Bengaluru: Yoga, the ancient discipline, with earliest mentions found in the Rig Veda. Thousands of years later, yoga has evolved into worldwide rage, with different schools and approaches taught around the world. It’s the perfect antidote, after all, to the many stressors that comprise modern life and has evolved as a social activity, too. Amidst the hype and the glamour, however, as yoga experts range from children to nonagenarians, a new breed of twenty-somethings are moving away from their more worldly ambitions to the more austere, spiritual way of life that yoga offers. Prerna Ramanathan, Chandana Manjunath and Nidhi Srivatsa, three young, Bengaluru-based yoga teachers talk to DC about what compelled them to follow this rather unusual calling in a world defined by material pursuits and the challenges they face in doing so.
26-year-old Prerna Ramanthan, who teaches Yoga at Inventure Academy, a city school, who completed her degree in Psychology before she changed tracks. She found, to her amazement, that she could heal the damaged ligament in her knee with the right combination of asanas. Her days are spent at the school’s quiet yoga pavilion, where every free moment is dedicated to poring over books on human anatomy to supplement her knowledge.
Prerna Ramanthan
"After the injury, I was drawn towards a profession that would teach the importance of a fitness regime and find a balance, to help cope with any sort of physical or mental challenges." Her interest lies in yoga's therapeutic benefits, which she combines with her degree in Psychology. "I want to work with psychotherapists and psychologists to understand how yoga can be applied as exercise therapy," she explained. Ramanathan, who completed a teacher-training course and went on to specialise in yoga for children, has been teaching for two-and-half-years now. "My family has supported me right through," she says, gratitude in her voice. "I was determined to do this - the fact that I would earn less money than my peers didn't stop me. I have my family to thank for this."
25-year-old Chandana raised many an eyebrow as she quit the “security” of a bank job to follow her passion, yoga. Now a senior instructor at Akshar Yoga, a prominent, city-based yoga institute, the 25-year-old says, "Yoga enables you to improve your environment by turning within." Her journey, however, has been less smooth. "I faced a lot of opposition when I said I wanted a career in yoga," she admitted, adding, "I believe the best gift you can give yourself is the chance to do what you truly believe in." And teaching, she maintains, helps her do this. "It makes me responsible for another person's well-being, teaching is my way of expressing my gratitude."
A law student at Christ University began practicing yoga in Grade 6 and it stuck! "There is no substitute for yoga," she said, emphatically. She was 11 when she took her first yoga class, at Carmel School in Padmanabhnagar. "After that, our school began entering us in competitions - they started with taluk and district levels and went on to inter-state events as well." The standard, Srivatsa found, was very high and she upped her practice from twice a month to a couple of hours each day. "If I'm training for a competition, my teacher ensures that this goes up to around five hours every day," she said. PR Krishnamurthy, a national level referee with the Yoga Federation of India, has trained her for eight years now. "I entered my first national level competition last year," Srivatsa added.
