Sandipani S Manur

Sandeep’s tryst with movement-art began with Judo . He went on to learn many martial arts such as Taekwondo, Kick-boxing and Muay-Thai. He connected with Kung-Fu as a way of life when he started learning it traditionally. During this phase, he was initiated into Oriental mysticism – Vajrayana Buddhism, Zen, and Taoism. By his teens, he began participating in several martial arts tournaments. The physical rigour involved brought him to his first yoga class to find physical, emotional and mental healing. His first interaction with yoga was when his teacher asked him to learn yogic practices to complement his martial arts training at the age of 14.  

 

Soon, he began to explore different styles of yoga and their underlying principles with teachers from Bangalore, Mysore, Pune, Rishikesh, Chennai, and Himachal Pradesh and practised Vinyasa Krama, Ashtanga Vinyasa, Iyengar, Hatha Yoga and Tantra. All of these showed him the tremendous diversity in the understanding and practice of yoga and he understood that all styles were different routes to the same destination. To complement his eastern studies, he looked to western understanding of the mind and body by studying western psychology, anatomy and physiology. His main interest lies at the intersection of eastern and western sciences. Apart from his technical qualifications he has a Bachelor's degree in Psychology and masters in Yogic science.

 

It was while he was working as a networks and security expert, that he decided to pursue his calling to be a yoga teacher. He realised the infinite potential contained in his perception of human consciousness, which could be applied through yoga teaching. He then started teaching yoga fulltime- first to those around him, and then expanded to teaching diverse groups of people, companies and institutions, one-on-one personal classes, and workshops. In 2011, he was one of the founding teachers of the then-largest chain of yoga studios in Bangalore, called a1000Yoga. 

 

In 2014, he founded Amrutha Bindu Yoga with his student, Medha, as a boutique yoga studio to build a community around traditional yoga practice and make it accessible to everybody. He now oversees curriculum, teaching methods, operational initiatives and quality management. Amrutha Bindu Yoga is  partnered with yoga schools in India and abroad, he travels frequently to train and mentor founders and teachers at those schools.

 

Sandeep believes that Yoga is about understanding one’s true self. He seeks to apply yogic practices for therapy, wholesome fitness, lifestyle & psychological counselling, mentoring and sadhana in order to help people understand their true selves.