What does our instructor Zuzana have to say about her morning yoga lessons?

The moment she became spellbound by yoga changed her life for good. Zuzana Maďari, a marketing manager and a hatha yoga instructor in one person, firmly believes that there is room for yoga in the world of business too. Not only does it help you get the body and mind started before your working day begins, it also has a positive impact on your well-being and interpersonal relationships. Read on to learn more about yoga and Zuzana’s life with yoga.

How do you feel about your Morning Yoga sessions at Westend?

My Morning Yoga sessions at Westend are among the best I’ve ever had.😊 It may sound like a cliché, but that’s the way it is. There are people of all ages and the sessions are never dull – we often laugh about ourselves.

How many people do you usually see? Have you got any feedback yet?

The room can take about 20 people and so far it’s always been fully booked. That’s one of the things that I find pleasantly surprising about Westend. The people seem to live active lives around here and our yoga sessions have been popular since Day 1. The feedback we’ve received is very positive. People seem to like to start their day actively and relax their bodies and minds in one go.

When did you first try yoga?

I came across yoga during my university studies – and I have to say it was love at first sight. Although I’ve always been rather impatient and lazy, my first yoga session had a profound effect on me. I managed to switch off my head completely and I felt quite relaxed. That was when I realised I couldn’t possibly miss the following session for the world – and soon yoga became part of my daily life.

A slightly personal question now: what does yoga give you and what does it take away from you?

As for the things that yoga gives me, if I were to list them, we’d be here until early morning hours. Let me just try and highlight the greatest benefits at least – the things that my yoga session clients and my closest friends and family have noticed about me. First and foremost, my health has considerably improved. I wasn’t quite aware of this in the first few months, but I realised the other day that I hadn’t been ill for 6 years or so. Before I took up yoga, I used to get ill every time I met someone who was ill. If I shivered with cold for a little while at the swimming pool, I just knew I’d end up shivering in bed, too. As soon as I took up yoga, though, it all stopped just like that. My immune system got much better, and the people around me noticed that yoga was doing me a lot of good. What’s more, it wasn’t just my health condition that improved – my family relationships got much better, too! I gradually became more patient and I stopped getting annoyed about lots of things, so I don’t get upset by petty little things anymore.

As for the things that yoga takes away from me, perhaps there’s only one thing I’d mention – I have less time than before. I mean I have to manage my time effectively. As well as being a yoga instructor, I also have a “standard” job, which is why I need to synchronise my yoga sessions with my family and what I do for a living. It’s often about making compromises…

In addition to practicing yoga, you also give yoga lessons nowadays. What brought you to this? In what way do you benefit from your own teaching?

The idea to become a yoga instructor came to me when I was attending a yoga session in Morava. First, I rang a few friends of mine and I gave them free yoga lessons to test my abilities. I was quite nervous at the start, of course, but my husband supported me a lot, and I’m really grateful to him for what he’s done. After the first few trial sessions, I realised that being a yoga instructor was really fulfilling, plus I’d received a lot of positive feedback from my yoga session friends. I wanted to take the next step, so I started studying yoga under the tutelage of Veronika Karmanová in Prague. It was the best decision I could have made. Not only did I learn a lot about yoga at the Karma Yoga Studio in Prague, but it also gave me the right direction – plus I had a chance to meet some wonderful people, who soon became my friends – practically my second family. How do I benefit from being a yoga instructor? Well, it might sound a little over the top, but I see it as a mission. Helping people at various stages of their lives is just the thing I like about my job. I’m delighted to see my clients returning to me, especially when they’re happier thanks to yoga. You can’t imagine how pleasant and calming it feels when my clients are lying on the floor in the final pose (savasana) at the end of my yoga session, in almost total darkness with only candles lighting the room. It feels so good to be able to enjoy an atmosphere of absolute peace and harmony in this 3D world of ours that’s full of people who are stressed out, under pressure, and always in a hurry.

We hear you specialise in hatha yoga. What exactly does it mean? What do you put emphasis on?

Be it in Slovakia or abroad, you can actually come across various forms of yoga: hatha yoga, fit yoga, power yoga, or ashtanga yoga. All yoga instructors immerse themselves in their sessions, so even if this or that particular yoga session has the same name, it can actually be quite different at the same time (except for ashtanga yoga, whose rules are strictly set today). My yoga sessions are based on several warm-up positions, which are called asanas. I’m a big advocate of making sure that each and every client practices yoga not only correctly, but in a way that is healthy. You see, you need to get your body prepared first. Before we get round to practicing this or that yoga position, I always explain to my clients how our body works, which part of our body we need to breath into, and in what way our muscles and spine are involved. We all need to learn what’s comfortable for us and what’s not. It’s really important to be conscious of your breathing and your body. You can’t just rush through the individual positions without being conscious of what you’re doing. You have to do everything with deliberation and breathe at a steady rate at the same time. Breathing comes first, and only then can you start moving.😊

To conclude, we’d like to ask you about the kind of people who are still gathering courage to take up yoga. What’s your advice for them?

Well, the important thing is to turn up.😊 Yoga is for everyone – and it doesn’t matter if your yoga sessions are supervised by me or somebody else. It doesn’t matter why you find yourself on a yoga mat – the only thing that matters is that you’re already on it!😊

Thank you very much for your time and we look forward to our Westend Morning Yoga sessions with you!