The Art of Vinyasa with Catherine

This offering is a vitalizing, movement-oriented postural practice designed to optimize energetic activation. Through rhythm, repetition, and flowing sequences, the practice engages muscles and the cardiovascular system while building strength and increasing stamina. Synchronized movement and breath support the release of physical tension and mental stress, allowing both gross and subtle energetic blocks to soften. The result is a practice that is both grounding and enlivening - cultivating clarity, resilience, and a deep sense of embodied vitality.

Everyone is Welcome Here

All bodies, backgrounds, and experience levels are welcome. No prior experience is necessary. There is never a cost. 

What to Bring

Please consider wearing comfortable, layered clothing and bringing any practice supports you enjoy - mat, blocks, straps, bolsters, or blankets. Community practice supports are available, and you’re encouraged to use them freely. Bringing water to hydrate after practice is also a good idea.

This Practice is Not Sold

This practice is not sold. It’s shared. Our offerings exist through voluntary giving - as a living expression of the community we are. What we receive is made possible by the many who have given before us, and what we offer allows the practice to remain unowned and open.

Giving is part of yoga practice - not as a duty, but as a remembering. When we give, the grip of “me and mine” loosens. The patterns of separation and self-importance are disrupted. We step out of self-absorption - the root of suffering - and feel into the truth of interconnectedness. Every act of giving dissolves a boundary. The giver and the receiver are not two. This is how the practice continues - through open hands and open hearts.

A Note About Yin & Yang Energies

In Taoist philosophy the yin-yang symbol represents the interconnectedness of contrary forces and the archetype of unity in diversity. These two energies are relative to each other - one cannot exist without the other. The two seeming opposites are interdependent - contained within each, is a piece of the other. Yin and yang energies are present in everything. The ancient yogis even referred to right-half and left-half of the body as “ha,” and “tha,” Sanskrit terms that can be translated to English to mean “sun” and “moon.” Yoga invites us to balance these energies of the body-mind, understanding these seeming polarities as a natural part of life and always in flux.

Yang energy is bright and warm like the daytime sun. It invites us into alert, focused, pervading, and active spaces. Yang energy is overt, open, obvious, and direct. It likes “to do” with effort. Yang is masculine, with an external gaze. Its air and fire elements allow it to bloom and lift, like a hot-air balloon. Its seasons are spring and summer – birth and the beginning of life – our first inhale. Its direction is south.

Yin energy is dark and cool like the nighttime moon. It invites us into calm, receptive, yielding, and passive spaces. Yin energy is covert, concealed, discreet and indirect. It likes “to be” with ease. Yin is feminine, with an internal focus. Its water and earth elements allow it to ground and root, like a lotus in mud. Its seasons are autumn and winter – the end of life and death – our last exhale. Its direction is north.

Some asana practices are more yin in nature, while others are more yang. Fast, moving, dynamic asana practice that straightens and squeezes the body embraces yang energy. It works muscles and the cardiovascular system through intense rhythm and repetition. Asana practice based in yang energy builds strength and stamina. Slow, still, quiet asana practice that rounds and softens the body embraces yin energy. It reaches the deep, dense tissues of the body (joints, ligaments, tendons) through long-held poses. Asana practice based in yin energy grows flexibility, patience, and open- heartedness.

Asana practice provides an opportunity to feel into the aspects of yin and yang energy, noticing our preferences for one energy over the other, and balancing into energy that we may be resisting.