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Top 3 "Not to Miss" Yoga Journal Conference highlights:
1. T.K.V. Desikachar at the Colorado Conference
2. Yoga & Rock Climbing in the Colorado Rockies
- A full day workshop that sells out every year - now you have 3 days to choose from!
- Register now to save $20--use promo code RC09 - (offer good for Tuesday and Wednesday Only--call to add to your existing registration)
3. Tour T-Shirt Design Contest
- Your design could be featured on the front of our 2010 conference tour shirts.
- Winner will receive two Main Conference passes to any 2010 Conference.
- Click here for details and rules
This month our teacher spotlight is on Jason Magness who leads the Yoga and Rock Climbing workshops. The evolution of yoga in the west is taking the practice in many new directions, and almost all of them are off the mat.
Practitioners are finding greater yogic awareness in activities such as acrobatics, slack line, hula hooping, dancing, running, cycling and even rock climbing.
Jason Magness is one of the few people who has actively explored yoga in all these realms.
In his own words, "Vertical yoga - that is what climbing is to me."
Namaste,
The Yoga Journal Conference Team
14th Annual Colorado Conference
YMCA of the Rockies
September 20-27, 2009
With the Colorado Conference less than 6 weeks away many classes are already selling out! If you are thinking about attending, don't delay or you may not get your first choice of classes!
Take this time for yourself and join friends and fellow yogis for an unforgettable experience.
Register now at yjevents.com/ep09.
Editor's Note: Jason Magness will be leading the Yoga & Rock Climbing All-Day Intensives at the upcoming Colorado Conference.
Click here for more information.
Jason Magness grew up in a fairly typical Air Force family, moving to someplace new every three or four years. His parents always understood how hard relocating was for children, but Jason never seemed to mind going someplace new. He seemed to thrive on it. He would form friends quickly, and although it was always difficult to leave them, the excitement of new places and people made moving easy. In the family's travels, Jason was exposed to many diverse environments and ways of life, and it's no real surprise that he has chosen to continue that exploration. That exploration led him to the mountains, and his discovery of climbing. And it is climbing that eventually led him to yoga. "Vertical yoga - that is what climbing is to me," he says.
"It's true that I've been climbing far longer that I've been practicing traditional yoga, but climbing was my first avenue of self exploration. From remote big walls of Canada, to the terrifying stone thrones of Patagonia, to the plastic hand holds of my rock gym, climbing has been my teacher. I have learned first-hand about suffering, fear, trust, self-reliance, beauty, companionship, love, death, and life. Even as I feel myself drawn toward a traditional yoga practice, and a wider range of adventurous pursuits, I know that climbing will always be a big part of my life. My spirit may visit many places in this life, but it will always live in the mountains." He has been teaching yoga since 2003.
Interesting facts about Jason:
- He was an avid bodybuilder through college, spending an average of 15 hours per week lifting weights, and eating at least 20 cans of tuna. Now he is a vegetarian and spends 15 hours practicing yoga.
- He majored in physics and minored in musical theater at the University of Oklahoma.
- He was a competitive swing dancer for two years.
- He started climbing when he was 18, and instantly he was hooked. As a self-proclaimed climbing bum, he has completed more notable climbs than most serious climbers twice his age.
- He has a twin brother named Andy. They lived, climbed and traveled together until Andy met his wife-to-be in the year 2000. The subsequent year was one of the hardest in Jason's life. It was during this time that he began to practice yoga asana in earnest.
- He built and owns a climbing gym in Grand Forks, ND, where his parents have settled.
- To help his balance, he's developed a yoga practice that is done on a apparatus called a slackline (similar to a tightrope). Check out yogaslackers.com for more information, or take his class at the Estes Park conference.
- When a freak blizzard hit during an expedition in the Cirque of the Unclimbables, he used pranyama to keep from getting hypothermia.
"It may not be that all climbers are yogis," Jason smiles. "But I hear all the fables about the wizened old yogis sitting on the Himalayan summit - so I'm pretty sure that all the wizened old yogis are climbers."
Praise for Yoga Climbing Intensives
"I was so scared hiking up to the cliffs, but in the end I didn't ever want to come down. The closing practice up high in the mountains will stay with me for a long time." Jenny H. (New Mexico)
"I've practiced for years with Jason, but doing his climbing yoga intensive was a first. I've been back three times and hope to make it a fourth." Becca L. (Utah)
"Jason's teaching - on and off the mat - is amazing. His eclectic background shines through in his sequencing. The morning asana was a perfect compliment to the climbing, and I have never been more blissfully inspired and tired at the end of a day." Christina S. (Los Angeles)
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Upcoming Conferences
14th Annual Colorado Conf.
Estes Park, CO
YMCA of the Rockies
September 20-27, 2009
Register Now!
7th Annual San Francisco Conf.
San Francisco, CA
Hyatt Regency
Jan. 28 - Feb 1, 2010
Register Now!
Save the Date
Boston Conference
Boston, MA
Sheraton Boston
April 6 - 11, 2010
Keynote with Deepak Chopra
Registration opens December
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