JOGA - Yoga for Athletes

   I work at a small studio in literally the heart of Mission Valley in San Diego called Hidden Gem Yoga Studio. Very small, intimate, a great little location where all types of people can come in and have a small class, feeling like their needs are accomplished and met. When we were first opening up, I put an add up on Craiglist for yoga teachers wanting to find the right teachers who had something unique about them and also their reason for turning to yoga. The response was over whelming with yoga instructors but also massage therapy. I collected the ones I wanted to review and took them to a meeting I had with the three other colleagues who were helping in the development of a wellness center. After reviewing all submissions, we narrowed it down to the A category B category and C category. A handful stood out based on their story behind it, one had an interesting certification under her belt that I particular was curious about. She wasn't in town for a demo as she was still back in her home state of Minnesota making a transition to San Diego. Because we were set to open the studio at the end of April and we didn't realize how many submissions we'd get, we ended up demo'ing two teachers, talking with two others by recommendation and the one in Minnesota via email. The submission from Minnesota was Amy Gist, with ten years in the navy, certified in Somatic Yoga and JOGA. (I'll get to the other teachers in the next blog)

    What dafuq (a friend of mine, text me 'dafuq' before and I couldn't stop laughing so I use it) ?!? is JOGA?? 
Strength training and conditioning for athletes, appealing already. I don't have an athletic back round, I did ride horses in my younger years and every thing else I learned along the way to where I am now. I'm alright at certain hobbies and sports. Anyway, it was the description she wrote and giving the back round of where it was developed and by who, it was something truly unique and I was keen to learn more about it. Fortunately Amy was on her way back to San Diego to live after spending sometime back home and her JOGA certification was in tow as well as Somatic Yoga. We asked her to elaborate more on the Somatic first, which she did a fabulous job at and then explained JOGA. 

     JOGA was developed by a woman in Canada by the name of Jana Webb. Jana moved to Japan for awhile a few years ago with her family and stumbled upon ISTHA (Integrated Science of Tantra, Hatha, and Ayurveda) yoga while searching far and wide throughout Tokyo for yoga. She told her story at our first US training after 4 days of constant physical practice, workshops, posture labs, and lecture. She waited until the end of the training to explain how she was able to develop this system throughout years of experience in many different fields. However, that will be for the next blog. 

   We loved Amy's spirit and her knowledge of what she was talking about, along with the passion of understanding different styles of yoga and body work. She was on staff and we integrated her classes into our schedule, knowing nobody has heard of JOGA and or much of Somatic Yoga, we knew it was going to take progress to develop. Intuitively I felt confident in this system, despite still wondering of the name JOGA, it was untapped and that was exactly what we wanted at the Hidden Gem. Gem yoga all around as we grow. 

Stay tuned for the next blog..... 

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