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I got to catch up with Holly Konrady, Stress Management Specialist, Co-Creator of Calm Institute, Yoga Teacher (e-RYT 500), Tri- Mindfulness event creator, and so much more! She believes that getting your exercise should be as normal as brushing your teeth and she is simply, grateful to be here.
This year Tri-Mindfulness has teamed up with Yoga Village and Veg-Out to bring the best to our community and bring out the best in each other.
Holly can you tell us more about what Tri-Mindfulness is? Tri-Mindfulness is an event that I created a few years ago to help raise money for an organization. It has been very successful and is a great way to bring people together to raise money for a good cause and to practice yoga together. This is a 5k run/walk, 45 minutes of yoga, and 15 minutes of mindfulness practice. The 5k
will begin and end at the Live Oak Pavilion Center and the yoga and mindfulness will take place on the lawn. We can get 300-350 people with yoga mats on the lawn.
What is your vision for the yoga community in this area? I see Yoga Village as a centerpiece for our community, where we can all come together as a collective, which in turn can strengthen each of us. I believe Yoga Village is in a unique position to serve as the facilitator of this collective. Yoga is not competitive, yoga itself should be shared and while I understand that it can also be a business I think that the more we share with each other about what we are doing, the more that people will come to yoga. It would be so helpful to know more about each other, to know what each studio’s niche is. I think about the first time someone walks into a yoga studio, there are a lot of questions like “am I going to be able to do this, am I going to be welcomed”, much like starting anything else in your life. If there were more of a collective of yoga studios going “yes, just get to one of them, they are all great” and knowing what their niche is because everyone has their niche, strengthening will happen, and it will only be good for business.
Why is it
so important for the yoga communities to come together? Yoga should be shared
Tell us about the first time you walked into a yoga studio or your first introduction to yoga. When I was a young child, my mom had a yoga instructor come to the house. She was such a pioneer. I was in fourth grade, and I remember I would do yoga on the floor at the foot of my bed, it helped calm me down I was kind of a live wire (laughs) can you imagine that?!!
I can’t think of the exact first time I went into a yoga studio but the first time it had a real meaning for me was at Seaside Yoga with Ashley Ludman. (insert big smile). Ashley was so sweet, you felt like you were her best friend when you walked through the door. I tore my ACL and was I recovering, and someone said I should try yoga, and I did. I am so glad I did because within a year I was doing a teacher training and then right after that I was teaching.
Do you think that if you never had that injury would you have discovered yoga/rediscovered yoga? Yes. I went into it thinking it would be a physical practice and being as physical as I am I would have rounded my way that way anyway, because my body needed it. I went into yoga for physical reasons but interestingly it is about relaxation for me and is also about th
e physical and the spirituality and connection. Yoga is just taking that moment to just go “wow, I am present”. That is what I do in my work at the hospital, to help people to become more present, with heart patients and cancer patients, because they are scared of the future. Stress has the ability to decrease healing and they are there to heal. When the mind has the ability to be in the past and the future the mind will go to what it remembers or what is ahead rather than in the present, our mind goes all over the place. When you can bring yourself into the present and take a slower breath the brain is interpreting that breath to say that you are okay. When the brain gets that message your body functions more effectively, nothing is shut down.
It was such a pleasure talking with Holly, I hope to see you at Veg-Out event, Tri-Mindfulness !!