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Integral Yoga: the Path to Wisdom Within
January 2014
By Roberta Miceli
For me, yoga meant a series of things I couldn’t do: contorted body poses, uneven breathing practices, and the ultimate torture—trying to quiet the mind. Then I took a class in Richmond, Virginia, taught by Nora Vimala Pozzi, and realized I had it all wrong. Nora’s approach made me realize that by accepting where I am, yoga can help me access the deepest part of myself. Through her Integral yoga classes at the Integral Yoga® Center of Richmond, she helped me and countless others find the wisdom within. She teaches her students a different way: “. . .Yoga is about transcending the mind. It’s about going beyond the cognitive self, the thinking, the chatter to a inner peace. It’s a path to transformation,” she says.
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Nora’s path to becoming a respected, sought-after yoga teacher was a circuitous and unexpected one. Her journey began with what was supposed to be a three-month stay in Richmond. In 1981, she and her late former husband traveled from Argentina to the Medical College of Virginia because he needed a kidney transplant, which happened two years later. In the meantime, he had embraced yoga as one of many alternate therapies to keep himself alive. He ultimately lived forty years beyond his doctors’ prediction, and Nora attributes his survival to yoga. Recognizing that yoga was instrumental in helping to heal her husband, she began her study, taking classes in yoga while practicing architecture, her day job at the time.
As she immersed herself more deeply in the study of yoga, Nora soon became certified as a yoga teacher and began teaching and directing the Integral Yoga® Center of Richmond. Today, she is a nationally and internationally known teacher, offering classes in Continuing Yoga, Yoga for Cancer Patients, Gentle Yoga, Yoga Philosophy (Raja Yoga), Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy, and other yoga practices. But she claims that her most important practice is studying herself. As she puts it, “I have to know myself inside out and upside down to be as genuine as I can for my students. I have to continue to accept where I am and recognize that pain is simply resistance so I can help my students do the same, acknowledging our common humanness.” This is one of the main lessons she learned from her guru, Sri Swami Satchidananda, founder of Yogaville, who has been a strong influence in her life. She acknowledges him as her constant inspiration and the source of her deep yoga knowledge. Nora’s students are in awe of her. They gush about her classes and tout the many ways she has helped them through emotional and physical challenges, large and small. Morgan Obrochta, a twenty-something professional, started taking Nora’s individual yoga therapy sessions after surgery for a brain tumor, which left one arm paralyzed. What started with sessions where she sat on the floor and struggled to shrug her shoulders, ended in sessions where she could open and close her left hand. According to Morgan, “I started going (to yoga) for physical reasons, but continued for emotional ones. Yoga has taught me that there is always tomorrow, that I need to have fluid expectations.”
Taylor Whitehouse, an engineer, says that Nora’s classes have changed his life. They have helped him understand who he really is and helped him find that middle place, that place where he is living in the moment. “As a very analytical person, I had to work hard to free myself from thinking, to recognize that spirituality goes beyond the mind. Yoga has turned me into a spiritual person and that has made all the difference.” |
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Most of Nora’s classes are taught at the Friends Meeting House at 4500 Kensington Ave., in Richmond, Virginia. The six- to thirteen-week sessions range from Beginning and Mixed Level Yoga, to Continuing Yoga. X-Gentle yoga (including Chair Yoga) sessions last six to eight weeks. Individual and group Phoenix Rising Yoga therapy, Integral Yoga private sessions, Reiki and Reflexology are also available. Detailed descriptions of the various class options, contact, cost and payment information are found at YogaHelps.com
As Leda Spencer, another of Nora’s students, says, “Nora is a treasure to Richmond. Her classes are not like any other yoga classes. Her classes teach you to feel like you can handle everything in your life.”
Follow Nora on Facebook.
As Leda Spencer, another of Nora’s students, says, “Nora is a treasure to Richmond. Her classes are not like any other yoga classes. Her classes teach you to feel like you can handle everything in your life.”
Follow Nora on Facebook.
