Meet Sarah Zandbeek! Sarah is a dynamic and innovative Yoga facilitator, she watches the bodies in the room and nature around her and from these elements designs classes on the fly, so in the present moment what is needed is met. She uses her vast knowledge of Traditional Chinese Medicine and 7 years of embodied yoga practice and facilitation as her canvas to which she creates upon. Sarah has hosted many workshops based on a variety of topics from arm balances, learning to fly, cleansing, back bending, blind folded yoga, sound scape, elemental clearings among many others. She has also taught and co-taught Yoga Teacher Trainings and is deeply passionate about her work. Her main focus is on healing with the realization that healing doesn’t have to be a tumultuous endeavor, it can be quite exciting and fun if we let it be. Sarah is all about having fun from a place of deeply connected truth. You can find her dancing up a storm or deep in meditation, she plays both sides of life well.
We are extremely excited to be a part of numerous upcoming adventures with this lovely lady. She will be co-teaching with Jana Roemer this November in Thailand for a 200 hour Yoga Teacher Training then in December running a retreat in Thailand and in March 2016 she will be slowing things down with a rejuvenation and raw food retreat in Nicaragua, co-taught with Kristin Fraser from Inner Glow Nutrition.
Learn more about Sarah in this interview:
How did you find yoga?
I was a dancer, so movement has always been in my life. When I came home from a life changing trip to Thailand in 2007, I realized I needed to make some big shifts in my life if I was going to get down to the very Essence of what makes me happy. Each time I had gone to yoga, I thought it would be a really cool job and it wasn’t until I went to Vancouver and knew I needed to live there for awhile, that I decided I would do my Teacher Training. It has been an uncovering of sorts and I am still “finding” yoga.
What is yoga?
Yoga is everything. Literally everything. How are you eating, how are you sleeping, how are you in relationship, in chaos, in turmoil, in joy.. It is the way we walk the earth and the way we treat it for the earth mimics the Self. It is how you are breathing into this world and how you are allowing the world to breathe into you. It is the way in which you respond to all that is around you, while maintaining the essence in which you are, never form fitting “who you are” to fit in. Yoga is movement infused with breath, for breath is the healing agent that purifies the body. What is yoga….. it is this, it is that, it is the everything in the nothing and the nothing in the everything. The paradox, the dichotomies, and ultimately it is the context in which everything happens. This doesn’t make sense? Yoga is the seed at the bottom of all of this, that is unchanging and ever growing.
What to you is the most essential quality in a teacher?
Momentary admittance and presence with what is.
As a teacher, what is the core of your message?
We can be Free.
What is the biggest challenges yoga has brought you?
The observation and awareness of the ripple of my every action.
What are the biggest benefits yoga has brought you?
The ability to obscure and be aware of the ripple of my every action; it is both a blessing and a curse.
If you could teach anywhere in the world where would it be?
I can teach anywhere… and it is awesome!
What is your favorite place on earth?
Wherever my Home is set up. If I have a cozy place with all my teas and superfoods, I am pretty easy.
Who is God to you?
What a question. God I hope one day sinks so deep into my heart that I can say from active truth that God is everything, everywhere, through all of time and space. Right now, God is my guidance, my support system, my cheerleader, my elevator, my sustainer, my destroyer, and the one I devote my entire life to.
Other than people, what has taught you the most in your path?
The trees and the water. Trees are steady and patient, always growing towards the light, not through dismissal of shadow, but rather through rooting so deep into the darkness of the soil they gain the deepest stability of all. Water continuously moves with the forces surrounding it, never trying to force something to move in an unnatural direction or create something that is not. It simply moves, cleansing and shifting it’s surroundings, yet powerful enough to create immense chaos, and permanent change.
What is love?
Love is allowance. Love is freedom. Love is space. Love is unconditional. Love is maintaining your own sense of Self so you can stand steady in someone else’s truth, even when it hurts. Love is consistency. Love is sensual. Love is ever learning. Love is ever evolving. Love is endless. Love is selfless action. Love is surrender. Love is communication. Love is deep honesty. Love is the ability to listen with a steady, sweet heart. Love is empathy. Love is tragic. Love is hardship. Love is fight. Love is perseverance. Love is vitality. Love is clarity in action, direction, and word. Love is showing up in all ways, always.
Even in following certain lineages, every teacher has their own delivery and style. How would you describe yours?
I see who has arrived and I teach to the common thread that binds that group together. I look for what needs to be healed, what needs to be released, and what needs to be liberated and I do my very best to awaken the force that will aid in the purification and rebirth of what needs to move into fruition.
In which way has yoga most changed your life?
….that isn’t a real question… when one thing changes, every thing changes. It has changed my life in every way and still is… and I have no idea about it.
What got you into yoga?
Wonderment.
