301 - What Studio Ownership Taught Me About Depth, Voice, and Freedom with Suzanne Dunning

Yoga isn’t about doing the “right” thing — it’s about finding what’s true for you. 

In this conversation with yoga teacher, Tosha Yoga studio owner, and Flow School alum Suzanne Dunning, we talk about devotion, sequencing, voice, and what happens when teachers stop trying to fit a mold and start trusting their own way.

That’s where the real shift happens: less pressure, more freedom, and a practice that actually feels like yours.

Connect with Suzanne on Instagram

Weekly stories by email from Bonnie HERE

Connect with Bonnie: Instagram, Email (hello@bonnieweeks.com), Website

Produced by: Grey Tanner

Transcript

Bonnie (00:06.266)
Welcome back to the podcast loves. I have for you today another interview with somebody who is a Flow School alumni. So if you've been listening for a second, you know that this is a series of podcasts where I talk to Flow School alumni, in specific the people who have come to immersive in-person long trainings, where we're really dropping in for 40, often 40 plus hours at a time, and we're really doing some deep diving together.

And so this is a conversation about their journey and their experience with like their journey with yoga, their experience with flow school, thoughts on yoga, the way that we have worked together, what we've learned together, and also the cool things they're creating. So I'm really interested in these conversations as both like a real life experience to share what it's like to even be in the room with people. I think as somebody who

Is online so much of the time that like people interact with me and people find out about me because of the online world and to have the continual kind of experiences where we're actually dropping in in person where people are like, wait, is this person even real? What is this experience gonna be like? It's so important to me, I think, to help portray like what that experience is so that it can be like more real. So we're like, this is we're we're being real humans here.

and really for me, helping teachers own the hell out of their voice wherever that is in their journey, whatever that means, is really important to me. And I really believe that the room is only as good as the people you have in it. And I have truly found that over six years of leading flow school, the teachers who join Flow School are some of the most heartled, nerdy, generous, and brave leaders out there.

And so today I have Suzanne with me, and we are here together for this conversation, Chat About Flow School, to share what Suzanne is all about. And we're gonna be real ass humans. Suzanne is somebody who, gosh, elevates the room. Somebody who is interested in asking questions that are meant to go five layers deep and probably another two more after that.

Bonnie (02:19.917)
This is somebody who is more interested in being curious than being right, and also open to a lot of ideas while at the same time not not apologizing for her own point of view. This is somebody who cares fiercely about her people. And and as we're having this conversation, then it was you know just over three months ago that we were in the room together.

And so I just think about the conversations. We're at this table that I'm podcasting from right now, the conversations we got to have, the depth where we gotta sit around the table and be like, this is what teachers need, this is what community needs is circles like this and conversations like this, and gathering of of humans like this. And I'm so happy to have you here today, Suzanne. Thank you.

Suzanne (03:06.977)
Thank you, Bonnie. It's such a pleasure.

Bonnie (03:09.523)
Mm. so I would love to we're gonna like slowly walk into this this journey together. You're gonna share. Well you first tell where you're coming from, share with where where where are you where are you located? Where's home base?

Suzanne (03:23.453)
Yeah, I am in Northern California, like true North California, up in the Redwoods and on the coast in Arcata. I have a yoga studio here and it's a little drizzly this morning. It's the first drizzle we've had in a while. so yeah, I've just gotten back from the UK and it feels really nice to be here and be in the cool and be near the water and be amid the waters. So

Bonnie (03:51.246)
Yeah, yum. I also love that I mean not that I I haven't noted this, but that you're a studio owner. And for me, I think when studio owners come to Flow School, that feels extra special because you don't as a studio owner, you don't often get feedback and education and like are able to put yourself in education circles in quite the same way where your where your studio is.

Like it already comes with a the preconceived who you are and what people can or cannot say, even if it hasn't been agreed upon. Like that's hard.

Suzanne (04:27.979)
Yeah, yeah, it's hard and it's and it's lonely and it really, I mean, I think if we are serving our individual communities and therefore yoga at large, it's not that we have to be going out and finding other people and other voices and other contexts in which we can learn, but we have to find some way to be a student and to maintain that.

Bonnie (04:54.135)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm really grateful that you chose Flow School. And it it really is just such an honor, I think, to hold that space where, you know, in the room there's such a variety of folks and like them places where they're at, but a place that you could feel like you could land. Yeah. I I'm sure like that makes sense. You're like, is this gonna be for me or not?

Suzanne (05:10.475)
Yeah, definitely. Definitely. I wasn't sure. I wasn't sure what I

Suzanne (05:19.009)
Yeah, yeah.

Bonnie (05:20.277)
Yeah, well and I'm excited for you to talk to that. Let's like I'm gonna go to a little bit more beginning for your journey, but then to definitely loop that back to and talk about is this for you and is this for studio owners and like and what that gift was too. So in the many variety of ways that could be. Okay, so tell me, let's like zoom back, rewind a little bit. How did you find yoga?

Suzanne (05:32.449)
Yeah.

Suzanne (05:40.845)
I found yoga.

Probably age eight. My mom had done integral yoga in New York City in the 1960s. And she wound up teaching a little bit in rural Vermont. we lived on I was born on a farm and grew up on a farm back there. And she taught yoga when I was, I think before I was born. And then fast forward we come to California. And yeah, I think age eight, she just we had.

She deemed me ready to share a little yoga with me. And I remember my little brother was like harassing us and she got so pissed off. She like ran off to go yell at him. And I was kind of left alone to just kind of like be like, what is this thing we're doing? didn't really pick it up again until age 12 when I found a book called Meditation for Children. And in the back was this like perfected child in a unitard doing these black and white.

Postures and I remember putting on Enya, lighting a candle, locking my bedroom door, taking off my rollerblades, and going into this world with this book. And I remember distinctly it being nighttime and doing shoulder stand. And I had never done that. You know, most poses are something familiar to a pose you do in regular waking life, but.

Shoulder stand is like one of those distinct ones that you don't do really. Like you don't find yourself in shoulder stand. And I've since talked to students that have said the same thing that that feeling of coming down out of shoulder stand was sort of this, it was this for you know, no other better words to say, it was touching the goddess. I mean, it was feeling her in me in a way that I had never felt. And yeah, so 12, then fast forward age.

Bonnie (07:17.688)
Thank you.

Suzanne (07:42.998)
18, I'm a senior in high school. My soul is as dead as it probably ever will be in the rest of my life. And I am forced into this PE class and sweet talked the PE teacher into letting me go outside and do my own yoga. and he said, sure, but you have to take some students with you. So take some of the other misfits that are not lifting weights either and go outside.

Bonnie (08:02.562)
Mm.

Suzanne (08:12.449)
And I remember it was a zero period class, so it was like 7 a.m. And I remember the sun rising and we're facing the sun. And I remember helping this girl do headstand. And I mean, like, yeah, the rest is history. I've never had a real job. So I don't know. It started there. I went to UC Berkeley. I studied medical anthropology. I was like deep on the academic train and

felt worse and worse and worse the more time I spent on a computer. And I just kind of looked around and was like, any profession that I'm gonna go on, I know I'm gonna excel rapidly. And the faster you get to quote unquote the top, it pretty much guarantees that you spend more time on a computer. And I just wanted to engineer my life so that I spent as little time as possible on a computer. And

Bonnie (09:00.366)
Mm.

Bonnie (09:06.187)
Suzanne (09:06.951)
So I just kind of like let the academia questions rest over there and I just kept practicing. And 11, 12, 13 years ago, I started opening my studio, which was a very long process. it didn't I didn't decide to do it. It found me, it chose me, and it was a really arduous, challenging process. And then

Bonnie (09:33.098)
Yeah.

Suzanne (09:36.278)
Yeah. And then for the past 11 years or so, I've just been held in the cradle of a beautiful space and have gotten to develop and explore my relationship, my views on yoga, my my what where really refine where my heart lies and what I want to do with this life and what how I want to influence this lineage.

Bonnie (10:02.818)
It's beautiful. Yeah.

Suzanne (10:03.245)
So let's fast forward again, yet another chapter. found myself at about 10 years into studio ownership feeling a little just stale. And every few years I would feel like this stagnancy that needed to be zhuzged. had followed you for, I don't know, a good decade or so online. And

I don't know what it was exactly that caused me to sign up for Flow School. I think the fact that it wasn't in the standard 200 and 500 hour containers. And I really think that what we because the container so much shapes what is the contents of it. I was just inspired by your agency to create a new container. And

I and yeah, and just a leap of faith. And then as soon as I got there, I was like, hell yeah.

Bonnie (11:03.418)
Great. You know, this makes me with me because I I really am it's on my brain and heart to to hold teachers for a little bit longer. And I think with all of my my time with Flow School that I what I'm kind of putting out there and like prepping for is to teach all to delete a longer training. and usually those are called something like a three hundred hour, but I'm like, yeah, it's probably gonna be more like a four hundred hour, which even as you say this, you know, I'm like

Suzanne (11:07.083)
Yeah.

Bonnie (11:33.306)
I think I'll just call it a four hundred hour training. 'Cause n nobody's c doing a four hundred hour training. You're doing like a two, a three, or a five and I'm like, Well it's we're gonna make something else.

Suzanne (11:45.165)
Or just call it something entirely different altogether. It's like I love that Flow School is not anything designated, you know, it's just is what it is. And that's lovely.

Bonnie (11:47.436)
It's true.

Bonnie (11:53.027)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. Cause I mean, I the hours are relevant and irrelevant. It mostly is like it's helpful, I think, as a time judge for me. And when you think of and I think of it almost as a title of a program. If somebody were to go to a 200 hour program, I'm like, I hope you do at minimum 200 hours, but a 200 hour program is just the title of your first training.

And the that first training, like let it be three hundred and seventy-two hours. Like I like does it matter? Like is the content like do you actually feel prepared walking out of a teacher training to actually go teach? And like then it's however length of time that is. So

Suzanne (12:40.471)
Think it's all pretty up for discussion because you know, you could have how much of a 200 hour if you start getting, and here it comes into the question of the whole yoga alliance, which I have a real bone to pick with, but you know, arguably I lead a quote unquote 200-hour training that's more like 300 hours. And one way that I actually think that that could potentially be more effective for creating a teacher is I say.

This is actually only a 50-hour training, but you have to have studied with me for five years first on a regular, like four times a week basis. Study with me for five years, then we'll do this five, 50-hour training that will just focus on the teaching of yoga. It will not be the contents because you will have learned that over the past five years. And I just, I just really, I feel like the whole thing needs to be considered.

Because this whole two hundred hour thing that these few people in the nineteen nineties created as the standard doesn't necessarily still apply and is certainly not necessarily optimal.

Bonnie (13:48.645)
Yeah. Well and yeah, gosh. Okay, so several things. One, I love the idea of deep study that you have said, you know, to be like, Okay, if you really wanna do this, like let's study for a long time so you really understand some depth here. And it also acknowledges like your depth and we can't give as teachers like

the everything in one class. Like you you're gonna get one baby thing in one class and another baby thing in another class. You're gonna fold it together. and because you are on a self-discovery journey. Like you're you're discovering who you are alongside like this, you know, you're who you are as a person, alongside the process of of yoga and what we're defining as yoga here. so I think like the depth of that is really interesting as

And because I think it pushes the industry a little bit, because it's so easy and to kind of have teacher training be something that might feed studio revenue, but it's also like you know, come and just go and get your teacher training or or pushing teachers, pushing students who are quote unquote can do yoga and it looks good to be a teacher when they're not even interested in being a teacher.

So I think that there's like there's some like soft nuance in there where like, yeah, it might actually be the thing that they discover themselves through. and like how do we really elevate the industry of yoga and do we make that be a more serious study of the different aspects? Cause you can take I I I think sometimes those of some trainings as, you know, we can go really wide, but really shallow. And

I mean, what I'm really trying to do with Flow School is like we're gonna pick one little area of that and go down deep. And I am very much in acknowledgement of what I am not giving. And that is the and that's on purpose because like I'm like we're gonna go here and then if there is something else with somebody else, go deep elsewhere. Like you the you can't you you or we need to spend like a a hell of a more time together. so I think the the idea of teaching yoga as a craft.

Suzanne (15:48.353)
Yeah. Yeah.

Bonnie (16:00.375)
And as like something that has depth, then it speaks directly to this. So yeah.

Suzanne (16:04.097)
Yeah. Yeah. And that, you know, that does bring me back to why I originally signed up for Flow School is that I lead teacher trainings. I've been leading them for eight years. And the the portion on sequencing to me, I just I mean, on the one hand, I feel that we do not need a liberal arts education type yoga training. Some s teachers might be. They might want to have, you know, ten hours of Sanskrit. They might want to have

you know, 25 hours on the Yoga Sutras, they might want to have 25 hours on the Bhagavad Gita. They might, you know, or are those 200 hours best spent on the portion of yoga that that student is truly passionate about? And you know, I've had phenomenal teachers. Some of my, you know, I had a phenomenal teacher doesn't know anything about anatomy. She does not at all teach anatomy. She teaches from heart, she teaches with music, she teaches from emotion.

I've had other teachers that taught with no music and very little emotion and very little poetics, and we're just the nitpick, you know, bones of anatomy, the dry stuff. And I am so grateful for the way those teachers have honed their specific passion, and that's what makes them effective. We don't need just generic, like cookie cutter yoga teachers, and everyone has to know a little bit about the same amount of everything.

But what prompted me to sign up for Flow School is that I sensed that I had a lot of unconscious I had a lot to uncover about why I sequenced the way I do. And so I was really just looking for someone that had conscious beliefs about why they sequence what they do, so that I could push up against that, you know, and decide. And I think that's where you and I got into some interesting conversations. Is it was like, I was like, wait a minute, you're doing that? Like.

Bonnie (17:45.986)
Mm.

Yeah.

Bonnie (17:54.009)
Yeah.

Suzanne (17:58.794)
I don't do that. Like I do not at all plan my classes. I do not at all create set sequences. And yet there's a lot about how you do what you do that resonates with what I do. And then a lot that just doesn't work with the way my brain works and the way I teach. And that was really enlightening to be around. So yeah.

Bonnie (18:18.146)
Hmm. Yeah. What and I love that we were able to have those conversations and within the community of like everybody else who is here too is because I'm I think it's it's such a journey, I think, for each of us and perhaps easier for some than others, and depending on I think your experience, age, lived experience, culture you're from, all the things, right? Brain chemistry, great. but to know that there's more than one way to be right.

And to not have to defend your way or to recognize when you're defending your way and say, why? Like why am I here in this place? And and you know, you can learn that in a billion different ways. I think as a parent, I've learned that as a parent in a lot of times and in a very benign sort of experience. my middle kid, gosh, years ago, we were it it was right before school, and we were doing back to school shopping, got some new clothes.

And when I was growing up, we went back to school shopping and it was like a big deal. But I haven't really made it a big deal with my kids. It's like, okay, do you need anything new? Like, is anybody out of socks or underwear? Is like like what's the pants situation, you know? And then they're like, nope, I'm good. Like, okay, fine. And then like sometimes I think when I were younger, I was like, that's what you do, because that's what I did. and then you don't wear your school your clothes until school starts.

And so we had gone back to school shopping, and I remember my middle kid, she came down and she opened the door to the room I was in, and she had on her new outfit. I was like, Well, you're wearing your new school clothes. School was like in three days, right? And she was like, and I was like, Well, you know, and then she left and I just remember sitting there and I just had this moment where whatever I was doing was all of a sudden set down. I like, Bonnie, why does it matter actually? Like, does this even matter?

Suzanne (20:07.5)
Mm-hmm.

Bonnie (20:07.586)
And it was this moment where like I could see her disappointment and she was just stoked. She was like, it doesn't fucking matter like it doesn't matter. And and so it was like such this soft little moment where she was sad, she came down, she had changed, and I like, you know what? I said, you're absolutely right. Like you should 100% wear those clothes. I don't care. And we were able to have this conversation, you know, and and through that, where I was like, we are all programmed with like an idea of what's right and what's not.

Suzanne (20:32.919)
Mm-hmm.

Bonnie (20:36.012)
And not even necessarily for a solid reason. And and so I think like I like thinking about that example that challenged me in like this kind of soft way that was like out a lot of consequences. But then to bring it into a room where, you know, when I started teaching flow school and in person, all of a sudden we're we're sitting at the table together. I'm not just on a screen. And I think there's some way that when there's a screen between us, that it feels less real sometimes. And

Suzanne (20:39.136)
No.

Suzanne (21:02.071)
Definitely.

Bonnie (21:03.074)
And well, and if I'm to if I were to put us in a Zoom room, right? And there's like now, let's say there's 25 of us in the room, to unmute and to comment and to have it, it's like it's not the same. And it feels less, there's a less human touch to it, still super valuable, can be really life-changing experiences that you can have online. I believe that. And when I had to set sit in the room then and then like hold these things like our conversations to be like,

There like again, the you know, I I I s I did my first in-person trainings in twenty twenty three and on online. I had been online since August of twenty twenty with Flow School. So I was doing online and in person. But it was really once I sat in the room with people, I was like, I have to actually own my shit and be able to hold the space, like hold center, because everybody's gonna bring their own piece of the magic to this room and all of our beliefs of what is right or what is not right.

And be able to like play with those in a way and I need to be able to be the example of like how do I hold this in like a soft enough way where we can actually wiggle it and find something for all of us in this experience. Yeah.

Suzanne (22:13.953)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Bonnie (22:17.38)
So I think where we landed and you're like, wow, I'm not writing a single class down, my brain's not working, Bonnie. And I'm like, okay, cool, because that is not that's something that I teach a lot, is I'm like, okay, it I think teachers often feel a pressure. So it depends on where you're coming at, right? So I'm I can't speak for every single teacher, but there is a lot of teachers who feel pressure and it's not and it's cultural, like it's not.

taught to us, but that you have to have a different class every single time. And so then I think if we're talking burnout, we're like you have to have a different playlist, you have have a different class. And then you're if you're trying to teach 10 classes a week or whatever, even if you're teaching one class a week, you're like, wait, how is my life organized to be able to tap into my creativity and to set my life up to have a creative enough life that I can actually create space for me to do this? And so this is I think where where teachers then can feel really burnt out.

Or to and this is this is great, we're diving in, or if they show up in a room and don't prepare and are just saying they're gonna teach the energy of the room. I think that it is a skill to do that really excellently, and it can be a way that you avoid the work and the craft of learning how to sequence. And you can get stuck in patterns, and it's where I think teaching yoga can get really boring and stale and unin uninspiring.

And then with that said, that is how you teach. You walk into the room, you're not preparing, and you are teaching, like you're you're teaching whatever it is that comes out of you. Yeah. So like in in like the wrap back to this, I think it's really beautiful to me because I think we've had conversations since full of school as well about this, but I love the way that we built a language together.

Suzanne (23:52.737)
Yeah. Yeah.

Bonnie (24:13.194)
And I like I so respect your knowing of yourself and the skill that you walk in the room with. And I truly believe that it's like a like the skill to prepare a class is like a is one branch of it, the skill to know who's in the room and to be able to deliver something that is of value, totally a skill that we also need to hold. And it doesn't qualify a better or worse teacher. They're just different ways.

Suzanne (24:42.103)
Definitely.

Bonnie (24:43.31)
Yeah. Yeah.

Bonnie (24:53.304)
I felt like there was times in Flow School that you were like, okay, now I'm gonna try writing something.

And they watched you almost laugh and you were like, I can't even like what what am I even doing?

Suzanne (25:05.985)
You mean like writing a sequence down? Yeah, no, I like couldn't.

Bonnie (25:07.747)
Yeah.

Bonnie (25:12.056)
Yeah.

Suzanne (25:12.653)
Cause I didn't ha I mean like my brain just stopped even at as I mentioned in flow school, when I teach, I don't even say the name of a pose. So I know them from teaching teacher trainings, but I'm like, am I gonna write out Prasarita Padotanasana right now as a starting point for this sequence? You gotta be fucking kidding me. That's gonna take me like 20 seconds. I'm not gonna write that out. I'm not gonna draw a stick figure.

Bonnie (25:22.81)
Mm.

Yeah.

Suzanne (25:41.91)
I don't know Bonnie's crazy like acronym language. I don't have an English word for this pose. So like even just right there, I was arrested at like like a lack of language to even begin entry to sequencing with a pen and paper.

Bonnie (25:48.793)
Mm-hmm.

Bonnie (25:57.796)
Yeah.

Yeah. Mm. Okay, so say more. So you come to Flow School, you're like, okay, this is where I'm gonna be, like we're gonna find some things, but then you bump up against that. What else did you bump up against?

Suzanne (26:14.189)
The way that that system, you know, just what you're saying that when you teach

In a way that is not premeditated in sequence, that can lend itself to being really unconscious. And you can get stuck in these grooves of just sort of teaching what your teacher taught or some sequence that you found, and you just do the same thing. And I've certainly been there. You know, you can just like want to blow your brains out. It's so fucking boring. And something about that is bypassing the brain. And I think, you know, if we think about the mind being like,

the air element and this image of the sword having the power to cut through what is dead, to cut off what is dead, whether that is conscious or unconscious. It's like bringing the sword in to delineate what it is, where we're steering the energy. And I think the challenge for me was feeling that there was this unfamiliar reliance

on the mind as the source of the sequence. When I wasn't used to that, I don't source from the mind. When I prepare to go teach, I align myself, and so I do prep, you know, I'm preparing all day long. I don't have any other job. All I'm doing is thinking about yoga. So you know, I'll be on a run, I'll be on, I'll be at the beach, I'll be on the forest, and I'll open myself or I'll open a book of poetry or I'll be listening to a podcast or I'll be

Suzanne (27:55.446)
You know, like I was just in my, I have a Shanos singing teacher. I was just in my Zoom call with her and practicing my singing. And at the end of that, I had, you know, some imagery come through of my download for my class that I'll teach later this evening. And it's like a star. It's like looking into the night sky, finding a star and being like, tonight we're exploring this constellation. Tonight, this is where the direction of the flow is going to go.

It's directed, it's clear, there's an intent, but it's not mentally defined. And I actually don't know what I am there to discover until I get there. It's like I can't, I don't even know what's in the constellation. I just see the star and I'm like, that's where we're going. Don't know anything else. And in the process of I think the confinement of Flow School, the way that it's funneled through a mental lens of.

you know, exploration and the written word and ideas, it strengthened a muscle in me that allows

Something about it makes me less afraid now of, you know, in the past, I think I was actually sort of afraid of the sequence getting just brought down to the mental level. Like that would suck all the juice out of the flow, out of the practice. And I think you helped me see that that's not necessarily the case, that you really can find this spark of yoga it from any of the angles: mental, breath, emotional, physical, all of it.

Bonnie (29:21.892)
Yeah.

Suzanne (29:37.373)
And so yeah, it was it was challenging, it was confronting for sure, but it's it's been huge.

Bonnie (29:46.095)
Yeah. it's so fun for me to hear you say this 'cause I so much think of what what I personally do as very not mental.

And and where you said like a little bit ago you said how you felt like maybe flow school was gonna teach you something that like was bring gonna bring something conscious. I think about my creation of Flow School as people seeing what I was doing and I'm like making videos on Instagram and I'm flowing in the way that I flow and people are like, What are you doing? Like tell us about tell us about what's happening here.

And I was like, I don't know, this is just like what I do. Like, this is just innate to me. And I did not know. And so people started asking me questions. So I started sitting with myself and saying, What are you doing? And so I had to make conscious what I was doing. Like I I chose to. I chose to make conscious what I was doing. I could have, I could have not. But I was like, what am I doing that actually helps describe this? If I were to distill this into a language.

Suzanne (30:24.097)
Yeah. Yeah.

Bonnie (30:49.302)
that other people know. Because I really love your like this is the constellation, this is where we're going. And if I'm gonna bring human design into this and even though we don't have to dump jump in, like you're a projector and I'm a manifester. And and for you like to have this vision too and be like, this is where we're going, this is the constellation. And have this as a as a leader is actually really like I was like, that's so beautiful. You're like, I see it. and so I I so

I so get that with you and being feeling who you are as a teacher and as a human being and being able to be in the room with you. Like I would so trust your guidance and can see like so much beauty in that vision and the dedication to the path that you have that that you have created. and like flow school is really this baby that I've this brain baby that like brain heart body spirit baby, whereas like, what am I doing? How do I make it conscious?

Suzanne (31:31.253)
Yeah. Yeah.

Bonnie (31:45.753)
So that I can consciously deliver to somebody else, and we have to have a way of understanding, so then they can make it unconscious. And all of a sudden it just is becomes part of them. But now there's a language to describe where if you're like, I can come to flow school and maybe learn how to speak about sequencing in a way that describes maybe the experience that can then be applied. And and I think there's been a lot of people who have actually had flow school, like come to flow school and like, this is.

This is how I do it. I just know how to talk about it. And I think that's really beautiful because it's taken a lot of work, a lot of work to figure out how to describe it and to and and in enough words for people to be able to pick up and start to put the experiments on. So movement experiments are like there's a part of brain and a part of body. There's so much about trying to give teachers permission to get out of their own way.

and actually get into themselves so they teach from that in body experience that's not just brain. Yeah.

Suzanne (32:44.235)
Yeah. And I think that was what actually drew me to you as a teacher. Is like, I've been in this yoga world, I mean, full bore, like since age 18, Rodney Yi, Shiva Ray, Sarah Powers, I am there at their feet, like learning from these teachers who learned from very traditional models. And didn't themselves ever even necessarily develop.

Bonnie (33:05.529)
Yeah.

Suzanne (33:11.659)
What you're talking about. And I think that's why I was drawn to you is I'm like, here is a teacher that I can sense is drawing from something inside of themselves. And that is really rare in the world. I think that most people are, myself included, was I had created over the years of just having enough teachers that I had sort of found this sort of patchwork amalgamation that was my own. And periodically I would feel, and increasingly over the years.

Bonnie (33:19.716)
Mm.

Suzanne (33:40.204)
The authentic authenticity of what I had to offer, whether that was sequence or a philosophy or an idea or whatever, a way of teaching. But I always felt some sense of like falling back to, especially when I needed to teach something to teachers, make it conscious of what are we teaching and why are we teaching it. I felt like I was pushed back to old philosophies that honestly stem back to like,

The roots of these original dudes, Ayengar, Krishnamacharya, Desikachar, Shivananda, like these primary little like dozen dudes that we could sit in a room and be like, God bless you all. I bow to your feet. And also, is it not time for this tradition to take a next step without losing something that is essential to it? And that's, I think, where the present.

context of yoga is fraught is that with the commercialism, the capitalism, the online tech element, the just the sheer like finding your way through the maze of the algorithms, it can really be near impossible to find something that bridges those two spectrums, something that is actually tapped into the to the tap the headwaters of, you know, arguably the Himalayas, Mount Mount Kailash, you know, like arguably,

Still has a drop of that original essence and is coming from that which is equally deep within each of us and isn't just something created to sell something or because their teacher did it or because it's a 200 hour or some pre-known model. yeah, and I do hear what you're saying about the non mental piece. I mean, you know, when I say to people, I study with Bonnie Week, they're you're the dancer woman, and I'm like, She's not a dancer.

I know why you think that, because what you're describing is like learning choreography, which I'm terrible at, to then be able to do those moves authentically. Once you have those moves, they're in you, you know, and it's hugely empowering and it's not mental. and so I do think it's a similar, like let's consciously make an architect the choreography of a new dance.

Bonnie (35:51.407)
Yeah.

Suzanne (36:00.184)
So that there's something beyond Surya Namaskar A, for God's sake, you know, something beyond the primary series that we can draw on as a fundamental pattern that we can then play with with other patterns.

Bonnie (36:16.408)
Yeah, absolutely. Mm.

Mm.

Bonnie (36:25.326)
I think in some ways the evolution of where we are at with yoga and to speak to that, I'm like, it's all of our responsibility. If we're choosing to be in the yoga sphere, you're like, it's on, you're picking it up then. Like, what like what do you want to bring to what do you want to bring to the room? And how do you want to move with it? And what responsibility are you willing to hold with it? And I think for where I've landed too is like, I I'm like, okay, I

I didn't grow up with this. I haven't been to India. I haven't, you know, like whatever it is, like, how can I stand here in this and be like, no, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna feel like I'm gonna take responsibility here to honor where it's come from and be so freaking grateful for that. And say, like, okay, how do like how is this serving right now? Like, what's right right now? How is this serving right now? And then for me, I'm like, and how is this serving teachers right now?

How are teachers served right now? Because if teachers are served better, then communities are served better because the teachers are held. And what do teachers really need in this? And and when I think about, I think why sequencing for me is because you don't you don't have to say Sanskrit in a in a class, right? Like you're you're the case in point for that. And I and for me, shorthand, like I had to shorten words because I don't want to like write the whole word. I'm like, I'm gonna figure out how to write that word.

Short and I'm gonna know how to write it short because I'm not gonna write out something that's 30 characters long, right? So you gotta create a shorthand if you're gonna write your classes. but I I think to to introduce something where it feels like it it honors the system it's come from, but also then supports the growth of where we're at right now. And that if teachers don't wanna use Sanskrit in their class, like they don't even like you're teaching a slow flow.

And you're just like going through everything once, like people don't need to know that you're in a supine twist. You're just like walking them through the body motions. How do you give them the instructions in a clear, concise, commanding, compassionate way? Like, how do you guide them through and like stand in it yourself? Like, and why are you putting that pose after this pose? And what else is possible in between those poses? So I think for me, if you strip away everything and you really look like teachers are walking in the room, they're gonna have some playlist, most likely.

Bonnie (38:47.042)
And they're gonna be asking people to move their bodies. And so they need to develop some system for moving people's bodies. And if you're in a Sun A, go get the Sun A. And if you wanna teach other things, you have a lot more time if you take a Sun A out of class to teach some other things. That are also vinyasas. Yeah.

Suzanne (39:03.469)
Yeah.

Suzanne (39:07.147)
Yes, hundred percent. Hundred percent.

Bonnie (39:13.858)
I loved like Suzanne, I truly I loved so much our time in Flow School where you'd be like, Well, that's not what I do and I don't like it.

Suzanne (39:24.437)
When it was like that contrary.

Bonnie (39:26.898)
No, but like it's like it really, I I truly I think because for myself, I'm I'm just like, I don't I am so down to listen to other points of view and I don't have to apologize for my point of view. And I think for all of us, how can we sit in a room, and this is I think for everybody, like how can you not get like go on the defense, and also not apologize for yourself? I think there's I think that's like a

Really careful space that you have to figure out how to navigate for yourself. And I I think it's why we could treat everything as an experiment. So it has a little bit, there's like a magical edge to it. We're like in sparkly land, right? Like this is an experiment. This conversation right now, an experiment. Okay, cool, right? Nothing has to be perfect. That means we gotta like be weird in it. It can be a wiggly thing. but also to like just be able to hold.

Space for not your idea.

Suzanne (40:26.923)
Yeah. Yeah. And I think that that was something else that I got from Flow School was the modeling of how you held the space from precisely that platform of there are a lot of different ways to be right. Allows the process of learning yoga to happen to happen, period.

So that the contents of what we're discussing, in this case, Flow School, it's the sequencing of yoga poses. You could have been teaching us stream biology and you would have still been teaching us yoga, right? Like the way that you teach and the way that we teach as teachers is the yoga. And that I think is what is so missing from a lot of contexts of learning that I've found in the quote unquote modern yoga world.

Is they're teaching the contents of yoga. They're teaching the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, but they're not teaching yoga. They're not, their nervous systems are not teaching from that curious platform of there are a lot of different ways to be right, which allows the room to breathe. It allows psoas to soften. It allows us all to be circular, to be in a c in a community, to actually be live learning and

hearing and speaking to each other. And that yeah, I got a lot out of that. It it showed me, I mean, a, I mean, tangent to really just like pump Bonnie's flow school here. It totally, I don't know what happened. I mean, I tell people, I'm like, my back doesn't hurt anymore. Ever since I went to Portland and did that thing with that woman Bonnie. And they're like, why? What'd you do? And I'm like, I don't know. But something shifted. And I do think it comes down to the indescribable

Bonnie (41:59.451)
Mm.

Suzanne (42:23.275)
Something indescribable in the in the essence of that permission that you're granting to not have to apologize and not have to get defensive and to still be the one that's holding the room. Cause you do that really well. Yeah.

Bonnie (42:37.412)
Thank you. Oof, all of that I'm just like chills over here.

Suzanne (42:43.253)
Yeah, I got a lot from it, so thank you.

Bonnie (42:45.966)
Mm-hmm. One, I mean right after because we do a one-on-one after our flow school drop-in together. And you said that you came back and teaching has shifted. Like you're you're not trying to plan classes still. You're like as in write down to repeat and do you like any sort of that? But like you're walking in and it's different. How's it different?

Suzanne (43:12.033)
Well, a few of the key ways that you orient to the design, the pattern, the ritta of Sanskrit's sort of understanding of how we're put together, you the way that you sequence respects that in a way that I don't feel that most sequences do. They're either aimed at some particular, like, we're gonna like, you know, relieve.

Plannar fasciitis. Okay. So that's like addressing a problem, right? It's not actually addressing the design. It's not actually geared toward the center of the system. And the way that you sequence and encourage the understanding of the body's natural way that it moves, so that yoga is not so damn foreign. So it actually is more akin to.

essentially what we would naturally just be doing in our everyday life, except with more intention. And so yeah, a lot of the a lot of the elements that you taught in terms of sequencing are in there and then just the way that I'm sequencing is informed from them. And it feels great in my body. So but don't students seem to like it. Students haven't stopped coming. I don't know if they like it, but they haven't stopped coming to class. So that's good.

Bonnie (44:32.194)
I love that. Well you're back

Bonnie (44:38.82)
Perfect. Well and your back really was had been hurting for a long time and it was hurting here.

Suzanne (44:44.075)
Yeah, yeah. And I had yeah, yeah, yeah. It's interesting. Patterns that we can get into as teachers, especially, because of feeling like we need to hold a position can then wind up having such a detrimental effect on our own systems. Like when that system needs to change and it doesn't, because we don't know what other system to replace it with, it's like our bodies pay the price.

Bonnie (44:45.934)
Which low back feed is is has some layers.

Bonnie (44:52.399)
Yeah.

Bonnie (45:12.16)
Mm. Yeah. Oof. Okay, so it's that. And I think this like to even before we started recording of like we're all here to help show each other that there's something else possible. And and I have had this countless times in my own life where I didn't even realize that I needed to see that something else was possible. And then all of a sudden somebody is in front of me. I was like, okay, so I could do something different.

Suzanne (45:41.238)
Yeah. Yeah. And I think a lot of what you're so courageous in the way that you show up. And I don't even know if you know how courageous you are in the way that you do show up, allowing that the simplicity, like you don't overdo, and you do hold a lot of room for people to just discuss among themselves. And you allow the conversation to be really tangential and you allow

Like these little rivulets in a way that you're very masculine in this in the structure you hold, but very feminine and soft in the way that you permit it to evolve and and to have its own sort of intelligences inside of it. And so I really felt like witnessing, you know, witnessing that.

I really, you know, I see yoga as like we're all sculptors and we're essentially trying to reveal what's essential underneath it all. We're not trying to add a lot. And that's where I think most yoga trainings and yoga in general actually become spiritual materialism. It becomes this like, and now I've studied this text and now I've gotten this degree from here, and now I've done this, and now check, check, check. And I've got this mala and this white, you know, outfit that I wear and this, you know, and it's like.

Okay, and who fucking cares? You know, like the ability to sit in a room with each other and discuss like what is the core essence of what we're doing and why are we doing it? And to be able to let those ideas be met is like to me the heart of it. So yeah, I think that your your devotion to and your having sat with yourself, you having resourced from within yourself and

Bonnie (47:30.018)
Mm.

Suzanne (47:37.305)
Is the reason that you can then allow others to do that. Yeah.

Bonnie (47:42.148)
Yeah. Mm.

I and that's why people I think walk away from teacher trainings and from yoga changed, because then it's almost like these moments where you have to sit with yourself. And if you decide to take it up like like it it is it is not nothing. And I think running your own business, if you're gonna be own your own entrepreneur, your own business owner, you're gonna face so many layers of yourself and you can choose not to

Suzanne (47:55.085)
Hundred percent.

Suzanne (48:02.029)
I've never said it.

Suzanne (48:15.031)
Yeah.

Bonnie (48:16.034)
And choose not to look and you will find something different if you do.

Suzanne (48:20.789)
It's not the normal path. Yoga is not the normal path. And it all is self. You know, my I studied meditation with Jack Cornfield when I was like 20. And I remember the only thing I took from that that I recall consciously is him saying, I am pretty sure that 99%, if not all, of a spiritual practice is just learning to love yourself. And what are we doing if not sitting with ourselves and trying to figure out what the fuck we're doing, but learning how to love ourselves?

And so to study yoga is really just the art of studying how to let go of what is not you. And that is infinite. Like you're just continuously letting go and letting go and letting go and getting down, down, down, down to the to the essence.

Bonnie (48:49.998)
Yeah.

Bonnie (48:58.874)
Mm.

Beautiful.

Bonnie (49:09.038)
Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Mike. Mic drop. Yes. Like it's beautiful. So beautifully said.

Suzanne (49:16.308)
Yeah.

Yoga is so beautiful. We're so great we are so lucky to have inherited this.

Bonnie (49:24.576)
Yeah. Well and I want to look back to I mean you're talking about like the sculptor like finding the thing and you know my I have a kid that's a sculptor, I have a great

Grandpa that was like a sculptor, a famous sculptor, and of stone, and so like whether it's clay or stone, whatever. but I think as you said that and you're like, you know, we are the sculptor, like finding the thing, and right after you talked about like the holding, and I think there's there's an art and I I think there's several layers of things that I would love to teach teachers. I think right now I'm like, okay, I'm gonna I'm refining how I how I am doing sequencing and stuff, but I think to talk about leadership.

Suzanne (49:41.089)
Right, right.

Bonnie (50:02.574)
Talk being seen, talking about like the really like this. How do you go in to actually lead out? and there's and the many facets of what that is, but like the being able to hold a room, but also being fluid in the room. Like, so how do you and I talk about this in flow school a lot? I'm like, we have to build in our classes, we are building banks that hold the river. but they also affect each other, and the river banks change and the river changes, and the river had looks like different things, and and you

You have to be both as a teacher. And you have to create both for an experience to be actually a space that people can land in and bring themselves to. And so when you're talking about a sculptor, I'm like, I think we're the sculptor and we're the clay. Like, I think we're sculpting and we're being like having this conversation, like both of like those are both versions of us. And I and I even say I'm sitting in

In the pause studio right now, and I was sitting here yesterday at this table, like facing out here behind me, and and I just looked at the room and I was like, What do you want to this space? And my girlfriend was sitting here with me and Mackenzie, and she's like, I feel like the room just saying, Well, what do you want? As you know, this space is evolving, and I have some ideas for this space and and where I think it's both. I think we we are like the sculptor and the sculpted, and I think it's both.

Suzanne (51:21.789)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Bonnie (51:28.364)
Hmm. Okay, let's loop to people. You met some people at Flow School. What was it like to be in the room with other teachers? Especially teachers then that you did not know when coming to this space.

Suzanne (51:40.43)
it was fabulous. It was just so heartwarming to connect with people who have been on sort of mutually, you know, isolated paths of journeying through the pseudo-yogic, pseudo-spiritual and sometimes very spiritual depths of of the current modern world we live in. yeah, it was delightful.

Bonnie (52:05.58)
Mm, yeah. Mm. Is there anything that felt I mean, I we've talked about a bunch of things, but maybe something that we haven't mentioned that felt surprising or like unexpected that you left full school with?

Suzanne (52:39.755)
Not that we haven't voiced, I don't think. Yeah. I mean the the personal effect on my own practice, I didn't expect it to affect my personal body so much. I you know, I went with sort of this impersonal, I'm just gonna get more refined in how I teach sequencing.

Bonnie (52:42.106)
Yeah.

Suzanne (52:58.549)
I didn't realize how much how I was teaching sequencing was based on how I sequence and how I sequence was affecting me. I mean it all sounds quite obvious, you know.

Bonnie (53:09.784)
Yeah. Well, and it's interesting that if if people say you studied with me and then they said, what did they say? The dance lady? A dancer. Right? Because I love a lot, because I don't have a dance background at all. And I I think I probably there's probably a picture somewhere in the archives of me, you know, with some ballet outfit on when I was eight, you know, like that was probably a a thing that exists out there.

Suzanne (53:16.981)
A dancer.

Suzanne (53:23.625)
Right.

Bonnie (53:39.717)
but yeah, I didn't come from dancing. I've actually felt really awkward in my body as like a tall person and coming from a really strict religion, religious background for like so much of my life. And and you know, before we start recording, you you know, you talked about how like for both of us in our different approaches, but also our similar approaches, that we can see each other's devotion to freedom. And

the freedom to choose and for everybody to do that and the and that we can see that in each other and recognize it. I think that is that is something that practicing yoga has helped me find in myself. And and having and choosing to redefine myself in so many ways. So I think like finding myself in dance was actually because yoga is weird. And you do like weird things with your body.

So I think it broke something in me, like broke something open in me where I was like, I can like it doesn't, I can be weird. Like you don't have to like hold myself in a certain way. I can actually let myself be weird in it. So I think to be, you know, for people often have assumed that I have some some sort of dance background and dancers really enjoy coming to my classes. But I think it's exactly what, you know, you've kind of mentioned too is while I'm making it conscious, I think I'm really trying to help people tap into call it dancing if you want.

Suzanne (54:40.309)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Bonnie (55:03.972)
But like tap into that people don't think about it necessarily. When you're just like dancing and moving around on the floor, if you were just a dance, you're not really thinking about it. there could be several levels of that, depending on how comfortable you feel. But regardless, like you're gonna do what your body innately feels good in. that doesn't mean you can't challenge that or you can't like push into like some different spaces and like find something else, not push us in a a negative thing, but explore.

but it is that that I am bringing, I feel like, to like through flow school, through through teaching sequencing, like I do, creative sequencing, where it's like how do you work with the innate movement of the body, but as something you can actually give words to? because I think it's actually hard to to say words to some things and

and so just like to address those who might be like know you and like think about like the dancer, like who's this dancer person, I'm like I will take that as a compliment because I super respect dancers and you're right in that I'm using elements of what the body how the body likes to move, but we're layering it with tr the tradition of yoga. So it it makes sense in a new way. Yeah.

Suzanne (56:13.653)
Yeah. Yeah. And the and the piece of owning what's weird. It's not just yoga that's weird. Life is weird. And every single one of us, every single one of us is weird. And that's what the sculptor metaphor is all about. Is it's like we have all been conditioned with a bunch of baggage that makes us

Bonnie (56:24.322)
Yeah.

Bonnie (56:28.44)
Yeah.

Suzanne (56:38.719)
really uninteresting sculptures. It's all the ways that we have adapted ourselves to fit in and be ubiquitous and be the thing that's not weird and is a general shape of a human that's got kind of a good upbringing and kind of a good education and like the right teeth and the right body shape and like it's all this like filling in of what is the awkward, weird shape of us. And

That goes all the way down to the level of voice, which, as teachers, is like our main tool that we're painting our painting with. And if you get really specific about letting your voice be its authentic voice, you can't help but confront the fact that it's gonna sound weird and it's gonna sound bad. You're gonna have to find where your voice sounds bad to you and own that and love that part of it.

Bonnie (57:33.653)
really

Suzanne (57:37.078)
And so, you know, the voice piece is where we are teaching yoga, you know, long before I, long before I knew how important the voice was to each of our individual unfolding and spiritual awakening, I would say. I knew how important it was to teachers because I had, when I was like 22, moved to the San Francisco Bay Area and was trying to find a new teacher, had had a teacher that I was in love with.

And went to like something like 28 yoga studios. I mean, this was in like the late 90s, early 2000s, when there was just like you couldn't throw a rock and not hit a yoga teacher in the Bay Area. And I went to each of those studios, like the majority of their teachers on their roster. So each studio had like, I don't know, 10 plus teachers. I went to like 200 teachers and I realized how rare it is to find a teacher whose voice you can stand. Well, a voice that I could stand.

I realized that I had at least at that time in my life, a very, very particular voice that I was looking for. There was some sort of timbre or authenticity that I was just not finding in the majority of voices. And I think you find it more now. I think that I think that yoga is something about it is maturing into something that's more real. At least in the West, in those years, 20 years ago, yoga was really immature. And like

really cute, but like really immature. And so I am grateful that I can roll into more classes now and find something that feels essential of that teacher coming through in their voice. you still hear a lot of the like woo-woo voices, the like prefab, I'm gonna talk like a yoga teacher and extend your vowels and make it all breathy and make it sound like you're

Bonnie (59:19.65)
Mm.

Suzanne (59:34.648)
Just so relaxed, you know? And like, like you're essentially trying to be hit, like they're trying to hypnotize you, you know, which if you're down to be hypnotized, that's fun. But like those of us that are like not into that, it it's infuriating, you know? and I think that's what I mean when I say that you teach just by nature of how you're showing up, because you're teaching that. Doesn't matter the content, the words you're saying.

Bonnie (59:50.351)
Yeah.

Bonnie (01:00:02.858)
Mm.

Suzanne (01:00:03.149)
quality of your voice is reflecting your nervous system. It's reflecting the the river that has moved through you. Yeah. Hmm. Thank you.

Bonnie (01:00:10.474)
Mm. Thank you.

I mean th now I just wanted a super tangent 'cause you've been taking voice lessons. How long you've been taking voice lessons?

Suzanne (01:00:21.805)
I started taking, let's see, well, I've studied, you know, mantra for a long time. I studied Sanskrit with Manorma, and I studied, I've I've I've been on these tangents of mantra, and I always would say, like, this is not singing, you know, this is not just like you with being like, I am not a dancer, and also thank you, you know. It's not singing, it's not dance, but when you've surrendered to

Allowing some intelligence, letting the weirdness come through, it gets very graceful. It gets inherently, you start to confront the sh the sharp edges and they smooth out because you've loved them. And it starts to sound more like singing. It starts to look more like dancing, right? It starts to get a grace to it. I started studying Shano singing, which is Gaelic unaccompanied singing.

Bonnie (01:01:01.806)
Yeah it's

Suzanne (01:01:16.989)
As a way of connecting to my ancestry, Irish ancestry. And I've been to Ireland many, many times, love Ireland, but never found the thing, the like bone memory that I was seeking there. I was actually forced to question: does it even exist in a geographic place? Or is this just my ancestors that I want connection to? So

I wound up studying with a teacher who she does yoga. She says she does yoga to basically support the vessel for these songs so that they can continue to live in the world. And I started studying Shano singing with her about I don't know, eight months ago, not that long ago. And it's been quite a journey, yeah.

Quite a journey. Not long after that, I lost someone who was like a sister to me who was very musical. And I didn't quite realize, I don't know, you know, there's a part of me that feels I started the the journey of voice to prepare me for the grief that was gonna need to move through me. and you know, in Ireland they have like a tradition of keening, a tradition of of wailing. And

Bonnie (01:02:16.386)
Yeah.

Suzanne (01:02:39.573)
You actually, you know, if someone has died, if you are the one that has lost someone, let's say you're the wife that's lost your husband, a woman who has lost her husband, who has been through it, there's keeners that will come to your house and teach you to they they they model for you all night long. They will keen, they will wail. And it's to show your body how to do this, to to let your voice be learning from.

these basically riverbanks that have expressed this incredible potency of force. And

To me, I just think that there's something there about allowing, you know, what is what is magnificent, what is vast, what is incredibly deep and painful, and what is utterly, absolutely gorgeous to flow through. And I, you know, I had one of my teachers call me yesterday and say she's struggling with getting students through the door. And she was just kind of like, is there anything I can do to like.

get students to come kind of or come back. And you know, each it's so personal for each of us. Like we don't really know what students are resonating with us within us. But I said, you know, what I speak to when a student is coming through the door is I am speaking to the part of them is that is in deepest anguish. I'm assuming that they are there because they are in deep, deep, deep suffering. Because they wouldn't be there if they weren't. They wouldn't have been driven to

To ask questions or to investigate themselves. They would just be off doing the normal thing. Yoga is not the normal path. so I have such great respect for students because I know they're suffering and they've heeded the call to turn toward that instead of turn away from it. Yeah.

Bonnie (01:04:33.326)
As you say, life is weird. I think as people close to me have have passed, I'm like, no d death is death is weird. It's we're weird, life is weird, death is fucking weird.

Suzanne (01:04:47.265)
Yeah. Yeah, it's all pretty damn weird.

Bonnie (01:04:51.576)
Yeah, and that's really beautiful. The I mean who knows the magic of the timing of your lessons and I think the the keening and the wailing, that's really beautiful and just thinking about the preparation in some way to support yourself in this passing of your friend and and voice. Yeah.

Suzanne (01:05:13.813)
Mm-hmm. And the other thing that's been remarkable is my teacher, it's like, you know, she's teaching yoga. It's just, it's the same damn thing. You know, you orchestrate a sequence, we call it the melody of a song. You learn an actual melody. You could just do freeform vocal expression. That would be, you know, the same as just freeform dance on the yoga mat. but you can learn particular patterns and melodies, and then those become part of you.

And it can be trained in the same way that we can't do an updog the first time we step onto the mat, and then the next thing we know it's second nature. You train the muscularity of your voice. And because it's the part of us muscularly that immediately interacts with the Holy Spirit, that interacts most intimately with breath. To me, it's like it's like the seed.

That is going to grow the whole tree. It's the blueprint that you're working with that is still conscious. It's still, you can still, you know, consciously work through vocal exercises to increase your range, increase your variability and tone and all of that. But it's different than your arm and training your forearm to be more limber and more strong, right? I could, I could lose my arm. I can't lose my throat.

I could lose my voice, my vocal folds could be damaged, but I can't lose the access to the stream of breath. And so to change the musculature of who we are, arguably so that it holds less tension, less baggage of what we've adapted and adopted and are carrying that's not ours, actually just gets life. Life just starts getting more and more free. And our voice feels more and more free, and we feel more and more like ourselves.

And then we are resonating and actually speaking to the world more from who we are. And then the world calls back to us. And it's just fucking amazing. It's amazing.

Bonnie (01:07:12.984)
Yes, yes, yes, yes. You know, when I when I have used, I mean I've been saying the phrase, you know, I help yoga teachers own the how to their voice for a long, long time, for several years at this point in time. and I think the longer that I go with that phrase, like holding that phrase in me, and I'm just like like there's so many layers to that, but it is exactly this. And I think the nuance in it is so big, but it is

Like it affects everything. Like it really is. I and it is like sequencing. It is the like it's gonna be fucking weird at first. Like you're not gonna like everything feels i i it might feel wrong. It might feel like you're like, this isn't how I do the thing. This is like this looks too messy, this is like it and it it should be. Like i if you're stepping into it, it should be because you haven't done it before. And and I love your like the visual that you gave of like the edges

Suzanne (01:08:06.306)
Yeah.

Bonnie (01:08:11.182)
Like they're sharp, like they're sharp, and then we roll it and we keep on going with it. And and I think that development of voice and of freedom in that is it I you can find that in a lot of different ways in life. You can find it very much in your body is a way that you can experience and discover a lot of freedom, but your voice automatically to me is attached to that because they cannot be separated.

And so you free your body in some way, that's gonna affect your spirit, it's gonna affect your mental, it's gonna affect your voice. And we can add and we can go at it different ways. If somebody can go voice, then it goes to body, then it goes to spirit. Right. So there's like the many, like the pathways all connect. but it's a hundred percent what I think of with like owning your voice is is being able to s stand in it, explore with it, let it let it evolve. And

Suzanne (01:08:45.153)
Yeah. Yeah. Right.

Suzanne (01:09:02.603)
Yeah. Arguably, yeah. Arguably we have no right to have it that weirdness and that foreignness ever go away. You know, it's like arguably we are we're still being totally like we're still getting birthed until the very last day we die, in which case we are foreign to ourselves up until the last more moment.

Bonnie (01:09:09.742)
Hmm. And I kinda want like yeah, I'm like no, I wanna re keep some of it here 'cause it keeps me in my seat. Yeah.

Bonnie (01:09:24.386)
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we were born again today. Like we we like I woke up again and I'm just like, well, who's this spawning today? Right? Well, and I have some things that are like coming up for me, and I'm like, this shouldn't even be scary, but like I'm real fucking nervous about it. Okay, great. And I'm like, how do we keep pushing those edges of like, like, what can we hold? And who are we in this? And how do we own ourselves in this and not apologize for it? But also it is.

Suzanne (01:09:31.629)
Suzanne (01:09:41.227)
Yeah.

Bonnie (01:09:54.605)
I'm so I'm so committed that everybody has a a heart of like deep honesty and authenticity inside them. And not everybody knows what it is. Like you really like it there is some some guidance, I think, and a a self-discovery journey to find that, but that there is. And when everybody taps into that untouchable center that's like who they are.

Which is constantly changing day by day, right? But if they're interested in committing to that journey and leading from that heart, the world changes. And we are gifted so much by each other when we sit in a circle like that, where we lead from that center place.

Suzanne (01:10:43.457)
Yeah, it is it. It is it. Mm-hmm.

Bonnie (01:10:43.62)
That's it.

Bonnie (01:10:50.252)
Mm. you are such a gift.

Suzanne (01:10:53.197)
Thank you, you too.

Bonnie (01:10:56.834)
Mm.

Okay. How people go how can people find you? What's your studio name?

Suzanne (01:11:05.121)
My studio is Tosha Yoga and yeah, Instagram Tosha Yoga. I'm not I'm I don't like I said spend much time on the computer. So I'm on the mat and I lead retreats. I lead retreats a few times a year and yeah, Tosha Yoga. T-O-S-H-A. Sam Tosha but shortened without the emphasis of the sum. So simpler.

Bonnie (01:11:30.776)
Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for this conversation. Yeah. Yeah.

Suzanne (01:11:34.721)
Thank you, Bonnie. It's been a pleasure.

Bonnie (01:11:38.5)
Y'all, as you can find, I'll put links for your studio and also your Instagram in the show notes so people can easily click and go check it out. And I think with Podcast Land, we put this out in the ether. And so if you hear something here, there's not a like a reply button. There's no thread that you can respond on. It actually takes some effort, which is tricky, to to actually reach out and be like, if you're a listener of this podcast and you loved what Suzanne had to say, like I think.

Like s I I really so appreciate the way you show up in the world and the depth of which you have been willing to sit with yourself and the way that you guide others into that. Like truly. So y'all go go give Suzanne some love. Mm. Tell what you share with her what you appreciate about this conversation. Share it on the gram. My email's there if you want to share out also with me anything from

Suzanne (01:12:19.543)
Thank you.

Bonnie (01:12:36.42)
From this, so all the all the channels are always open. As is the internet. Always on. Always on. Go put it, go touch grass.

Suzanne (01:12:40.994)
Yeah.

Suzanne (01:12:47.309)
It would be great if it just turned off for like, I don't know, twelve hours a day or twenty twenty-two hours a day.

Bonnie (01:12:56.322)
You know it would be a different world. Okay, go to yoga at least.

Suzanne (01:13:04.646)
Yeah. Thank you, Bonnie. I appreciate it. Thank you for all you're doing in the world.

Bonnie (01:13:05.306)
Okay, loves. Thank you for being here.

Absolutely. Thank you. Okay. Till next time, y'all.

Suzanne (01:13:13.997)
Okay. Okay.