Although Briohny Kate Smyth’s body strength allows her to work on the advanced yoga postures of inversions, arm balances and strong standing postures, her teaching is surprisingly accessible.
A former pop star turned Los Angeles yoga instructor, Briohny Kate Smyth was only 13 when she appeared in a popular TV commercial, At 18, she released her first album “Briohny” and followed up with by a few other full-length outings, all of them hits. Now she’s back and fans are flocking to her classes at Absolute Yoga Bangkok.
“I’m glad to meet my Thai fans again and it’s great to be doing it in the new role of yoga teacher,” she says. “I’m pleased too that yoga practice is popular in Thailand right now, as this is something I can share in helping people to enjoy better self-acceptance.”
During her singing days, Briohny says she hated her half-Thai, half-Western looks and always felt she was too fat. She lived on diet pills and water and suffered from the twin eating disorders of bulimia and anorexia.
“My mother told me to take a break from work, so after shooting a travel show in Nepal I decided to travel for three months through Nepal, India and Tibet. I was only 16 at the time, and met other travellers who had come to India for yoga. I followed them from Delhi to Goa, where we joined a challenging ashtanga yoga class led by an Indian teacher.”
On her return to Bangkok, Briohny continued to practise yoga at Absolute Yoga. After she moved to the US, she took her journey to another level by completing a 200-hour intensive teacher training immersion with gurus Annie Carpenter, Kia Miller, Joan Hyman and Bahni Turpin.
“Yoga brings me back to myself, and teaches me to pay respect to the body. My life changed when I gave birth to my daughter Taylor and I’ve been doing yoga with her since she turned two.”
Briohny says her daughter enjoys doing Acro-yoga, an acrobatic-like practice, which has three people doing a yoga posture together.
“This helps us share, communicate and trust each together in a very happy way. Taylor loves to be a flyer (a person that has been elevated off the ground in Acro-yoga practice). In fact she is a very good flyer while my husband Dice is the Base to support her on the ground. This practice builds the bond between us all, and gives her both confidence and physical benefits.”
Briohny also teaches yoga to her mother, who at 60 is now learning to do handstands. “She started attend my classes a few years ago, but has yet to manage the inversion posture. Her upper body just isn’t ready. I’m happy to see my parents getting healthy and improving their body strength every day”.
After an eight-year silence, Thai fans rediscovered Briohny when her awesome yet controversial “Yoga by Equinox” video clips went viral on YouTube late last year, winning her close to 4 million hits.
“I was criticised by many people in the US. They felt what I wore during practice was too sexy. But my intention was to inspire people to practise yoga. Surprisingly, I received only positive feedback from Thailand!”.
Since coming back to Thailand a few months ago, Briohny has conducted several yoga workshops at Absolute Yoga Bangkok with her husband Dice Iida-Klein. They’ve also joined hands with the yoga studio to record a DVD “Inspiring through yoga by Briohny”, which is scheduled for release at the end of this year.
Her first session last week under the theme “Intro to Flight” was an inversion-focused class where she introduced many tricks for arm balances for every level of practitioner. She and her husband teach the class together.
“I am dedicated to teaching, and at the same time, inspired by my own students. I have a passion for advanced postures but I love to share yoga practices with everyone. The improvements in Nick, one of my current students who was badly burned when a citronella candle exploded, inspires me to keep up what I am doing.”
Although her body strength allows her to work on the advanced yoga postures of inversions, arm balances and strong standing postures, her teaching is surprisingly accessible. When teaching, Briohny says she is strongly focused on safety through body alignment, and always tell her students to maintain body awareness throughout the practice.
“I believe yoga practice should be sustainable and something that can be done for life. My ultimate goal is to have yoga as the important part of my life, and a tool for sharing love to my family, students and people. “
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