By 
First of all, thank you so much for coming to my little blog! I appreciate every single one of you who take the time to come to my blog and read about the things I love, and topics that I am most passionate about.
Yoga is one of my favorite things to do.
This practice has grown on me a lot over the past eight years, and in the last five years, it has been part of my daily routine that I never miss! Even while traveling.
How I started:
My first few yoga class experiences were good. The classes were nice and comfortable, but I took the class and left. I wasn’t inspired to go back.
Until I met my current teacher and mentor, Aree Khodai. It was in the fall of 2017, yoga students were lined up to go into her packed yoga classes at Equinox. I definitely wanted to see what the hype was all about. The first class I took from her, she kept coming over to adjust me and put me in the correct form of the yoga poses. I felt like I was targeted and the worst yoga student ever. But there was something so endearing about her and the way she taught. She was very strict with her poses, very directional with her cues, all while making us all laugh. You can tell she was very passionate about teaching yoga but also very knowledgeable. Since then, I never missed a week of class.
As my form improved and I was able to get deeper into the poses, I started to understand the practice more and really began to appreciate not just the physical benefits but the meditation aspect.
Just a Hobby:
Yoga is a practice I like to work on daily, and I give myself about one hour to an hour and a half to fully be present, ground myself, and move my body. Being on my mat was a nice little escape from the constant pressures that I felt from my job as a digital content creator.
Coming from the beauty and fashion world, creating makeup tutorials and attending fashion shows, I felt like the two world’s didn’t collide. Yoga felt like a separate thing and it is a hobby that I love, and will always be just a hobby.
Connection to Myself and My Community:
As I started to consistently do yoga, I was investing more of my time and energy to this practice. I was wearing athleisure more than ever, and started to share with my close friends how amazing this practice this.
I saw improvements in my physical health, mental health, and self-love. As I took more time on my mat, other insecurities in my life began to fade away. The constant need to be fully glam to feel beautiful didn’t feel necessary to me anymore. I felt strong because of my practice and became open to other workouts. My relationships also started to improve as my alignment with myself and others started to become clear.
What brought me the most joy was the community. My teacher and yoga classmates held space for me for just being me. We simply supported each other and cheered each other on as we got into different poses. I didn’t feel judged, I didn’t feel excluded, I felt loved and I felt accepted.
Sharing the Practice:
There are so many reasons why I wanted to do Yoga teacher training! I love my teacher, I wanted to learn more about the practice, I wanted to improve my practice, but most of all I wanted to share this practice with others. This practice that changed my life for the better.
I developed such a strong connection to myself and others through this practice and I want others to feel the same and reap the same benefits.
Yoga is a practice and I am constantly learning more about it as I go. If I can share the knowledge I’ve gained through this practice to others, that would bring joy me joy and hopefully, if it works the same for everyone as it has, it will bring joy to you as well!
If you have any questions about Yoga or how to start, feel free to leave me a comment on my blog, my Instagram, YouTube or TikTok! Be Ready to see some yoga content on my platforms!
xoxo Arika
