The Yoga Studio Is Dying — And What Comes Next (Audio)
What does it really mean to stay devoted to a practice for three decades — and let it keep changing you?
Harmony Slater and Russell Case sit down with Jodi Blumstein: long-time Ashtanga yoga practitioner, founder of one of Chicago's first Ashtanga shalas, and the teacher who led the Mysore program at YogaWorks in Los Angeles for over 15 years. Now teaching online to a global community, Jodi brings the rare perspective of someone who has lived through the full arc of Ashtanga yoga in the West — from the early days of counting in Sanskrit with a German accent at a single Chicago class, to practicing on Oak Street Beach with Tim Miller, to navigating the post-COVID world of online Mysore.
This conversation is honest, nostalgic, nuanced, and full of lived wisdom.
In this episode, you'll discover:
- What it was really like to study with Tim Miller, Dena Kingsbrough, and Nancy Gilgoff — and how each teacher gave something completely different
- Why the traditional yoga studio business model is unsustainable — and what might replace it
- How Ashtanga practice should evolve as you age (and why the 'marathon' model of practice is the key)
- What the rise of Instagram did to the Ashtanga community (for better and worse)
- How Jodi found her way into online teaching — and why she's never going back to in-person
- The practice philosophy she now teaches: rotating series, building core strength, and adapting intelligently for the long haul
- What Pattabhi Jois's presence was really like in those final Lakshmipuram classes
Connect with Jodi Blumstein:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jodi_blumstein/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@jodibe4483
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Ashtanga Yoga Teacher
Jodi Blumstein has been practicing and teaching Ashtanga Yoga for more than three decades. She began teaching in Chicago in the late 1990s before moving to Los Angeles, where she spent over 15 years teaching at YogaWorks and the Center for Yoga.
Between 2013 and 2017 she filmed more than 200 classes for Glo and for many years was the platform’s only Ashtanga teacher.
Through decades of practice and teaching, Jodi has developed an approach that emphasizes safety, refinement, and intelligent modification so that students can sustain a strong and evolving yoga practice over a lifetime. Her teaching helps practitioners access the foundational benefits of the Primary Series while integrating the energetic principles of the Second Series and the strength and vitality cultivated through the Third.
She now teaches daily live Zoom classes and hosts an online yoga studio where students from around the world gather to practice together.
Online studio:
https://app.arketa.co/jodibyoga
