Kate Robinson asks hard questions.
Writer, poet, mother, trauma-informed slow flow, prenatal, meditation and yoga nidra expert, Kate Robinson is one of Boston's best-known teachers and podcasters.
Renowned for creating a shame-free and at times goofy space for students to try new things and make mistakes, Kate’s classes are unique, strong, incisive and kind. Her MFA, chapbooks, and publications in national literary journals explain why she is one of Down Under's favorite orators and a voice of the Unrolled Yoga Podcast. As a yoga researcher and advisor with both Brigham and Mt Auburn hospitals with prenatal and post-surgical clients, Kate’s focus was honed by years of training as a Division 1 Track & Field Athlete throwing the Hammer and her own experience with PTSD and addiction.
We invited her to speak about her new leadership position and the unrelenting havoc she has created at Down Under.
"Emerging from Teacher Training well over a decade ago, I saw zero plus-size teachers. I met so many studio owners who confessed they weren't ready for 'fat yoga teachers on staff'.
In a sea of super able-bodied, thin, wealthy, white narcissism/voyeurism, I made a point of teaching yoga for larger bodies, those in recovery, high risk, underserved folks and anyone who did not fit the mould or believes yoga is more than a vehicle for aesthetic improvement.
I've developed a reputation for questioning the very mechanics by which yoga is brought to the “consumer”.
The management at Down Under has always welcomed my mouthiness, and quite frankly, celebrated it.
I make a lot of noise as an employee and asked for radical internal changes from the hiring of a more diverse faculty and initiation of scholarships, to profit-sharing on faculty workshops and the shedding of any in-studio idolatry pointing to Pattabhi Jois or other male Indian gurus. In each instance I was eventually heard. When I exited an unhealthy marriage with a 1 year old, no car or home, Justine loaned me the keys to her car, rearranged my schedule and helped me launch mediation and yoga nidra offerings at Down Under which ensured I earned more during the pandemic than before.
Down Under folks are always examining and exchanging opinions on our industry and the model we are trying, albeit imperfectly to create.
I’m the one yelling about how Capitalism and yoga are fundamentally at odds: in our desire to make yoga accessible, we drive the price of a yoga class down which then fights against our desire to value our teachers’ time and is still too expensive for some. I want us to engage in critical debate around how we position ourselves as teachers and as space holders, to look around and ask who is not here or who is not talking much.
Who is not teaching here, or practicing here and why is it not more urgent for us to ask for more from the people who can give it.
This is a studio that clearly values its teachers and we as teachers value the managers and our students. So there has to be the possibility that our students who are able to afford a level of sustaining support can help those who can’t afford yoga to access our offerings.
Down Under has made radical improvements. What is so unique about Down Under is the quality of thought amongst our yoga teachers. So we have this really cool melting pot of doctors, artists, activists, parents, writers, academics, musicians, leaders in different professional industries, all coming together with the shared vision that yoga is more than just acrobatics. It’s more than being a brand “ambassador” or an influencer.
We have cool original thinkers as opposed to yoga sycophants. That is part of what makes us great as a faculty- that I’m sitting across from Didi, an orthopedic surgeon who can cut someone open or Tristan who’s an literary editor, potter and horse-lover, Claire who is a professor or Sabbi who just added her Master in Yoga philosophy to her Doctorate in Philosophy, Stephen who counsels Vets on trauma or Ashley who is championing racial justice. The list goes on and on.
I just don’t YET see this level of critical thought from other studios.
Down Under is a group of wildly diverse colleagues who come from different lineages, traditions and backgrounds. We are a moving tapestry of post-modern yoga and our expertise, class offerings and our teacher training program are solid. We involve many voices and promote plurality of critical thought which is necessary in the industry.
The fact that we all have one foot in the “house-holding” and professional world and another in our spiritual passion makes this group really frickin’ cool. Rather that being competitive with each other, everyone is coming from the fullness of their adulthood, and the confidence of ourselves as human beings, not teaching-logos. That internal maturity allows us to come to the table willing to take constructive criticism and willing to give it respectfully.
Our teachers are skilled and compassionate enough to imagine themselves in someone else’s shoes and that's a huge reason I want to be in this company.
I'm giving birth in a couple of months and after that I’m hoping to go to law school. How will I juggle it all and teach yoga? I’ll do it because I’m at Down Under and we'll just work creatively together until we find a way to make it work.
