When asked why I want to become a yoga teacher, my response might be a little different than many other people. It’s not why I want to be one, but rather why I want to be a better one. I completed my first yoga teacher training a few years ago in San Francisco, California.  As I went through the process of attaining a deeper yoga foundation I found myself at a crossroads of sorts. I decided to quit my job and travel in order to explore more of the world and myself. While traveling, I have been teaching yoga, in Mongolia, China, Vietnam, and currently as a teacher in Laos. But during my teaching I have realized that there is a need within me to learn more …  a lot more.  I now have the desire to go back to school and dive into deeper yoga education.

However as amazing as my experience teaching yoga abroad has been, it has not paid very well. This is due, in part, to the time I donated to teach free classes for the community in Mongolia.  The students had the opportunity to donate money for each class, which was given to local charities.  In addition, as a yoga teacher in Laos, I currently donate a percentage of the money I earn to various charities and causes around town.  After traveling through Asia for 19 months, I now find myself without the funds necessary to further my yoga education. This is the reason that I am now asking for your generosity to help further my studies in yoga.

I’ve been fortunate to have studied with many great teachers, and have taken little bits from each of them.  Some of these teachers are well-known in the yoga community, like Dharma Mittra, whose classes always filled me with the most amazing warmth.  I would leave his classes feeling blessed to have been near this karmic man and his indescribable energy. Or my time spent with instructors Dana Flynn and Jasmine Tarkeshi, where I received my 200hr yoga teacher training (RYT) credentials.  More than anything, they taught me to have fun in class and in life.

Dana’s infectious laugh always seemed to fill the entire class with a radiant love and happiness. I have also studied with teachers you have likely never heard of, but who inspired me nonetheless. It is because of them that I want to teach more. I want to be like those teachers. I hope to share my yoga practice with the world. When students come to a class, whether as newbies or as experienced yogis, and leave with that blissful happy look on their faces and in their hearts, I get a great satisfaction as a teacher.  If I can share what I have learned and make other people feel great, or motivate them to pursue yoga more seriously and study with some of the great yoga masters that have inspired me along the way, than I will feel like I am part of the process.  If it were not for these teachers, then there would be a lot less yogi’s in the world and I think that would be a terrible thing.

I teach Vinyasa with hints of Iyengar, Yin, and even some restorative yoga.  But, I have always had a love for and desire to teach Ashtanga. Ashtanga gives me a way to focus my energy. I can follow a text and teach the Ashantga series, but I really would not understand it. I hope to train with It’s Yoga Thailand to learn more about Ashtanga. It’s Yoga was originally founded in San Francisco, a place I hold close to my heart.  I feel connected with the studio there even though I have never actually been inside it.  Once I complete my Ashtanga yoga training, I hope to teach yoga in prisons. I believe that people in prison can use the Ashtanga yoga system to help focus their energy and any anger they possess.  It is my hope to help people who are incarcerated get themselves on a better and healthier life path.

I am a very passionate and caring person who gives so much of himself in his classes.  I now hope, with your help, to obtain more yoga knowledge and skill in order to help make a positive difference in people’s lives all over the world. Satyam and namaste. 🙂

2012 Yoga Scholarship Essay

By: Andrew Rosenstock

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