For busy New York yogis, Yogoer.com is a dream service. In a couple of clicks, the site provides every nearby yoga, pilates, fitness, and dance studio based on an address. It’s Mapquest for your source of well-being. The site also provides job postings for yoga instructors, profiles of studios and instructors, and a blog. To make it even easier to utilize the service, Yogoer.com is available as an iPhone app. You can also follow Yogoer on Twitter.
Last week I had the pleasure to interview Erica Heinz, a graphic designer, Huffington Post columnist, yoga instructor, and founder of Yogoer.com. I’m also excited to announce that I’m recording my yoga teacher training diary on Yogoer.com’s blog. My thanks to Erica for the opportunity to connect with the community she’s building on Yogoer.com.
Christa - What was your inspiration to start Yogoer?
Erica - While I was working full-time as a web designer, I often missed a yoga class by 10 or 15 minutes. And at small studios, the next one is 60 or 90 minutes later. So I'd think "There HAS to be another class around here somewhere" and start madly Googling. Finally, I wondered why there wasn't just a map of all the yoga studios in the city, so I built one.
Christa - How did you get interested in the practice of yoga?
Erica - In college, I took a "Yoga & Relaxation" class, where we learned how to de-stress and fall asleep on the floor. Very useful. But there was one day we did Fish pose, and my eyes filled with tears for no apparent reason! So I thought, whoa, there's something to this.
After college, I needed a substitute for crew. I'd rowed for seven semesters; it was the hardest sport I'd ever done, and the most mental. It's a repeated motion that eventually becomes pure muscle memory, and then it's just an exercise in will. So I was drawn to the 26-pose sequence of Bikram; it was the shortest sequence I could find. Then I heard Ashtanga was "better", so I tried that. And finally I wandered into Atmananda Yoga, where I eventually did my teacher training.
Christa - Did you know you always wanted to teach or did the desire to teach grow out of your own practice? How did you know when you were ready to teach? Where did you do your training?
Erica - I took the teacher training in order to train, not to teach. I realized that I would never learn the correct alignments piecemeal in group classes. And I really liked the sequence at Atmananda; it was the most fluid sequence I'd found. So literally an hour before their training started, I signed up. I'd been going 3 times a week for months; during the 6-month training I practiced every day. I went from zero to splits in six months, and obviously I knew the owner's class by heart; they asked me to teach.
I never feel ready [to teach]. It's such a huge responsibility when you look out at 20 individuals that you're going to lead through things they've maybe never done before. The challenges are different every time, even if you teach a set sequence. But I knew I had enough athletic training to keep people safe, and a steady practice to draw from, so finally I relaxed and just let it happen.
Christa - How has yoga influenced your work as a designer and how has your design work influenced your yoga?
Erica - When I started calling myself "a yoga teacher," it was the first time I really started taking care of myself physically, emotionally, and mentally. It was a title I wanted to live up to. That in turn made me a more relaxed, creative, and better designer. Yoga has taught me to get out of my head, and follow my feelings. And my design work helps me visualize, communicate, and plan things a lot better.
Christa - Can you share information about your upcoming yoga book?
Erica - I'm designing a book called The Yoga Sequence for Sabina Stahl; she co-created the Atmananda Sequence with Jhon Tamayo. Her sequence is adjustable — you can combine several short sequences or do variations, based on the day. The first draft is done, and now we're looking for a publisher.
I'm also working on an eBook for Yogoer, based on some of the things I've written about on the blog and the Huffington Post. It's a work in progress, but aren't we all.
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