Durham Yoga Group

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Durham Yoga Group

The Durham Yoga Group meets once a month to run a workshop for anyone practicing Yoga in the Durham area. The group is non profit making.

We invite along teachers from around the region and aim to give those who attend a new experience of Yoga that they might not get in a weekly class. Durham Yoga Group is run by four local Yoga teachers (Jacqueline Stevenson, Noel Sharpe, Judith Gibbons and Leigh Johnson) who organise the regular meetings and source the teachers. The topics are decided by the teachers themselves and are varied and often surprising! All of those taking the sessions are qualified teachers. Once a year we run a free session for members and make a donation to a local charity.

03/09/2025

Looking forward to our next monthly session Belmont Parish Hall at 10am to midday on Saturday 20th September 2025 with Helen Beeson. We'd love to see you there 🙏

After many years as a group exercise instructor teaching a variety of classes both high and low intensity, Helen qualified in Pilates in 1999 and straight away saw the benefits for both her participants and for herself. From here she started to explore different methods and styles to enhance her teaching. Helen suffered a serious injury, a full rupture of her achilles tendon through doing many high impact classes. This led to her not being able to teach for a year. Helen started attending Yoga for rehab and her passion for mind and body classes was ignited. She firstly carried out a 200 hr Yoga training with the Himalayan yoga institute and soon progressed her teaching and practice by undertaking the 500 hr (level 4) diploma trading with the BWY.

This session will be called Autumn Equinox and finding balance between the sun and the moon.
We will start with a sun salutation to generate heat with some grounding postures to follow for some standing strength work into a moon salute for some cooling as we shift towards the season change.

Helen will do a guided meditation and relaxation at the end of the session.

Join us in celebrating the change of seasons and reconnecting with balance, energy, and stillness. 🍂✨

16/08/2025

The DYG were treated to two teachers today. Amanda, who is half way through her 500 hour BWY training, impressed everyone with her natural, confident and clear communication style. She led us through a series of seated and standing warm up sequences, and some reclined leg stretches, ensuring that we were fully prepped for our peak pose of Downward Facing Dog. Amanda invited us to marry all movement with the breath to fully reap the benefits of the practice. Well done Amanda on successfully teaching to your largest group yet and best of luck with the rest of your course! Jacqueline then took the helm, guiding us through a lovely practice during which we energised out chakras; we found it to be calming and nourishing. To end the practice, we had some fun practising Zen walking, which tested out brains as well as our balance! Thanks and well done to both teachers.

12/08/2025

This month's event, at Belmont Parish Hall at 10am to midday on Saturday 16th August, will be a charity event, with all monies paid for entrance to be given to charity. If you can't come along but would like to add to our total, please send your donation by bank transfer and let us know on durhamyogagroup@gmail.com

(If you don't have the bank details, contact us and we'll send them to you)

The session this month will be a joint affair between one of the newest teachers in the region - Amanda Reynolds - and one of the oldest (!), Jacqueline Stevenson, one of our committee members. We are very glad to give Amanda this opportunity and hope you will be able to come along and welcome her.

Amanda will teach for the first 75 minutes and Jacqueline for the final 45 minutes.

Amanda

Discovering Yoga in 2018, I became fascinated and have decided to take my personal practice further by studying for the 500-hour BWY Diploma in Teaching Yoga. Now half way through my course, I have received my interim certificate and have begun teaching, sharing the benefits that yoga can have for our bodies and minds.

My classes focus on gentle and mindful mobility, stretching, and strengthening, a chance to work with our body whilst promoting calm and relaxation.

I will be sampling from my present course assignment of creating a 10-week lesson plan.

"A Self-Compassion Journey - an anatomically led and mindful practice for whole body and mind health."

Week One - I start to notice. The benefits of Yoga.

This session will begin with a breath awareness practice, followed by a dynamic warm-up, basic vinyasa with focus on Ardho Mukha Svanasana, and dynamic cool down, ready for Shavasana.

I look forward to practicing with you.

Jacqueline

I have been teaching yoga now for many years and my yoga has certainly changed to move towards more gentle and meditative practices. We will be working with enhancing the Zen walk that Marcia Ash introduced us to in her session some months ago, bringing an enhanced sense of balance, concentration and contemplation to the practice. And if we have a laugh as well, all the better!

After that exercise of the mind, we will move the breath through the body in the (now traditional for August) Yoga Nyasa: q breathing, chakra energising and meditative practice.

26/07/2025

🌞 Saturday Morning Yoga Bliss 🌿
Our lovely monthly Saturday morning yogis were treated to something truly special today, thanks to Ros Beaumont. 🙏
Ros guided us through a beautiful blend of mat and chair yoga, starting gently in the chair with mindful breathwork. We eased into seated car stretches and gentle twists—just what we needed to settle in and arrive on the mat (or chair!).
She then broke down Sun Salutations into two accessible flows—one standing, and one using the chair. We practiced each a few times, then enjoyed combining both into a flowing, self-guided sequence that left everyone feeling connected and grounded.
To close, Ros offered a thoughtful explanation of Yoga Nidra, then led us through a deeply restful 40-minute practice. I think it’s safe to say nobody wanted to leave after that. 😌💤
Thank you so much, Ros, for such a nourishing and balanced session.

08/07/2025

'Slow Summer Flow and Focus' with Ros Beaumont

Saturday 26 July 2025, 10am to 12 midday

Join Ros as she offers a relaxed space to explore the body and breath in both energising and calming ways as we move gently through the greener and lighter months. Following some breathwork, the session will conclude with an extended practice of yoga nidrā drawn from the Himalayan tradition, so do bring all the items you like to use to maximise your comfort in when lying down in savasana (blanket(s), pillow/bolster, etc.)

Having practiced yoga for 20 years, Ros came to teaching following the encouragement of her first yoga teacher - Sandra Marsden. Following the successful completion of the BWY teaching diploma, she’s offered yoga in a range of settings - from community groups to university students - and loves offering yoga outdoors when ever possible as the surrounding environment and elements add so much to a practice. Ros enjoys offering inclusive and accessible yoga spaces for all, encouraging her students to 'do what you can do today'. In addition to drawing on the Hatha yoga tradition, her teaching is also informed by the increasing volume of research evidence into the value of yoga, mindfulness and nature-based practices to promote health and wholeness.

Have your usual yoga equipment, including blanket(s) and props for relaxation.

26/06/2025

🌞 Summer Solstice Session 🌞
Although we missed Zhanar this month, we’re reminded that teamwork makes the dream work 💛 A huge thank you to two of our committee members who stepped up last-minute to lead the session – Jacqueline and Judith your energy and support were invaluable!
On a warm and sunny Saturday morning, 20 yogis came together to honour the Solstice. Our physical practice was a celebration of the sun’s power and the season’s abundance – with flowing movements and expansive poses that invited deep, nourishing breaths. 🌿✨
After moving our bodies, we turned inward with a short meditation and a deeply relaxing yoga nidra. Using the sun’s energy, we focused on manifesting our highest, most radiant selves. 🔆
It was a beautiful way to mark the Solstice – grounding, energising, and full of intention. What a magical start to the day. 🌻🧘‍♀️🧘‍♂️

08/06/2025

Looking forward to seeing you all at our next workshop at Belmont Parish Hall on Saturday 21st June 2025 at 10am to midday.

The session will be taken by Zhanar (Janar) Riffer, titled.....

"The Balance and Coordination Asanas", followed by rejuvenating Yoga Nidra.

This workshop focuses on the transformative benefits of balance and coordination asanas, designed to improve muscle coordination, posture, and overall strength.

The practice enhances physical and nervous balance while calming the mind and grounding the body.

The session concludes with a rejuvenating 25-minute Yoga Nidra (the most enjoyable part of yoga class for some students) at the end.

Suitable for all levels, this workshop promotes physical vitality and mental clarity.

Janar is a certified British Wheel of Yoga teacher, with over 23 years of hatha yoga
practice.

Yoga has been her anchor through life’s challenges, offering her healing, reducing stress level, promoting self-awareness, and resilience.

She is passionate about sharing this transformative practice, using asanas, meditation, and breathwork to help others find balance, inner peace, and a deeper connection with their body and mind.

Please, bring your usual yoga equipment, including blanket(s) for yoga Nidra.

17/05/2025

What a beautiful journey we shared today in our Monthly Yoga Workshop with Georgia Giannopoulou!

Georgia, a gifted psychotherapist and Hatha yoga teacher, guided us through a deeply nourishing two-hour session infused with somatic movement, awareness, and care.

We began with a grounding body scan and soothing face massage, gently arriving in our bodies. With pranayama and embodied movement, we flowed mindfully through shapes like cat, pigeon, half frog, dolphin, dog, and cobra—each posture a conversation between breath and body.

Georgia then led us through a few rounds of alternative, mindful sun salutations, reimagined through a somatic lens. We closed with a richly deserved deep relaxation, more pranayama, and a grounding chant, leaving us all feeling centered, open, and deeply connected.

Thank you to everyone who came and shared this space with us. We can’t wait to do it again next month! 🙏🕉

05/05/2025

Our teacher for our next session at Belmont Parish Hall on Saturday 17th May 2025 is
Georgia Giannopoulou.

Georgia is an experienced psychotherapist and yoga teacher and her take on hatha yoga is that is about tuning-in and moving from internal sensation towards healing and authentic living. In that way it is a somatic approach to yoga, promoting embodiment (living in your body) and internal/external awareness (interoception-exteroception-proprioception)
Through asana pranayama and meditation we aim to connect body to mind so that we can breath move and live with intention and heal the residues of past stresses on the body by learning to be flexible and adapt to change/cultivate resilience.
Her classes are playful, non-performative, inclusive and trauma-informed.

Please bring your mat, blocks, strap, cushion and blanket.

Looking forward to seeing you all 🙏🕉

26/04/2025

Any of our lovely members leave a red metal water bottle after this mornings workshop? Let us know if it's yours, we'll get it back to you if we can or keep it safe until our next workshop on Saturday 17th May 2025. 🙏🕉

26/04/2025

Today, 26 yogis gathered to share in a beautiful session led by Noel.
For over a decade, Noel and Jacqueline have nurtured the Durham Yoga Group, bringing a rich variety of yoga and movement practices to our community.
In today's class, we reflected on the deep history and evolution of yoga — a timeless reminder that the practice is not one-size-fits-all, but a personal journey shaped by our own capabilities and needs.
With mindful attention, Noel guided us through thoughtful movement and stretching, weaving in elements of somatics and pranayama to deepen our connection to body and breath.
Thank you, Noel, for a truly grounding and inspiring session.

Address

Belmont Parish Hall, Broomside Lane
Durham
DH12QR

Website

https://www.yoga-durham.co.uk/?page_id=272

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