Kassandra Prus is a Toronto-based yoga teacher, educator, and qualifying yoga therapist (IAYT 2021). Kassandra’s lineage of study is through the direct students of TKV Desikachar (son of T. Krishnamacharya and founder of Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram (KYM) in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India)–teachers Ante and Felicia Pavlovic (Yoga Therapy Toronto) and Dr N Chandrasekaran (Yoga Vaidya Śālā). Kassandra works to uphold and respect the powerful classical teachings of Krishnamacharya and his lineage through rigorous ongoing personal practice and study. These classical teachings come directed through Kassandra’s lived exerience of navigating the world as a queer and trans Ukrainian living in Toronto. For Kassandra, working with yoga as a somatic mano śastra (science of the mind) mirrors newly proven western understandings in psychotherapy and neuroscience, somatic psychotherapies, our understanding of trauma and more. It is of great interest to see how these deep indigenous knowledge systems built to heal all the layers of ourselves from the inside out (body, physiology, mind, emotions, spirit) will co-mingle with modern allopathic medical research into the future.
This lineage of teaching has brought Kassandra to working with students and clients of myriad abilities and conditions–seniors, those living with disabilities, trauma, physical and mental health concerns, and more. Kassandra currently teaches at Union Yoga and Wellness (Hatha+Meditation, Yin), Yoga Village (Accessible Yoga), Runnymede Public Library (Chair Yoga+Meditation), Ukrainian Canadian Care Centre (Seniors Drop In Program), Ivan Franko Long Term Care Home (residents and staff), and with private therapeutic groups and clients.
Kassandra also trains yoga teachers, group class teachers, allied health professionals, social workers and more in two training programs: a 40 hour Therapeutic and Chair Yoga Teacher Training (focussing on deepening personal practice and understanding the “why” for āsana practice in the viniyoga lineage), and well as as a trainer for the USA based Accessible Yoga Training in their 3-day training, founded by Jivana Heyman.
Kassandra’s group classes focus on allowing the deepening breath to guide the body into places it hasn’t been before–physically, physiologically, and mentally. You can expect to be guided through slow-moving, breath-initiated dynamic movements to deepen flexibility (removing blockages in the body-mind system), as well as some longer held shapes where we explore observing the present moment through classical tools like bhāvana (visualizations) and mantra (focussed attention on vocalized or mentally repeated sounds/statements). Class is occasionally begun with therapeutic ball-rolling massage and ended with formal seated dhāraṇā (concentrative meditation) or prāṇāyāma (breath practices). In working this way, each student is given the opportunity to discover their own practice, their internal autonomy, and take agency over their own body’s needs. In Kassandra offering a framework to work within, each student chooses how they, that day, will engage with their body, breath, and mind. Connecting to that observer who is helping us make choices allows us to gently peer beneath the coverings of anxiety, pain, trauma, or depression.
Kassandra’s private sessions bring a kind gaze to each individuals unique needs by examining their lifestyle, goals, conditions, mental state, age, location, occupation, and more, to create a personal practice specifically designed to bring them closer and closer to radical self acceptance. Kassandra offers infinitely modifiable classical tools of yoga according to each students need, as well as lifestyle, ritual, eating, sleep, and other suggestions to support well being and a well-rounded healthy life. Viniyoga encourage an internalized and lived understanding of yoga practices, allowing for the ability to continuously adjust teachings to suit each individuals receiving them, as per Krishnamacharya’s teachings of “Give what is inside of you, not as it applies to you, but as it applies to the other”.
When not teaching, you can find Kassandra thoroughly enjoying life walking in the forest, at folk dance and music jams, cooking, gardening, fermenting, or foraging. Nature is the greatest teacher!
This lineage of teaching has brought Kassandra to working with students and clients of myriad abilities and conditions–seniors, those living with disabilities, trauma, physical and mental health concerns, and more. Kassandra currently teaches at Union Yoga and Wellness (Hatha+Meditation, Yin), Yoga Village (Accessible Yoga), Runnymede Public Library (Chair Yoga+Meditation), Ukrainian Canadian Care Centre (Seniors Drop In Program), Ivan Franko Long Term Care Home (residents and staff), and with private therapeutic groups and clients.
Kassandra also trains yoga teachers, group class teachers, allied health professionals, social workers and more in two training programs: a 40 hour Therapeutic and Chair Yoga Teacher Training (focussing on deepening personal practice and understanding the “why” for āsana practice in the viniyoga lineage), and well as as a trainer for the USA based Accessible Yoga Training in their 3-day training, founded by Jivana Heyman.
Kassandra’s group classes focus on allowing the deepening breath to guide the body into places it hasn’t been before–physically, physiologically, and mentally. You can expect to be guided through slow-moving, breath-initiated dynamic movements to deepen flexibility (removing blockages in the body-mind system), as well as some longer held shapes where we explore observing the present moment through classical tools like bhāvana (visualizations) and mantra (focussed attention on vocalized or mentally repeated sounds/statements). Class is occasionally begun with therapeutic ball-rolling massage and ended with formal seated dhāraṇā (concentrative meditation) or prāṇāyāma (breath practices). In working this way, each student is given the opportunity to discover their own practice, their internal autonomy, and take agency over their own body’s needs. In Kassandra offering a framework to work within, each student chooses how they, that day, will engage with their body, breath, and mind. Connecting to that observer who is helping us make choices allows us to gently peer beneath the coverings of anxiety, pain, trauma, or depression.
Kassandra’s private sessions bring a kind gaze to each individuals unique needs by examining their lifestyle, goals, conditions, mental state, age, location, occupation, and more, to create a personal practice specifically designed to bring them closer and closer to radical self acceptance. Kassandra offers infinitely modifiable classical tools of yoga according to each students need, as well as lifestyle, ritual, eating, sleep, and other suggestions to support well being and a well-rounded healthy life. Viniyoga encourage an internalized and lived understanding of yoga practices, allowing for the ability to continuously adjust teachings to suit each individuals receiving them, as per Krishnamacharya’s teachings of “Give what is inside of you, not as it applies to you, but as it applies to the other”.
When not teaching, you can find Kassandra thoroughly enjoying life walking in the forest, at folk dance and music jams, cooking, gardening, fermenting, or foraging. Nature is the greatest teacher!
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I learn a new variation or something completely new every class. You always create a safe and encouraging space for me to try new things and challenge myself. The amazing part is that it never really seems hard! |
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Although I'm a very active person, I never spent time looking after myself physically. I really demonstrated to myself my years of self neglect after committing to and beginning chair yoga. Kassandra has slowly but steadily helped me gain better balance, become a bit more flexible, and stronger. It will take time to come back to the level I aspire to but little by little I am improving. – Lydia F. |
**Information about my Yoga lineage**
Yoga Therapy Toronto // Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandirim (KYM) // Yoga Vaidya Śālā // What is Yoga Therapy
**Information about my Buddhist meditation and mindfulness background**
Thich Naht Hahn and Plum Village
Yoga Therapy Toronto // Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandirim (KYM) // Yoga Vaidya Śālā // What is Yoga Therapy
**Information about my Buddhist meditation and mindfulness background**
Thich Naht Hahn and Plum Village
I recognize that the sacred land on which I work has been a site of human activity for upwards of 15,000 years. This land has been tended and cared for over time by the Anishinaabe First Nations, the Huron-Wendat, the Petun, the Seneca, the Mississaugas of the Credit River, as well as many others unrecognized and unrecorded. This territory was the subject of the Dish With One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenant, an agreement between the Iroquois Confederacy and the Ojibwe and allied nations to peaceably share and care for the resources around the Great Lakes. This covenant to care for the land and treat it as an equal partner in all decisions, was extended to settlers when these allied nations opened their arms to us all landing in Tkaronto (Toronto) and broader area. How can each of us continue to uphold this covenant on the land we walk on daily, so that our generation and future ones can continue to gather and practice together here for the next 15,000 years. Yoga's philosophical "yama-s", or self-regulating behaviours involving our interactions with other people and the world at large as a great guide to help us do this, and what I look to in my life as support on my journey.
