The Ecosystem that Surrounds Us

Welcome to the latest interview post from the True Nature Tribe. If you’re new here, head back and check out the earlier True Nature Tribe blog posts for some background on the project. Throughout this project we photograph and interview yogis about yoga in nature. We had such a blast interviewing this next yogi and she’s no stranger to having her photo taken or to conservation. The beautiful, the talented, the inspirational Amy Ippoliti. What is yoga?

“Yoga is consciousness in relationship.”

Amy’s yoga journey starts out in an all-too-familiar way. As a typical 16-year-old teenager she started having trouble with the popular girls at school, which led her to turn inward and become somewhat of a loner. She told her mom of her plans to be a social outcast and just focus on her homework and that landed her an invitation to her first yoga class. “It was super far out but something about the mystery of it all made me want to continue doing yoga,” Amy recollects, “And I did.”

Yoga was how Amy survived high school. There’s something interesting about the phrase “surviving high school” as though high school is perilous. Amy claims community is her reason for why yoga continues to be such an important part of her life. Amy describes the kind of person that is drawn to a yoga lifestyle as someone who’s seeking, someone who wants to become more of who they already are, wants to discover himself or herself, or wants to know the mystery. “Being around that kind of person is really appealing to me, so that’s what keeps me on the mat.”

As a yoga teacher, teaching is part of who Amy is. For her, watching people and their transformations is fulfilling. Some of Amy’s students want to become yoga teachers, some of Amy’s students just want to do yoga. Teaching at workshops and retreats, online at YogaGlo, and at her own studio in Boulder, Colorado has shown Amy that everyone has a different reason for beginning yoga. “A lot of people start because they want to get rid of stress in their life and many want a workout and many would like more flexibility. Those are the main statistics that we hear. And there’s also a percentage of those who come to yoga because they want to find out who they are. They want to take a larger journey of self discovery. The good news is that whatever your desire for starting yoga, your going to get all of it. So that’s the great news. Most of my students are inquisitive. They want to learn, and they’re incredible students. They’re dedicated, curious, and they want to be educated.”

One of Amy’s other passions is environmentalism. Whenever she can she tries to get outside and hang with animals. Amy and her partner, Taro Smith, create imagery with interspecies interaction to try to help raise awareness and consciousness around the creatures on the planet. She talked about how activists traditionally use shock and horror to try to wake people up. Taro and Amy are trying to do something different. They’re trying to create awe, euphoria, or joy. “Our hope is through awe and the joy of seeing imagery of species interconnecting to raise consciousness and raise awareness because people want to protect what they love.”

Graphic images might make people shocked, appalled, angry, or desperate to do something but such images also make people sad and bummed out. “So when you see images of someone doing yoga underwater with a huge 1500-pound manta ray or a pod of dolphins it’s just joyful and it’s astonishing and it creates a reaction of awe. And that gets shared, that’s what goes viral in our modern social media culture. And if that’s what it takes, that’s what we will do.” The proceeds of her artwork help support various conservation projects such as WildAid. Amy even entwines an eco-conscious component into her 30-day yoga challenge helping others create habits that are healthy for the planet. I love Amy’s approach to conservation because she doesn’t deny the why. It’s for the marine animals, yes, but it’s also for the impact they have on our lives. “Plus its super fun to be in the water with these animals. There’s been nothing more extraordinary in my life and nothing more exhausting than trying to keep up with an animal that can breathe or hold their breath underwater way longer than I can.”

In yoga, we hear a lot about connection and community. We hear about it in two main ways. Yoga teaches us about connection to our self (finding our path), and connection to others (understanding and empathizing). However, there’s a strong message about connection to everything. Many yogis are vegetarian, a practice of non-violence and honoring our connection to animals. The connection talked about in yoga is bigger than just our yoga class and yoga community. It’s about the sustainability of the world around us and all of the creatures too. Conservation seems to be a natural extension of being a yoga teacher in our modern society.

“Our strategy is to document these creatures also before they’re all gone.”

When I asked when she fell in love with nature and animals, a smile formed on her lips. “I think I was born in love,” she said with a giggle. Her earliest memory of being alive included a love of the Earth and its creatures. She sees awareness and sensitivity as results of a yoga practice. Through her experience teaching many yogis, she observes it as a natural shift in a lot of people.

“You become more aware of what you put in your body, what you put on your body, and then you also become aware that you’re interconnected and that you are part of a much larger fabric of the natural world. It’s really inherit to just suddenly care more. You just care more. You realize that everything you do has a cause and an effect and that you’re connected to a larger web and therefore your actions have consequences. You start to become aware of what those actions are and how we can deeply effect the ecosystem around us by the choices we make: how we spend our money, etcetera.”

During her photo-shoot she skipped and danced and had an incredibly playful attitude toward the scene around us. She noticed the large views as well as the tiny flowers. The challenges of practicing outdoors seemed to light Amy on fire. “Doing yoga in the outdoors, there’s something really distinct compared to when you are in a studio. In a studio you may be able to focus more but when you do yoga in nature there are so many contours in the land itself that might lend themselves as a prop. There are the elements themselves that dance around you and touch your skin. Feeling the fire of the sun and the solidity and the stability of the earth beneath you, and the wind on your skin. There’s just something so sensuous and rewarding about that that’s really different than being on a yoga mat.”

Where some would see challenges of practicing yoga outdoors, Amy sees props. During our shoot Amy used rocks, bridges, and other features to guide her into poses. Rather than fitting the environment to herself, she molded herself to the environment and became a part of it. Despite Amy looking and feeling at home in nature, she does teach and practice in a studio and obviously sees value in that too. It’s not a question of nature vs. studio but rather what new and different experiences can we integrate into our practice. “One is not better than the other it’s just another type of experience whether you’re on the mountaintop or you’re in the sand or you’re on a stand-up paddleboard with water all around you. Or underwater. Holding your breath is a whole other form of yoga and Pranayama, breathing techniques (or non-breathing techniques we should say.) It’s an amazing experience to integrate that part of yoga into your practice.”

And that’s how connections get made. One minute she’s talking about the beauty of doing yoga in nature and she’s suddenly reminded of doing yoga underwater. Which, of course, brings up a whole other set of challenges, which we redefined as ‘props’ earlier but will redefine as ‘opportunities’ in this case. When she’s underwater there’s this whole other thing she has to think about, which is the breath. But hey, we have a name for that in yoga. Pranayama. It’s one of the eight limbs of yoga and when describing it many teachers talk about energy, breath, and life force. Amy describes it as follows, “The single most uplifting practice would be pranayama because there’s nothing more direct of a transmission that we are supposed to be here, we are supposed to be alive, than when you take a breath in and you notice it. You notice that the Divine wants you to be here. You’ll get reminded pretty quickly when you focus on your breath a lot.”

As Amy puts it, “Yoga is such a long journey; it’s something I’ve done for so long that it’s a path of self-discovery and a way of becoming more skillful in the world and becoming more of my best self in the world. Instead of hiding behinds ideas of who I should be or not being open to changing or to improving. I’m constantly on a journey of wanting to improve, wanting to get better, and wanting to be more of myself.” Near the beginning of the interview, Amy spoke of the fact that people come to yoga for various reasons. They also stay for various reasons.

“Staying connected to yoga helps me be my best self in the world. That’s important because I want to make a difference when I die. I want to be able to say that I helped make the planet a better place. If I’m at my best then that means I’m going to be able to leave the planet better than when I got here. The constant work on oneself is the reason I continue to do it.”

Thanks Amy! And thanks to the rest of you for tuning in! Be sure to visit our website for more information on what we are doing with the True Nature Tribe project about yoga in nature. You’ll see glimpses of the stories ahead and well as ways to get involved. We would be honored if you would support our project in whatever way you are able. Join our newsletter below. We’ve also created a Postcard Pack that is available for purchase. 100% of the profits will be donated to land conservation.