them in front of other classmates. Never in a million years regardless of how annoying that particular student was. Nor would I allow students to hurt themselves based on my instructions when I can guess that is precisely what is likely to happen given what I know about their body because of my special training. I have witnessed both of these behaviors at Adeline. It is simply irresponsible. Their excuse is typically "but that's how it's done in Pune." If you think Brahmins and untouchables are great, than by all means, unquestioningly copy e read more