Classes
Katharine's classes focus on the breath and using pranayama as a way to calm the body and the mind. She uses Iyengar alignment principles to keep the body safe while flowing through creative Vinyasa sequences. While her classes are challenging they are also restorative and relaxing. She allows her students to soak up their practice and leave the class feeling rejuvenated.
Vinyasa
Vinyasa is a "flow" practice. My form of Vinyasa is getting settled into the body and mind with breath work, linking the breath with movement, and then warming up the body with sun salutations and dynamic stretches. The flow begins in the sun salutations and carrries on throughout the entire practice -- the body is more in motion than in stillness.
Vinyasa is sequential, even choreographed, movement that interlinks postures to form a continuous flow. The flow begins and ends in either tadasana (standing mountain pose) or downward facing dog and contains a specific sequence of breath-synchronized movements used to transition between sustained postures, either standing or arm balancing ones. An intention or focus is typically set at the beginning of class to help expand your yoga practice and and understanding of yoga and to help you take the necessary steps toward reaching your yoga goal.
Hatha
Hatha yoga is all about the breath. Taking deep, full breaths, feeling the breath move throughout the body, and linking the asanas (postures) with the breath. The breath dictates the movement.
Hatha yoga uses the breath to quiet the mind so we can then feel the breath in the body and how it effects the way we feel and move. We use the breath to move in and out of postures, to stay in postures, and to surrender or lift up in more difficult poses.
The postures, linked with the breath, are meant to open the energy channels of the body so that your energy can flow freely.
Hatha yoga is a path toward creating balance and uniting opposites. Steadying the breath helps decrease the fluctuations in the mind and allows us to be more present in our practice and in our life. In our physical bodies we develop a balance of strength and flexibility. We also learn to balance our effort and surrender in each pose.
Gentle
Gentle Yoga is often considered less intense, less strenuous, more minimalistic, quiet, meditative, and restorative. Gentle yoga serves a variety of needs: people with movement limitations or stiffness due to a lack of activity, relief from disabilities and chronic conditions e.g., arthritis, back pain and other musculo-skeletal issues, recovery from surgery, illness or injury.
Gentle yoga is a great way for new practitioners, women who are pregnant, seniors, and those seeking stress-reduction or weight management to start their practice.
A gentle yoga class encourages an individualized approach to the practice and allows individuals to make moment-to-moment adjustments. The approach includes carefully orchestrated movements and well-measured stretches, using props to hep support the body. Postures are approached in more gradual steps with plenty of time to focus on the breath.
Gentle yoga classes are great for those who want a softer, nurturing, slower-paced, well-supported, simpler, and more relaxing practice.
Yin Yoga - Restorative
Yin yoga is a restorative style of yoga with poses that are held for longer periods of time. Each pose is held for at least five minutes and can be held for up to 20 minutes. It was founded by martial arts expert and Taoist yoga teacher Paulie Zink in the late 1970s.
Yin yoga poses get into the connective tissues — the tendons, fascia, and ligaments — with the aim of increasing circulation in the joints and improving flexibility. The poses are designed to improve the flow of prana or qi, the subtle energy in Chinese medicine that runs through the meridian pathways of the body. Improved qi flow improves organ health, immunity, emotional well-being and helps to decrease stress and anxiety in the body and mind. Yin yoga is a more meditative, reflective, and medicinal approach to yoga. It is a great complement to more active (yang) forms of yoga and exercise.
