Iyengar Yoga with Karin Stephan

In these classes, Karin will use the principles of B.K.S. Iyengar Yoga to introduce students to basic alignment, improve posture, and create greater openness in the upper back, neck, and shoulders. Students will learn how yoga poses can be adapted to work with their own individual asymmetries, areas of stiffness, and patterns of discomfort or pain.

The classes are open to all levels and no previous experience of Iyengar yoga is necessary. A variety of yoga props will be available and used as needed to make the poses more accessible and effective. Students will be encouraged to work in a way that is appropriate for their abilities. They will leave feeling relaxed, centered, and more deeply connected to their bodies.

About Karin Stephan:

Karin Stephan is a leading Iyengar Yoga teacher with a career that spans over five decades. In 1972, she began studying with B.K.S. Iyengar, whose teachings profoundly shaped her understanding and appreciation of the human body. She earned a level 3 Iyengar Yoga Teacher Certification, and Iyengar's insights and acute sense of observation continue to be essential to her yoga practice and her teaching. In 1985, she co-founded, alongside Patricia Walden, the B.K.S. Iyengar Yoga Center of Cambridge, which was the first Iyengar center on the East Coast.

Karin has embraced Iyengar's definition of yoga as "precision in action," as this complements her own interest in structure and aesthetics. In her yoga classes, she weaves these themes of precision, structure, and aesthetics, bringing these concepts alive with instructive imagery and metaphors which guide her students towards the essence of each asana. She also brings a wry sense of humor and anecdotes from her 84 years of lived experience.