What do B.K.S. Iyengar, K. Pattabhi Jois, Sri T. Krishnamacharya, Desikachar , Ganga White, Lilias Folan and many other Yoga Teachers of both famous and influential note all have in common. They all Teach Hatha Yoga! Is this a secret practice they do privately and not tell anyone. No this is not some secret thing they do, as each and every one of them actually do Hatha Yoga. Yes they all do different styles and variations of Hatha but the root all grows from Hatha Yoga. Now many of the styles have travelled quite far away from their beginning bringing us a huge richness in choices of yoga. A few styles of yoga have managed to stay pure and close to yoga's origins. The most well known style to stay in the classical Hatha Yoga Mode is Iyengar Style yoga. (Iyengar Yoga has so permeated the world of yoga I think it would be near to impossible in todays yoga world to teach a class without using some of the knowledge this famous teacher has passed on to the yoga world)
Acro Yoga, Forrest Yoga, Yin Yoga, Shadow Yoga, Astanga Yoga, are some of the newer styles of yoga on offer these days. Having tried them all I must say to teachers who originated these styles ,"Well Done". They are innovative , challenging and make your body and mind feel great. With respect to all these great teachers I am also embarking and continuing on my own Yoga Teaching journey. Yes I have my own fantastic vinyasa hot sequences and I have my own style, how can you not when you have been teaching for a long time. What I want to offer students of yoga is a path back to the source. I want to help all my students explore Classical Hatha Yoga in all its Beauty and Power. Really it's what I have been doing for many years at The Home Of Yoga. Will we still do mindful yoga, therapeutic, Iyengar method,Hot Power Yoga, and other styles , of course we will. We will however, more and more try to take all the poses and sequences back to the classical roots with emphasis on breath, foundation, spirit and of course Iyengar Method intelligence in regards to alignment and posture. 
Sometimes it may mean a softening and other times poses that have been all but forgotten. When we do flow or Vinyasa we can use those classical poses in our sequences not limiting ourselves to just a few approved poses but opening ourselves up to the hundreds of classical poses. By the way any yoga that has a flow to it where one pose fits into another is Vinyasa yoga. Sometimes when people hear Vinyasa they think hot and fast and it can be, it can also be wonderfully slow with long holds that all come together in a flowing way. Similarly Power Yoga can be hot and sweaty from a hot room and fast cardiovascular poses and it can also be advanced inversions or backbends full of pranayama and deep long holds that heat from the inside out and blow your mind.
Classical Yoga is a way of not limiting ourselves. Posture and alignment will always remain important, as will guided journeys of spirit enthrall a new generation of yogi's. Yes tuck those sits bones and feel the wind blow thru you soul, a nice combination don't you think.
People often connotate Hatha Yoga with easy and not hard. Well any yoga can be made easy and gentle if that is what sits beatifully in the moment. Hatha from my experience of the seminars and retreats I have been to around the world have been some of the most challenging flexibility wise. They do some amazing back bends and inversions that really twist your brain as you get into them. Along with Breath work that takes you beyond. So watch the assumptions about Hatha Yoga, as they say "Expectations Breed Frustrations"
I think it is incredibly important with all these new styles out there that we come from a foundation of at least basic knowledge of the original classical poses. Start with the source before you try dessert. I think also when you come from a classical history you learn that the poses do not belong to us but are rather a gift for us to use and share towards better health and spirit. We can't own or copyright the poses or our sequences they are on loan to us from a very ancient tradition. By practicing classical poses we will as a group recognise this relationship. The Indian Government is currently working to help us all remember we do not own the poses or sequences. I think sometimes the practice of Classical Yoga and it's many variations prevents us from feeling like we own the great class we just taught. Sometimes when we teach the same sequence over and over again the danger to overcome is feeling like "I invented this sequence so I own it rather than the more humbler It owns me". To help prevent this the Govt. of India has taken steps that we wish to support and remember ourselves in our own practice. " In India the birthplace of yoga, an Indian government agency is fighting what it calls "yoga theft" after several U.S. companies said they wanted to copyright or patent their versions. Yoga is a part of humanity's shared knowledge, the agency says, and any business claiming the postures as its own is violating the very spirit of the ancient practice. India's Traditional Knowledge Digital Library has gathered a team of yogis from nine schools and 200 scientists to scan ancient texts, including the writings of Patanjali, thought to be the original compiler of yoga sutras. The group is documenting more than 900 yoga postures and making a video catalogue of 250 of the most popular ones, from sun salutation to downward-facing dog.
The catalogue will be released next month and given to the international patent system, which yoga gurus in India say is essential in an age when cultural traditions can cross borders instantaneously."Yoga is collective knowledge and is available for use by everybody no matter what the interpretation," said V.K. Gupta, head of the digital library, which was set up by the ministries of health and science. "It would be very inappropriate if some companies try to prevent others from any yoga practice, even if they call it some other name. So we wanted to ensure that, in the future, nobody will be able to claim that he has created a yoga posture which was actually already created in 2500 B.C. in India." The library has documented other traditional Indian knowledge, including ayurvedic treatments and homeopathy. Tens of thousands of yoga postures have been compiled, but many are not widely practiced. "This collection is very successful in preventing wrong patent information, but it is available in 34 million pages," Gupta said with a chuckle. "We are trying to shorten the yoga catalogue to make it very easy for the world to understand."
So to the world of yoga get ready for lots of classes,workshops and retreats with lots of yoga at the source. Classical Hatha Yoga
Sam Weinstein started his yoga journey with his mother as a child doing Hatha Yoga. Later his first teacher Swami Satya Pujari (Ed Keays) introduced him to the world of teaching Hatha Yoga. Later Pujari introduced Sam to B.K.S.Iyengar in India .These two methods today have led Sam to teaching Hatha Yoga with Iyengar method influences or as Sam Say's Iyengar Intentions of Details and Alignment. Sam thanks all his teachers and trainings for there sharing of yoga with him. From California to the Bahama's to India, to Canada I have learned so much from all of you. Most of all thank you fate that led me to a near fatal accident where yoga gave me the courage to say no to losing a foot and learning to walk again and to talk. Now I understand how important yoga really is.
Sam
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