Today we’d like to introduce you to Courtney Hans.
Hi Courtney, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
It’s an honor to be here! Thank you so much for reaching out to me. You’ve highlighted so many impressive and lovely individuals, and I am so grateful to be considered beside them. My story has kind of an inauspicious beginning. In college, I took a couple semesters of Sanskrit as well as Hinduism while I was studying psychology. I really enjoyed Sanskrit, so after I graduated, I took a six-week intro to yoga class. I thought it was the most boring thing. I didn’t get it. Each day after class, I hopped on my bike and felt calm and relaxed but just didn’t feel the need to continue on. Over the next ten years, I would take the odd yoga class here and there, rented Yoga Booty Ballet from the library… for real, but that was it. Then I had a buddy who kept on bugging me about joining him for a yoga class. I finally gave in just so he’d stop going on about it. I showed up with very low expectations. I felt out of place and had very little idea about what I was doing. By the end of class, I was absolutely completely hooked. Something clicked and I knew that I wanted more. Within two weeks, I wanted to be a teacher. I spent the next two years practicing then took a teacher training from the first studio I had taken that class. This was back in 2013 at the original Black Swan Yoga when it was, at the time, the only Black Swan studio. Less than a month after I finished my training, one of my teachers texted me “We’re in a pinch. Can you sub today at 4:30?” I remember feeling elated and terrified. I took the plunge, taught the class, and haven’t looked back. I taught in Austin until 2015 when I left most of my worldly possessions behind and thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail.
If you don’t know much about the Trail, it’s over 2,000 miles and runs from Georgia to Maine. It took me 180 days to complete. I am fully confident that my yoga practice and training prepared me for the mental challenges that the Trail throws at you. After the Trail I ended up in Richmond, VA, where I settled into a very lovely yoga community soon after arriving. I’m so grateful for this, because my life seemed to spiral. After hiking the Trail, I experienced a very dark depression. Even though I knew that this was a common occurrence for people who complete the Trail , I wasn’t prepared. I was more fortunate than I knew to have a yoga studio where I felt welcome, needed, and loved. From there I had a miscarriage and within a month my marriage fell apart. My mental health took a further nosedive. I could barely function, but what I could do was listen to my body, grieve, and go where I was needed. I showed up to yoga classes. I taught my classes. I went running. A lot. I was in a very physically demanding avant garde play, so I went to rehearsals. I wrote and recorded music. For months and months, this is essentially all I did. And it was what I needed. I had the foundation and understanding of a yoga practice that sustained me. It was an intellectual understanding, but there was something deeper — a body-knowing — that helped me to embrace and synthesize what I felt was chaos. I try to share this as much as I can: having the tools in place you need to care for your health before you need them, really need them, is the most incredible gift of preparation you can give yourself. I’m so grateful I already had a yoga practice in place.
I knew that I could go to a class, feel welcome, have structure, be a part of a community simply by being side-by-side with a stranger, and offer myself the love and compassion I was seeking externally. It’s powerful. Despite how much I adored Richmond and a beautiful life I created despite and because of the most difficult time of my life to date, I found myself in Washington, DC. I began practicing in my neighborhood studio and then began teaching there. Never have I ever been a part of such a strong yoga community as I had the joy of being a part of as at Realignment Studio. I was far from healed and I can’t express how much this place and the people in the community gave me life and reminded me that I am worthy of existing. Every step I’ve taken, I have been surrounded by people and experiences who quietly have embraced me and subtly nudged me to “keep going.” When it comes down to it, that’s all I want to accomplish as a yoga teacher. I want my students to keep going.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It hasn’t been a smooth road by any means! We all have our own stories, right? We all carry with us our histories, our insecurities, our embarrassments, our failures. Mine have certainly made me a better and more attentive student. I hope that it’s all made me a better yoga teacher. Since I’ve moved quite a few times in the past six years, I’ve needed to start my yoga teaching practice again and again. I even moved back to Austin at the start of the pandemic in March 2020. Each time I’ve relocated, it’s back to square one. I’ll mention again that I’ve been really fortunate. With every move, I wander into very welcoming environments and find a home everywhere I go. Now I teach virtually. There was one class when my students logged in from DC, Virginia, Maryland, New York, Tennessee, Texas, Arizona, Maine, and Japan. How incredible is that?! They blow me away with their dedication to themselves and their practice. There are some of my students who I only know through virtual classes, but most I know from studios in Austin, Richmond, and DC. It’s been a challenge for everyone adapting to this different form of interaction, but it’s provided so much opportunity. I don’t think I’d have been able to keep up with my students as well or as easily. It’s fantastic to hear their stories about what their practices are like now. How long. With who. Where they are in their homes. What they do to remove distractions and invite themselves to their center. And they keep showing up for themselves and for each other. As I tell them constantly, I am eternally grateful for them.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I think what sets me apart is that I don’t subscribe to “good vibes only.” Life is not only good vibes. The good vibes are lovely and I welcome that kind of joy all the damn time. But that’s not everything. That would be a diminishment of the vast human experience. I’m not a yoga teacher to keep my students from killing my buzz. Rather, there is a concept in yoga called sraddha. It’s faith, confidence, stick-with-it-ness, conviction, investment. Yoga is what we do regardless of whatever fleeting and fickle feeling arises. It’s on our mat, it’s off our mat. It’s “keep going.”
If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
I have grit. Or at least that’s what my mama tells me.
Pricing:
- My livestream classes are on a sliding scale from $2-22
Contact Info:
- Email: hello@practicewithcourtney.com
- Website: https://www.practicewithcourtney.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/practicewithcourtney
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/practicewithcourtney
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/practicecoco
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/practicewithcourtney
Image Credits
Yoga photos by Courtney Hans
