Yoga
All classes at Second Circle are a diverse mix of styles and methods. The teachers here bring their unique histories, expertise, and personality to every class. Some of our classes, like Foundations and Seven Salutations, are the same every time. Some, like Flow and Kripalu, are different every time. Some are only about 30% yoga, like our Dumbbells class or Roll & Restore. The common thread is that they are offered by and for our community as a way to bring our community together and support their well-being.
Foundations
All Levels
In Foundations we emphasize stability and functional alignment. We don’t do much on the wrists in Foundations, there’s one Down Dog, no planks, and no chaturangas. This ritualized class sequence targets the legs, hips, and core to create the groundwork for healthy movement in everything you do.
Flow
All Levels, designed to be challenging
Our Flow classes combine improvisation with repetition, with a primary emphasis on strong, well-supported movement patterns. In Flow, we mix “traditional” yoga poses with modern fitness routines, and no two classes are the same.
Roll & Restore
All Levels, Gentle
A grounding mix of therapeutic yoga, basic stretching, and myofascial release, Roll & Restore is a relaxing and light-hearted combination of methodologies. It’s excellent for washing off full-body tension and de-stressing after a long Monday. Tennis balls and foam rollers complimentary.
Seven Salutations
All levels, just be ready to move
Seven Salutations is our newest format, and we can’t get enough of it. In this class, we string together traditional Sun Salutations, more contemporary Moon Salutations, and other ritual sequences of our own design.
Kripalu
Beginner to moderate
In Kripalu yoga, we build self awareness through meditation, breathwork, and alignment. Classes are accessible for everyone, with slightly longer holds emphasizing sensation rather than obtaining the “perfect” pose. Yoga nidra is sometimes included as part of the practice.
Vinyasa
Moderate
Vinyasa yoga links breath and movement in a dynamic, flowing style. There is no fixed sequence; each class contains a different sequence of poses. The practice elevates heart rate and builds muscle strength and core stability. Some knowledge of yoga is helpful but all students are welcome.
Yin
Gentle
Yin is a slow paced, meditative style of yoga that uses extended holds of 3 to 5 minutes to focus on deep tissues and fascia. The goal is to improve flexibility and generate a calm, peaceful mental state. Yin offers a contrast to more active styles such as vinyasa.
Dumbbells
All levels, any weight or none
Dumbbells is a fun, full-body workout that blends strength training with yoga-inspired movement.
“Practice is a gift; we give our discipline, our focus, and our joy to the room. The room gives back what the room gives back.”
Yoga For Human Beings
You’re a human being. Your body evolved (primarily) to run, walk, swim, climb, squat, carry, and throw. This evolution occurred hundreds of thousands of years ago, way before Yoga was developed.
At Second Circle we believe Yoga should support the design of the human body, not seek to alter, transform, or “improve” it. We call this idea “body-first” Yoga. Your body determines the success of the practice, not the other way around. Following this idea, we have aligned traditional yoga practices with modern theory to create a system for empowered, healthy, human movement.
We focus on three core principles of body work:
Body First, Posture Second
Your body is a marvel of evolutionary engineering. A healthy yoga practice does not try to transcend or escape the body, it seeks to empower it. The function of a yoga pose must always follow the design and form of the human being doing it. The more information we have about human bodies in general and individual students in specific, the more powerful the practice becomes.
Stability supports mobility
“Pretty” yoga poses can be deceptive. Just because something looks impressive doesn’t mean it’s good for you, so we aren’t interested in super-bendy yoga poses at Second Circle. (We did them all before, we didn’t attain Nirvana. We did, however, attain some hamstring injuries.) Instead we focus on functional movement, a dynamic combination of strength and mobility. We will help you become more flexible in service of healthy, long-term, well-supported body patterns.
Basically, there’s no real reason for you to put your leg behind your head. There are, however, myriad excellent reasons for you to develop dynamic core strength.
Support the center
Just like a healthy root structure supports a healthy tree, a healthy center body is the key to functional movement. This will change the way you walk, run, swim, climb, throw, and even sit in a chair. Most importantly, it will change the way you breathe. Our practice isn’t about the poses, it’s about your life in motion.
Influences
Our practice primarily combines Bikram, Anusara, and Kripalu Yoga. It is heavily influenced by Thomas Myers’ work on ‘Anatomy Trains’ as well as Katy Bowman’s theory of ‘nutritious movement.’ There’s a dash of Yin, a sprinkling of Qi Gong, and even a smidge of Baptiste Yoga in there for good measure. Thousands of hours of study, in-class student work, and annoyingly nit-picky inquisition have gone into making this mixture into a unified, invigorating practice for students of all levels.
The Second Circle Teaching Family
Every teacher at Second Circle has trained and studied the ins and outs of this specific method. We practice together. We study together. We nerd out together over the weirdness of humans and the ways our practice can support them.
