About Yoga Māyā

Birthed amid COVID 2020 ‘Yoga Māya’ was created by father & daughter team Keith & Tammy as an opportunity to regroup, rebrand, refresh and redefine their intentions and purpose in how they shared yoga, meditation and mindful movement practices to their diverse and growing community, both in person and with the emergence of on-line accessibility too.

Originally dating back to 2009 Tammy founded their first yoga business under the registered name ‘Kalamunda Yoga Centre’. This was also the same year ‘Yoga in the Park’ Kalamunda, Stirk Park began and it has continued every summer since with 2024 being the 16 season of this truly exquisite offering.

2015, Keith took surgery and Tammy, while continuing their own [community and corporate] classes, also covered Keith’s classes. Over these few months this experience became the impetus that deeply inspired and prompted Tammy that it was time, they were ready to venture into their own commercial yoga studio space. This was the year ‘Blue Lotus Yoga’ was born and registered as our business. Our community presence in Kalamunda offering yoga classes became more solidified, our student following grew, our business model developed, and so did our timetable. We were now offering a variety of accessible classes every day of the week providing the support for students to commit to a regular movement practice which is extremely life-changing. Read here for a short blog from our dear friend Dr Jean Byrne as she reflects on the cultivation, steadiness, effort and fluctuations of both life and a dedicated yoga practice.

Initially we did not realize our commitment and actions were helping to build a strong and beautiful, warm, welcoming, diverse yoga community around us.

2020 June, - Yoga Māyā opens with Puja blessing.

2020 to present time ~ 2024 ~ is the era Yoga Māyā has grown to expand its teacher base, welcoming experienced teachers to join the Yoga Māyā team. Check out our Teacher Bios page to meet our team and find out about their background and experience; and learn about their offerings and teachings available for your own practice journey.

Why Māyā? What does it mean to us?

In sanskrit māyā has multiple meanings depending on the context such as being likened to prakriti, representing the illusion of the unreality within which the play of our gunas (human behaviors) take place, “that which exists, but is constantly changing and thus is spiritually unreal” ⁽¹¹⁹⁾ ….. ‘the power or principle that conceals the true character of spiritual reality’⁽⁵⁾⁽⁶⁾…. or quite simply from Vedic literature, ‘extraordinary power and wisdom’, and from Hinduism an epithet for the manifestation of the Goddess Lakshmi.⁽¹¹⁾

One of my friends who speaks from his decades of when he lived as Hare Krishna devotee shared this meaning with me which I am fond of too and speaks to the word māyā AND ‘yogamaya’,

“like all energies of the divine, they descend from the spiritual planets or lokas in sanskrit. Maya means illusion. So there are 2 energies of yoga maya, one being a type of spiritual illusion and another being material illusion. Material illusion is just plain maya, maya covers the soul in illusion, thinking we are just this body, nevertheless, maya is a personality married to Lord Shiva, Maya Devi, the goddess kali or Parvati as she is know. She is a goddess of epic proportions, well you have to be if you are married to Lord Shiva. Lord Shiva and parvati have interesting adventures as well. Their adventures are written in the vedas and tell epic stories of parvati and shiva and the other Demi gods or devas. So Yogamaya is the counter opposite of maya. Yogamaya is one of the divines spiritual potencies, a divine goddess, a personality that sometimes manifests in different forms to facilitate the divine past times or play.”

We have also, in our continuing commitment to being open and students of life in continual curiosity, humility and learning, recently learn Maya being described to mean, quite simply, ‘that which we are made of.’

Here [at Yoga Maya] we sit comfortably with allowing the meaning to mean different things at different times to different people. In that way reflecting the myriad of the human experience and the cosmic forces at play. It is a reflection of the changing way this space and the practice’s taken here extend into different roles at different times in peoples live to provide support, containment and self-inquiry.

Our Intentions

The last paragraph above in describing the meaning of Māyā provides segue to our mission statement and intentions for how we want to these practices to be so much more than just the formality of being on the mat. Jon Kabat-Zinn gives justice to describing this when he finishes one of his seated meditations with this suggestion,

“And in the final moments of this sitting, perhaps coming back to the breath, as the primary object of your attention and to the body as a whole… simply sitting, simply present, simply here, now, awake, alive, still, and perhaps affirming the possibility of bringing mindfulness to the every day, events and occurrences of your life as well, beyond the formal, sitting meditation practice. For it is in the conduct of our daily lives, that the deeper practice and challenges of mindfulness reside” - Guided Mindfulness Meditation: Series 2 (disc 1); Sitting Meditation 30mins, 2013, Jon Kabat-Zinn

Final thoughts…

Today, to us, the name represents the space which we feel has become an entity unto itself of safety, warmth, accessibility, belonging and respect. It stands for connection, and the people, students, teachers and facilitators that create this community.

Most importantly it stands for our commitment that ALL beings truly are welcome. In that commitment the reflecting, questioning, inquiring, as to how we can continue to learn and grow individually and together. How we can learn from you to better provide for you and our diverse community. How to use that intention to inform and bolster our thoughts, words and actions. Intending, along with our ethics, morals and values to be conscientious, informed, educated and humble beings.