Yoga Teachers Talking Yoga
Hello and welcome to the Yoga Teachers Talking Yoga podcast!
Our new second 6-part series of interviews is now out, where we again talk to yoga teachers both established and emerging.
We find out what got each of them into yoga, why they became teachers and got started, the styles of practice that interest them, who are their inspirations were and plans are for the future.
Yoga Teachers Talking Yoga
YTTY9: Bea Chan - Aurellia Wellness for Women
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Hello and welcome to the Yoga Teachers Talking Yoga podcast
Today my guess is Bea Chan. Bea and I met during our year long IYTA teaching course in 2021 and since then she has forged her own teaching career, closely linking it with her career in midwifery and pre-natal yoga.
She has also done courses in quantum healing and yin yoga.
Note: References in the discussion to the IYTA relate to the International Yoga Teachers Association, a forerunner of yoga in Australia. For 57 years, they taught and supported yoga teachers across Australia. Sadly, the IYTA ceased its operations in 2022.
You can find more about the new wellness centre, that Bea’s involved in:
If you’d like to express an interest in being a guest in our next series, we can be contacted on: infoytty@gmail.com
Further related content and bonus material will be posted on our Facebook page:
Hello, and welcome to the Yoga Teachers Talking Yoga Podcast. Today, my guest is Bee Chan. Bee and I met during our year-long IYTA teaching course in 2021. And since then, she's forged her own yoga teaching career, closely linking it with her other day career in mid-wifery and prenatal. She's also done courses in quantum healing and yin yoga and managed to weave these two into her classes for a somewhat unique accentuation on her yoga. Today we welcome her online from her home in Sydney and say hello, Bee.
SPEAKER_00Hi everyone! Hi Paul!
SPEAKER_02Thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_02So the start of the yoga journey for Bee, and why don't you tell us where it all began?
SPEAKER_00So yoga for me actually started with ballet. So I had done so much ballet when I was younger. I started when I was six years old. I do it like nearly every day up until I finished my HSC in U12, and then I went to do a full-time course for a year, and then uh once I committed to nursing, which is very different to um to ballet, I was still looking for like a physical outlet. I found that ballet can be very strenuous, and I was looking for something that was a bit more spiritual. So I moved from that love for the artistry of movement instead into that connection to self, connection to breath, and also I guess that inner peace that I found from doing yoga. Like there's nothing like connecting with yourself, especially in a world that's so distracted, you know, seeking answers from everywhere else other than yourself, you know, AI's coming out, everything.
SPEAKER_02The strenuous activity of ballet dancing transferred well to vinyasa?
SPEAKER_00I think so. I definitely think so, because I just felt like it gave me it gave me that focus that I think the movement helped me to focus a lot better than having like the still postures, especially starting out in yoga, because they say that you know the hardest pose in yoga is been is the shivasara, whereas the corpse pose, everybody lying at the end of class, just literally laying on your back, arms out in your head out. It seems like it's easy, but the running mind is a thing, is definitely a thing, yeah. That was really, really important. Um, getting that vinyasa, moving the body, and then finally finding stillness at the end. That's what really, really captured my heart. And yeah, absolutely. Like the yoga, the breathing has helped to center myself because in those challenging times, you really want someone who's grounded and centered, not someone who's like all over the shop and like as anxious as like yourself, you want someone who's there to anchor you, keep you calm, be like that rock, really, for you.
SPEAKER_01That's interesting.
SPEAKER_00And having like having your support people there is so important as well. But often support people might not have seen a birth before, so they'll be in the same situation as I was. And then from then, once I started to develop that, um what's the word? I guess once I started cultivating that discipline within myself, that was when I was able to tap into yin and start to enjoy yin because yin is a lot slower. You hold poses for at least three minutes at a time, and it's working on the fascia, completely different from your vinyasa practice, but equally, if not more, challenging at having to still the mind. Yeah. It's all about looking after them and preparing them for labor, for birth, preparing them for motherhood, that beautiful transition in life that's just so life-changing. And I found that with yoga, um, that ability to sit with yourself, especially during challenging poses, was very much a skill that was transferable into life, and especially in labor. So, for example, when you start getting the contractions, early labor, tapping into your breath work, tapping into yourself, and developing that trust as well, trust within you that everything's gonna be okay no matter what the outcome is just so valuable. And I just really wanted to share all of that. Um, because seeing it like seeing someone in labor is pretty for one.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00A couple of years really, so I felt like I was still a baby when I started all of it. It was interesting because midwifery was also around the time when I started learning yoga, so it all kind of came together. Um finding yoga as a form of connecting with myself, connecting with breath has been such a gift that I'm just so grateful for.
SPEAKER_02So when we did the course, you were new to your midwifery.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think I'd only been doing midwifery for like screaming, things are getting wild, mum's in pain, um, and just being there to help support them, going through a few breathing exercises, is just so valuable, and it yoga has really helped me build on these skills and help these women and families go through such a beautiful time in their lives.
SPEAKER_02You've refined the breath over time, or is it something that you can go to as a consistent sequential breath, or is there something you'll do differently for different people?
SPEAKER_00I found that honestly, I found that it was a combination of breath work and also, but more so the energy or like the vibe that you bring, the presence that you bring in like the birthing room or in your appointments. Uh, in the chaos of working in a like tertiary hospital, you're very much constrained by like time, so it's like you know, appointments can only be a certain amount of time, it's like you gotta get all this information out. But I find that the presence that you walk in with makes a really big difference, and I think breathing techniques for myself personally have really helped with grounding and centering myself, and then when coming into the birth suite, I think it depends as well when you come to the birth suite because not all women will be open to doing breath work, that's right, but that focus on the breath and saying, Okay, focus on the breath, remember to breathe, slow it right down. I think those are things that really make a difference.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so is that um are you aiming to get a birthing mother breathing into her abdomen, or you don't doesn't matter, it's just a deeper breath wherever they can get her air into.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so it's like lung expansion and as well as mainly like extending the exhale. So the longer you exhale in comparison to your inhale, the more your parasympathetic nervous system is activated. And so that's one of the techniques that I like to incorporate during um a class. So for example, inhaling for three counts, one, two, three, exhale for four, three, two, one. Even just as I'm talking about, I feel calm.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and yes, and so when you're communicating that way, they visibly react in a calmed way.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely, absolutely.
SPEAKER_02Whereabouts are you in midwifery in hospitals, which hospitals generally Yeah, so at the moment I'm working at Westmead Hospital, public hospital.
SPEAKER_00Um, and then the yoga that I'm teaching at the moment is one-on-one. I'm doing private. And just recently, one of the uh consultants at Westmead Hospital has wanted to open up a wellness center, so it's called the Women's Uh Aurelia Wellness for Women. It's gonna be based at Westmead, practically opposite the hospital. So it's at a prime location, really, um, right next to the train station and the metro. Um, but essentially we're opening it up so that we offer yoga for pregnancy, postpartum, as well as any gynecological conditions. So that's mainly focusing on women's conditions. Um, we're also looking at um physiotherapy for women as well as massage. So um it's going to be run by Dr. Allah Koon, who is absolutely wonderful. She has this vision on um opening up a more holistic space. She works a lot with high-risk women. So having this kind of offering just makes it such a beautiful gift for women because it's not only looking at the Western side of medicine, but also incorporating everything else, which I think is such a powerful gift.
SPEAKER_02Yogic union.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And do you uh we'll put links of that into the description so uh women who uh maybe expecting you going into that part of Sydney into those hospitals can look that up and and maybe um benefit from those services that you've been providing. Well done.
SPEAKER_00Yes, come through.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely, it's fantastic. Might be a nice segue because you've mentioned it a couple of times. I want to ask you about it because I'm interested in this stuff too. The quantum healing. Oh, yeah, the quantum healing. So, yes, what's quantum healing?
SPEAKER_00So, quantum healing is was originally actually all about past life regression, connecting with your higher self, connecting with your purpose. So, essentially with quantum healing, it's energetic, but it's also physical, it's also emotional. Going through the different things that you've gone through in life, especially um your relationships with you know, lovers, family, um, and going through kind of repetitive patterns in your life that you might recognize. So, whether that be, for example, um a father who was quite abusive, and then later on having a relationship that was quite abusive, and kind of repeating those patterns and learning how why they have happened to begin with, why they've happened in the first place, and then learning how to break those cycles is what a lot of quantum healing is about. Um, the reason why I say quantum healing was originally about past life regression was because Dolores Cannon, who founded the technique, um, in her initial stages of quantum healing, it was all about past lives and how those have related to the current life. So, in the example, running on the example that I had mentioned already about the um cycle of abuse, in that other lifetime, uh I had a client who I will not share the name but was happy to share, they had actually experienced a bit of that sexual abuse in the past life. Um, and then having become pregnant uh with that baby, and then having a termination in that past life, a lot of that energy was actually held within her womb. And so in this life, that energy has actually transferred, and so then the lessons that she was learning in that past life are repeating here because there are still lessons to be learned from it, and only until you learn and heal from those lessons is when you break those cycles. So, whether it means forgiving the perpetrator, forgiving yourself, and then having that courage to move forward from it, moving forward from um being in that um victim mentality, all of that kind of stuff. That's what quantum healing is all about. It's all about moving forward, moving into a higher vibration, a higher um timeline, I suppose you can say, to a point where things are healed, things manifest quickly. It's it's pretty incredible work, really. And I find that it's so it's such deep work, and that honestly was the one that was the thing that started everything for me. It started like the midwifery, it started the yoga, it started everything. Yeah, amazing.
SPEAKER_02I'm I'm pleased that I've invited you along to my new little podcast to finally hear that description from you because I asked it came up in a lunch, I think, during our course. This was so I I hooked on to that. Quantum healing. We uh we talked a little bit about it, but that was lovely. Thank you for explaining quantum healing to us.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and a lot of the a lot of the um information that comes through also ties in with the yoga, so like working with the different chakras in the body, so the different energy centers. So, for example, that chakra that that client was working on was a sequel chakra, your ability to connect with others, connect with yourself, connect with your sexuality as well as your creativity because you're creating new life. Um, yeah, the more I dove into midwifery, the more like clients that I attracted with that same um that same energy, like that same space that needed to be healed. Because as a midwife, I am working with that chakra.
SPEAKER_01Yes, yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's right, the ultimate creativity.
SPEAKER_00The tying with what we said at the beginning, how everything is connected and things just line up synchronistically, it's so true.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely, so true.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely, and um there's a strong element of karma yoga to that and the karmic binds that hold hold things in their place, and when those binds are fraught with despair or the victim or what these things that finding the way that breaks the binds and frees the soul is essentially where that quantum healing comes in, I'm sure.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. And then it gives you like almost like a little it gives you a little like peek into the doorway of of what your physical illnesses mean as well, because you know, in quantum healing, like I learned about how that client had cancer in that area in the uterus, and then in yoga, I we were also taught a lot about how the sacral chakra, if it's an imbalanced, then it can cause all these other problems also to do with your reproductive system.
SPEAKER_02The quantum healing is something you've been able to weave into yoga teaching and in the prenatal and the postnatal yoga teaching.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, even in midwifery, if I'm honest with you. So, like learning the concepts of quantum healing and the things that I've learned from other clients' experiences and even my own as be going under during quantum healing sessions, um it's been it's been really it's been really mind expanding to share a lot of that knowledge, but to weave it in a way that's easy to understand. So much like how you were saying, oh yeah, don't use the Y word, don't use the yoga word. It's much like that actually. So for example, with um with people who have diabetes, often the messages that come through quantum healing clients is it's all about not looking after yourself, like you're you have a problem with the sweetness, yeah. So you're you've got too much sugar in the body. Um, essentially it's like your body's telling you you're trying to find more sweetness in your life, whether it be sweetness in the way that you treat yourself, the words that you use, the the way that you organize your life, what's the ratio between work and you know, work-life balance, all of that kind of thing. So a lot of those concepts I actually gently weave into the classes that I teach, as well as in uh yeah, in midwifery, the women that I speak to, they'll be like, Oh, I have gestational diabetes. I'd be like, Hey, so have you had much time for yourself? Have you been looking after yourself? And more often than not, the answers will be no, like I've been working or I've been looking after my partner, looking after my parents, like so many things come up, and even now that I'm speaking, I'm sure little alarm bells might be popping up for you. You're like, oh hold on, I know someone who's got diabetes, or oh, I'm borderline diabetic, and it just kind of pops in, and you're like, you know what? It makes a lot of sense when you put the sweetness, the two and two together. So it's been interesting having a foot in the door in Western medicine as a midwife in a nurse, and then also having a foot in the door and all this other spiritual, holistic, otherworldly things, because it it offers a different perspective, and it's been nice to kind of bridge them together. The difference is you're finding the answers from within, and when the mind is quiet, much like yoga, when the mind is quiet, that's when a lot of these realizations and enlightenment can come. It's just like we were talking about vinyasa yoga before how I needed to quiet my monkey mind before I could find that stillness and find that centering and yeah, finding the answers within. That's what it's all about.
SPEAKER_02A couple of other things. So another question I I ask everybody is about inspirations, because everyone's got some inspiration within them. So B, who inspired you in your yoga?
SPEAKER_00Who inspired me? Honestly, the teachers who inspired me the most were Christina Ahamnos and Mel, oh gosh, I can't remember her last name. But they were the teachers who really inspired me. For one, Mel really taught she taught in a way that was all about discipline. I find that like some teachers offer like so many different like um modifications, like, but she taught in a really different way that I really appreciated because it taught me how to sit with the uncomfortability. Yeah. I found that that really that she really inspired me because she was all about discipline. And then Christina inspired me because she was all about energy and flow, and she just brought about this like otherworldly energy when she would teach, and I just thought, yes, I am vibing this otherworldly nature. I just thought, what better way to do it during what through yoga?
SPEAKER_02So what's happening in the near future, par from par from Aurelia? And apart from uh teaching.
SPEAKER_00And for now, so opening the women's wellness center, um, and being a part of kind of I don't know, it's almost like co-creating like this reality of wellness instead of always like illness or like sickness, which is in a way where I kind of came from working with nursing because I worked in hematology and border marrow transplant. A lot of the patients would come back after the cancer comes back despite treatment, and so it was almost like working with like sickness and then try trying to achieve wellness, but it's just a completely different realm.
SPEAKER_02It's marvelous if you've done it. Absolutely brilliant. I really think that's awesome.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, and and it's interesting.
SPEAKER_02I I find that interesting. I I'm very given to so I'm a bit of an energy scientist, and you're an energy center, and so am I.
SPEAKER_00I'm like, I love all the energy stuff.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Oh I can see you like teaching, um, but more like very similar to um Christina, like the teacher that really inspired me, like in like kind of weaving in like that energy star. And like that's there's definitely a need for it. There's so many yoga teachers who are very much more just like like positioning or like almost like a gym, but like it kind of loses the essence of like the subtle and energy body, and I find that that's what I'm seeking most these days because it's just not offered.
SPEAKER_02That's very exciting for you.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So hopefully the next little while will hopefully bring more to fruition the way you want it. In terms of the the quantum healing space, the the pre and post-natal, and maybe you'd take on some of that ballet yoga teaching.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02We'll need to stay in touch, B. But for today for today, that's that was fantastic. I really appreciate your time and explaining more about B. Um we talked about the Aurelia Center, we talked a little bit about different things.
SPEAKER_00Oh beautiful. Well, thank you so much for having me for. This was so nice today.
SPEAKER_02Very, very cool. I enjoyed it. Um so today was Yoga Teacher Talking Yoga, it's a podcast where we do just that, and we've just done that now. Maybe I have another idea in the future about having a a conversation with and certainly get you back on and dive deeper into the quantum field and the realm and all that stuff.
SPEAKER_00I would love that. Absolutely love that.
SPEAKER_02Until then, Bee, thank you very much.
SPEAKER_00Thank you, Paul. Now let's stay.
SPEAKER_02We hope you enjoyed hearing about how B has combined her yoga into her midwifery, which are all the very best at Westmead the Aurelia Centre. We're delighted that our next interview will be with Sarah Bunny, who's carved out a major presence in training yoga teachers across Southeast Asia, guiding her students into their own sense of empowerment. We look forward to seeing you then. Betty was such an interesting guest, so self-aware, with a real handle on things. She had an interesting phrase in sitting in the uncomfortable. And I thought we'd let her explain that a little bit more. What did you mean by sitting with the uncomfortability?
SPEAKER_00Mmm, so it was the first time that I had really done heated yoga, so the room would be up to like 32 degrees, and you would be doing different arsenas or different poses. Ah, and with just like the sweat dripping off your face, like oh I think I was also a bit like OCD with like cleanliness before all this. Because then with like sitting with like your face sweating, your back sweating, and then even when you're coming into like say eagle rap where your hands are like coming together, like having to touch like your sticky body was just like but reaping the benefits afterwards was just like oh turns out none of that actually matters, and what actually matters is like the practice, the focus, like it just goes beyond all of the things that you think like that aren't really all that important, and I think that that in itself was a really big lesson for me because it's like oh no, your focus is what is your drive, your focus is what creates your reality, all the other things, other opinions, other things on the side don't really matter. Yeah.