Lee Monk

I remember going to my very first yoga class in 2009. It was an Ashtanga class one evening a week. I must have been quite a challenge for my teacher, I couldn’t even see my toes let alone reach and hold them when instructions came to do a forward bend. I continued to turn up once a week and my teacher, Deena, very patiently encouraged a little more from each time.

After a few months of this I felt some very subtle changes within myself. I was sleeping better, I felt calmer and less irritable with myself and my family. The yoga was helping me access an inner strength that allowed me to face everyday life challenges. I needed more of those “feel good” feelings and at the end of 2009 Deena introduced me to Scott and Oz at Stillpoint Yoga London. Before I knew it by the end of 2010 I had a regular yoga practice of six days a week with both lead classes and self-practice.

Oz, Scott and Deena are very passionate and inspirational in the way they teach and encourage students to blossom, root and grow to their own unique and unlimited potential. Inspired and encouraged by my teachers I heard that John and Lucy Scott were running an Ashtanga teacher training course in the summer of 2011 in Hacienda, Spain. To my amazement John accepted my application; he said I had an “empty cup”, an open mind, open to new ideas regarding the practice and willingness to accept change to my current practice.

Having completed Ashtanga teacher training level I and level II just around the corner in January 2012, I see myself as a lifelong student with the desire to listen, enquire, develop and change in my practice. Passionate and dedicated to traditional Ashtanga, I have now reached a point where I would like to share all that I have experienced on my yoga journey and follow in the footsteps of my teachers, their teacher John Scott and John’s teacher Sri K. Pattabhi Jois. Through sharing my practice with students will help me deepen my learning.