For years, yoga has been a sometimes mysterious, often wise guide in my life, first Bikram yoga (with its sweaty intensity), then Vinyasa (which feeds the dancer in me), then Shakti yoga dancing and also intensive study with Angela Farmer—going deep within.
I bring to my teaching a humility and trust that comes from daily practice, my eclectic training (meditation, years at the gym, salsa), and joy in building multiracial communities.
Come as you are, all of you.
SURVIVORS ON THE YOGA MAT
For more than two decades, Becky Thompson has been practicing Bikram, Vinyasa, Baptiste, and meditative yoga in the United States and internationally. She has deepened her practice through study with Angela Farmer and Victor Van Kooten (in Greece), at the Yoga Barn in Ubud, Bali, at the Kripalu Center in Massachusetts, and through Shakti Yoga Dance trainings with Samantha Cameron. She has taught yoga at the International Women’s Partnership for Peace and Justice in Chiang Mai, Thailand, in Guangzhou and Dali China and in refugee centers in Greece. During her many years of studying, practicing and teaching yoga, Becky has witnessed many people who experience yoga as a physical practice as well as a way to heal from trauma, which led her to write her recent book, Survivors on the Yoga Mat: Stories for Healing from Trauma. Survivors draws tougher a multiracial group of stories of the pain and resiliency of the human spirit. Read More…
YOGA FOR EVERY BODY CLASSES
Going Inside
Yoga, a meditation in motion, leads us inside with the breath, to the precious space behind the heart, to stiff places we can free up. Conscious breath and movement help us remember our grounding with the earth, our connection to ourselves and each other.
Releasing Tension
Through postures and conscious breathing, yoga helps to calm the central nervous system, release tension stored in muscles, ligaments, and tendons. Yoga brings us back into the equilibrium that our bodies crave.
Cultivating Joy
A flowing yoga practice that combines breath and movement promises the cultivation of joy. Joy teaches us to be tender with ourselves, to walk with ease in the world.
MY ANGEL
The original Shakti Dance was created in the depth of winter, with Saturn as Capricorn’s ruler and guide, dictating the structure and dedication to rise against the odds. Working with a choreographic limitation (Saturn) of remaining down on the mat, I found creative ways for bodies rise and fly inwardly. In struggling with this difficulty (Saturn,) more of the magic-morph between angel and human grew within the movement. The intention is to expand, and unfurl our wings, to grow that angelic self and live here on earth. The joy of this Shakti is we learn to rise again and again until we are able to embody heavenly and earthly polarities. This is the sweet battle between high self and low self. We honor both. Both win, both serve this life.
BROKEN WINGS
Broken Wings is a Shakti Yoga Dance that moves Yoga bodies toward flight, from old and broken parts of self. Like all Shakti Yoga Dances, this piece explores the emotional body through linking poses and breath so the dancer within emerges on the mat. As lovely as it is to watch, it’s 100 times more exciting to do.
YOGA DANCE, SIMMONS UNIVERSITY
Becky’s course ‘Love Calls Us” including reading Herbie Hancock’s memoir Possibilities along with listening to his Elliot Norton lecture at Harvard University on Buddhism and creativity and learning a yoga dance for Hancock’s Imagine Project, based on John Lennon’s “Imagine”. We performed the dance for the Undergraduate Research Symposium.
BECKY’S WEEKLY CLASSES
In Boston, Becky films a new yoga class each week for YMCA-GO (available on YouTube) and she teaches on Monday nights (6:00 pm) on zoom for the Dorchester YMCA community and the National Women’s Studies Association. All are welcome.
RADIO INTERVIEW ON HEALING TRAUMA THROUGH YOGA UPLIFT YOUR LIFE, NOURISHMENT OF THE SPIRIT
Listen to Becky’s interview on the internationally syndicated radio show “Uplift Your Life, Nourishment of the Spirit” with Dr. Paula Joyce. CLICK HERE
TRAVEL TO CHINA YOGA AND POETRY COURSE
Becky taught “Working for Peace, Insisting on Justice” seminars in two Chinese provinces. The first for social workers and community activists in Guangzhou in southern China, and the second for community organizers, academics, and NGO workers in Dali. READ MORE…
Teaching at National University for Natural Medicine, Portland, Oregon.
Teaching yoga at the National Women’s Studies Association conference in Montreal.
