YOGA ARTICLE ARCHIVES

 

 



Early Year Yoga in Santa Monica

 

by Megan McCarver


Hello … My name Megan McCarver and I am a traditional Hatha yoga instructor in San Juan Capistrano. I was so fortunate to begin teaching yoga before the “yoga fad” emerged. The extreme popularity of yoga has transformed Western yoga in to a main stream health practice. Looking back 17 years ago, the yoga “business” was simple. In Santa Monica, California, there were only three large yoga studios. YogaWorks and Anna Forrest Yoga on Montana Avenue and the studio that I helped to found, Santa Monica Yoga on Ocean Park Boulevard.

I do not have much experience with the Anna Forrest Yoga Studio. It was across from a wonderful bakery The Boulangerie, where I would have my espressos and French pastries on some mornings way before Starbuck became so viral. Her entrance was through the alley, up the stair where her lobby would blossom out to two asana rooms. I only attended a few of Anna Forrest’s Yoga classes. At that time she was the true teacher for “Westside Warriors”.

As for Santa Monica Yoga and YogaWorks, we offered Hatha and Kundanlini Yoga and YogaWorks offered Hatha, Iyengar and Ashtanga Yoga. Our studio had light gentle blue carpeting and YogaWorks had forgiving wooden floors. Sometimes we played a gong during deep relaxation and sometimes Yoga Works teachers played the Didgeridoo. Santa Monica Yoga was considered the “hippie” studio, thought of as “an extension of our living rooms”. YogaWorks was considered more of a “yoga school” and a place for “stars” to come out to play.

Seventeen years later, many things have changed. Now Yoga flourishes in Santa Monica. Santa Monica Yoga has changed ownership and is still thriving on Ocean Park Boulevard. And YogaWorks is now corporately owned and is successfully branching out all over the world.

Some yoga trivia... There are possibly more yoga studios in Santa Monica than there are Starbucks and contrary to popular belief, a great majority of waiters today in Los Angeles are not actors awaiting stardom but are yoga teachers awaiting teaching gigs. Oh well, the beat goes on. Check out my other website www.YogaEverywhere.com. It was one of the first Yoga Portals and with some of the imporvements that we have implemented in the last year and the ones that are scheduled for 2011-2012 ... it will be one of the best again.

 






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