On October 1, 2010, I taught the first class at The Still Water Studio, my yoga studio in Wimberley. It was called Friday Night Lights, and 5 people were there. On October 1, 2011, we spent the day shopping for lumber and beginning construction of the world's first (and only) indoor TreeYoga ™ facility.
The story begins years ago, when I was folding towels one sunny late Spring afternoon in 2005 at a yoga studio in Dallas and "Hal" showed up at the door. He introduced himself and I recognized the name - his son was a regular student. And Hal was still high from his 3rd ever class. "I've been practicing yoga in trees," he told me, "and I think it is really beautiful and cool and I want to create a book of pictures for my wife. Can I borrow some of your cute yoga teachers to pose for me?"
What I remember saying is, "I think I'd better have a look at this myself before I put any other teacher at risk." What Hal remembers me saying is, "Well I love yoga and I love trees, so it sounds great to me!"
Either way, we went out into the soft green manicured lawns of Lee Park and Hal pulled out some bundles of heavy duty "slings" to keep us safe in the trees, and I took one look at what he was doing and said, "yup, that's yoga." And pulled on a sling, walked up a tree, flipped upside down, and giggled. TreeYoga™ was born.
Over the next year, Hal developed the ideal sling product called TreeYoga Multi-Slings (TYMS) and went into manufacturing. His lovely wife Debra took on the job of TreeYoga photographer. I gathered more yoga teachers and we played, practiced, discovered the poses, and let our laughing inner children out to play. We went to the Yoga Journal conference in Estes Park, created websites, videos and playshops, and slowly, the practice took root and grew.
But heat, drought and tough little critters make outdoor TreeYoga hard sometimes, so we're bringing the trees indoors. Look for pictures and progress reports here.....
The story begins years ago, when I was folding towels one sunny late Spring afternoon in 2005 at a yoga studio in Dallas and "Hal" showed up at the door. He introduced himself and I recognized the name - his son was a regular student. And Hal was still high from his 3rd ever class. "I've been practicing yoga in trees," he told me, "and I think it is really beautiful and cool and I want to create a book of pictures for my wife. Can I borrow some of your cute yoga teachers to pose for me?"
What I remember saying is, "I think I'd better have a look at this myself before I put any other teacher at risk." What Hal remembers me saying is, "Well I love yoga and I love trees, so it sounds great to me!"
Either way, we went out into the soft green manicured lawns of Lee Park and Hal pulled out some bundles of heavy duty "slings" to keep us safe in the trees, and I took one look at what he was doing and said, "yup, that's yoga." And pulled on a sling, walked up a tree, flipped upside down, and giggled. TreeYoga™ was born.
Over the next year, Hal developed the ideal sling product called TreeYoga Multi-Slings (TYMS) and went into manufacturing. His lovely wife Debra took on the job of TreeYoga photographer. I gathered more yoga teachers and we played, practiced, discovered the poses, and let our laughing inner children out to play. We went to the Yoga Journal conference in Estes Park, created websites, videos and playshops, and slowly, the practice took root and grew.
But heat, drought and tough little critters make outdoor TreeYoga hard sometimes, so we're bringing the trees indoors. Look for pictures and progress reports here.....
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