I would love to introduce myself and tell you all that is shifting with your beloved Pilates, Barre, and Yoga community in Castle Hill 🙏🏽

My name is Annika Saigi. I am 35 years old and the daughter of two immigrant parents (Thailand and Hungary, random right?).

I am also a proud mumma of two baby girls (now 5 and 1), engaged to the man of my dreams, a yoga teacher and aerial teacher, facilitator of a bi-annual Yoga Teacher Training, co-host of the Australian Yoga and Wellness Festival, and owner of a yoga studio in St Marys and Penrith known as Nin Yoga.

Nin Yoga is about to turn 7 next month, but before I had these studios, I used to teach at a studio called Aerial Fit. I actually quit my day job managing a video game arcade for over a decade to go on part-time with Bek and Becca to teach Lyra, Silks, Aerial Yoga, and Hatha Yoga at their Castle Hill studio.

Because Bek and Becca trusted me to embody their studio values and look after their community, they gave me lots a...

I have been ITCHING to tell you something.

Something that if you asked me if it was a possibility in June, I would have been like, "Mateeeeeeee, what are you even on about?".

Something that just continues to prove that there is only so much we can plan in this life.

Nin Yoga is merging with a dear friend in Castle Hill! From September 1st, all of our students and members will be able to book at that location, our third location!

Long story short, Body Barre Air, a studio I used to teach at, maybe 8 or 9 years ago, is looking for a new studio mumma.

Considering I already half knew the vibe of the community, and am still friends with the current teachers, and resonate with all their offers and core values, I actually didn't know how to say no.

That being said, I didn't say yes right away, either. I got the message with the offer while sitting by the first roasting marshmallows with the family. I then read the message out loud to the baby daddy and put the phone ...

I walked up to Penrith Studio stairs this morning to a fancy surprise!

As mentioned in a few newsletters, we have been loving Pilates.

Many of our studio friends teach in local Reformer Pilates studios around the area, which we love to visit, as well as mat classes at Nin Yoga. It's exceptionally complimentary to our main practice of yoga.

Yoga is the ride and fly, the core values, the what I come back to every single freaking time we need to make a decision in this roller coaster of a thing called life.

That being said, however, as I walked up the stairs at the Penrith studio today to get stuck into working on this newsletter and riveting tasks such as payroll and video editing, I was treated by one of our dearest teachers and friends, Dolce Fisher.

Dolce did our yoga teacher training three-ish years ago, but she has been a dance teacher for what sounds like her whole life.

She also teaches a solid amount of Barre, Pilates Mat and Reformer, as soon-to-be Clinic...

For someone who looks after yoga studios, I didn't do so crash hot in my actual yoga teacher training.

I used to sit in the back of the classroom during philosophy lectures and hide behind my textbook to sneak in a cheeky nap.

At one point, I put all the teacher training books over my face and laid on the ground and told my classmates that was the only way I was going to absorb this knowledge.

Promising right?

I was in my twenties and in India, the birthplace of yoga. It was a total honour to be there, but with the 200-hour and 300-hour courses condensed in 30 days, so much of the training was completely over my head because of how new I was to yoga at the time, how distracted I was by all the pretty things surrounding me and just the exhaustion from 12-hour days.

I had already taught some yoga in the past, but not traditional yoga. It was aerial yoga, and I specifically remember telling my teacher trainers in India that when I arrived, which they shunned, saying th...

Can I offer you unlimited classes for just one payment of $10?

Considering it is the middle of winter (apparently, its going to snow up in the mountains this week!), I wanted to find a way to encourage all of our one-class and two-class-per-week members to join us in the studio a little bit more!

So, what better way than bumping you all up to an unlimited membership for the rest of winter?

What do I mean?

Well, for a one-time payment of $10, I will go into the backend of your account and give you unlimited access to all of our classes for the rest of Winter (that's until August 31st, by the way!).

Just reply to this email, and I'll get it set up for you.

No pressure and I'll send a few reminders, as we will keep this promo offer for the rest of winter just for our one and two-class per-week members.

Annika xx

I'll admit it: I initially thought yoga was sooooooooo boringggggggg.

My first impression was 16 years ago in a gym at Rooty Hill.

All I remember is the yoga teacher reading from a book and telling me to relax certain body parts, weaving in many philosophical ideas I couldn't even fathom.

I pretended my eyes were closed to hide from the awkwardness of only three of us in a vast room, but I would have much preferred keeping them open.

After 60 minutes, I dismissed it as yoga was not for me and continued with my life. (unaware that a traditional yoga practice would eventually sweep me off my feet ).

Before that was all to happen, however, I adored circus, and a local school sought a new teacher to teach Aerial Yoga. I still knew nothing of the "yoga" aspect but thought I could wing it.

One student in my class had a background in gymnastics and was always ready to experiment with funky shapes in the sling.

Her exceptional consistency and strength, coupled with ...

We love yoga. Our main thang will always be yoga (hence the name "Nin Yoga").

But also, it's not the be-all and end-all.

Unlike the infamous "yoga" documentaries on Netflix (the Bikram one was exceptionally hard for me to watch because I started in Bikram yoga, but I thoroughly enjoyed Wild Wild Country because the 1970s have always been so fascinating to me), there are more layers to life than just having a hardcore and inflexible yoga only practice.

Yoga is an exceptional foundation, a home to return to within ourselves. It's been that way for me personally for nearly a decade. But what if we have a sore lower back from a weak core or our pelvic floor needs some attention from pushing out those huge things known as babies (fun fact: 50% of women have a weak pelvic floor).

Some exercises complement our foundational yoga practice, and one of them is Pilates.

So, how Pilates can help you?

Let's give you a lowdown on the history first.

It was developed in the early 20...

Slow Dance

"Have you ever watched kids
On a merry-go-round?

Or listened to the rain
Slapping the ground?

Ever followed a butterfly’s erratic flight?
Or gazed at the sun into the fading night?

You better slow down
Don’t dance so fast.

Time is short.
The music won’t last.

Do you run through each day
On the fly?

When you ask: How are you?
Do you hear the reply?

When the day is done,
Do you lie in your bed

With the next hundred chores
Running through your head?

You’d better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.

Time is short.
The music won’t last.

Ever told your child,
We’ll do it tomorrow?

And in your haste,
Not see his sorrow?

Ever lost touch,
Let a good friendship die

Cause you never had time
To call and say, “Hi”?

You’d better slow down
Don’t dance so fast.

Time is short.
The music won’t last.

When you run so fast to get somewhere
You miss half the fun of getting there.

When you worry and hurry through the day,
It is like an unopened gift thrown away.

Life is not a race.
Do take it slower.

Trigger warning: the following email speaks about domestic and family violence, and also a little bit about having a 5-year-old.

To listen to this newsletter instead, click here.

We snuck into your inbox each week for the month of May to talk about domestic violence in Western Sydney and how local women and children's shelter The Haven needed your help.

And because of exceptionally generous humans in our community, we raised this much...

According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 1 in 6 women experience physical violence, 1 in 4 women experience emotional abuse, 1 in 6 women experience economic abuse, and 1 in 5 women experience sexual violence.

Looking up and then rewriting these statistics puts my heartbeat in my throat. I am not ready to share my own personal experience in this area (as I was planning to do initially), but I do feel ok to at least continue to bring it to light.

So, THANK YOU for allowing us to confront what is happening in...

Trigger warning, the following email speaks about domestic and family violence.

Over the weekend we hosted workshop number two to raise money for domestic and family violence prevention appeal month.

We are also thrilled to thank you for your generosity and support; we have raised $1286.90 so far!

If you have already donated or attended one of the workshops, your contribution has made a meaningful impact on the survivors of domestic and family violence in our community. Together, we have helped to provide vital resources and support to women and children in need within our community, giving them the possibility for a future without abuse.

Being a victim of this kind of stuff is just straight-up awful and horrible and never ok. I have seen some of my closest friends and family be victims for what is, more often than not, YEARS.

This is not to say these women are not resilient and brave, but it is to say that what is even harder than being a victim of abuse is to...