Jan van Poll

A large part of my career I have worked in the care of people with a mental or physical disability. The last ten years I worked as a manager. The daily practice of yoga gave me the energy and alertness to keep doing my job with satisfaction. The effort and relaxation through yoga was an essential counterbalance to the stresses and strains in this position.

I believe that yoga can be a great support for men and women who have a busy life, a lot of stress, little or no exercise, are exposed to a continuous flow of information and therefore not able to achieve complete relaxation. Iyengar yoga is for serious people who want to know more about how the body functions, who want to explore their habits and be open to learn how yoga can benefit them.

In all yoga postures I give detailed instructions on how to do them safely. I ask you to concentrate on the posture and to observe the effects. Depending on your physical abilities it will be hard work and sometimes you will work up a sweat. There will be little opportunity to let your mind wander. The overall result at the end of the lesson is a deep relaxation.

In the late eighties I suffered from lower back pain. Physical therapy did not help. After a brief search through various types of yoga I discovered Iyengar yoga. The pain soon disappeared and never came back. However Yoga gave me more; I felt energetic, alert, happy and healthy. My enthusiasm and need to deepen my practice of yoga led me to the teachers training in Amsterdam. After obtaining my degree in ’91, I travelled to India and had three weeks of intensive lessons from B.K.S. Iyengar and his daughter Geeta in Pune, India.