| Yoga Bio |
Jessica Jennings, MS, ERYT-500, RYPT, became a Certified Anusara Instructor in 2006. She created the Ma Yoga® Prenatal Certification Program (RPYT) in 2012 as a way to share what she had come to call the “Five Sacred Steps”: the Universal Principles adapted to the particular needs, challenges and opportunities of women’s bodies, minds and spirits in their childbearing years.
Jessica’s passion for teaching yoga to moms and moms-to-be started in 2001, when she was asked after her first teacher training to teach a prenatal class at the first Anusara studio in Los Angeles.
In 2003, Jessica developed and ran a group visit and prenatal yoga program in the Ob/Gyn Department at Kaiser Hospital as a Lifestyle Educator as part of her Masters in Kinesiology. After six years of witnessing how life-changing it was for mamas to share experiences, yoga and transformation on their journey to motherhood and beyond, Jessica left in 2009 to train and help yoga teachers start their own “Mama Circles” in their own neighborhoods.
Ma Yoga soon grew to more than ten locations in the Southern California area with more than 18,000 women coming through classes to feel great, prepare for labor and enjoy their journey to motherhood and beyond.
When Covid quarantine happened, the Ma Yoga teacher tribe moved their Prenatal, Mom, and Ma Yoga Foundations classes online and began to serve mamas globally.
Similarly, the 85-hour Ma Yoga Certification Program (RPYT) went from half online to all-live online, and has now certified teachers from around the word.
The program is more than a prenatal teacher training: it’s a comprehensive deep dive into alignment principles and practices for women.
It includes prenatal training, therapeutics for women’s changing bodies, and “Mayurveda” – self-care, daily rhythm and food-as-medicine routines for busy women.
“Ma” means mother in just about every language, for instance Italian: “Madre”, Latvian: “Māte”, Norwegian: “Mamma” or “Mor”, Persian: “Madr”, etc.
In Sanskrit, “ma” also means the highest, most powerful, wise and nurturing, as in “Ma Kali”, the Mother of all Goddesses.
Whether we’re pregnant with an idea, a vision or a new way of being in the world, when we learn to truly mother ourselves, we begin to embody into our highest, most powerful and wise “Ma” Self.
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| Weekly Class Schedule |
Come to http://www.MaYoga.com to try a free class in the Ma Yoga Zoom Room!
Regular yoga (“Ma Yoga for Foundations”), prenatal, and mom yoga are all available throughout the week.
Or just go straight to our schedule – https://mayoga.com/book-me
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| What do you love most about Anusara Yoga? |
When I was looking for a teacher training in 1999, I was looking for principles I could use to get people out of pain, and into vibrant wellness.
I wanted to understand the WHY and HOW yoga works.
The Anusara principles of alignment gave me this, and to this day, I use this principles to align with my highest potential both on and off the mat.
Over two decades of working with women in their childbearing years, these principles have evolved and been adapted to adadress women’s specific challenges and opportunities.
I will always be grateful to my Anusara teachers for giving me these life-changing tools that form the basis of what I call the “Five Sacred Steps.”
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| Why do you teach Anusara yoga? |
I enjoy sharing principles with my students, rather than just lists of poses, each with their own separate instructions.
Providing teachers with a deep understanding of principles that are always true in the body and life feels like I’m teaching them to fish, rather than just giving them a fish.
And it makes life so much easier for me as a teacher, as I have a checklist to make sure my classes are safe, therapeutic, and transformative.
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| Why do you license with Anusara? |
As a Certified Ansuara Teacher, I love helping teachers feel confident using alignment principles to understand what may have been a little fuzzy or unclear before: The Yoga of Pregnancy, The Yoga of Healing for Women, and MAyurveda: Living Ayurveda for Busy Women.
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| Displayed Name |
Jessica Jennings, MS, ERYT, RYPT
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