My Story

Who is Divine Yoga?

I am a Mum

Here is my story.

When I reached my early twenties, taking care of my body and regularly exercising became very important to me. I started my fitness instructor journey, at the same time as starting my career in the Television Industry. At that time in my life, I was living in London and exercise was a hobby and something that came second to TV. My goal was to work my way up the ranks to Line Producer, someone who was in charge of everything however I was going to the gym so often I thought, why not train to become a fitness instructor? And so I did. In 2008, I completed by L2 Exercise to Music and very soon after, completed the training for Les Mills Body Pump and RPM (I was a massive Les Mills fan!)

In 2010, I made the decision to travel to Australia with a working holiday visa. Before I travelled, I completed my L3 Personal Training Certificate as I thought it would be a good idea to continue to teach my classes but also work as a PT. Well I didn't do my research well - everyone was a PT in Sydney! I soon found myself working back in Television and what followed was nearly eight years of fantastic, career enhancing experiences. I stopped teaching and focused on the TV career and worked my way up to Supervising Production Manager. It was in Sydney, a few months after arriving, I found Yoga or perhaps Yoga found me. For five years I practised and for five years I was able to breath and to move. I became more grounded, more flexible and more open. In 2015, I signed up for my 200 hrs Yoga Teaching Certificate and haven't looked back since. I had never contemplated doing yoga before moving to Sydney, because I thought it was for the older generation and boring! How wrong I was?!

I completed my training and taught classes in Sydney for a few years but still TV was the focus and that very much took over. In 2018, a calling bought me back to the UK and so I packed up my Aussie life, sold everything and returned. I dabbled in a bit of TV but I didn't want to live in London as my Father became unwell so I started working at a local club as a PT and fitness instructor. I started teaching Body Pump, RPM, Yoga again and every other class I could and then when I needed a little more, I retrained in Health and Safety, working in that Industry for a few years. I had my daughter in 2018 and a bout of Post Natal Depression stopped me from teaching. I had a break and focused on my H&S position however as we all know 2020/ 2021 had something big in store for us and for me personally, some rather unpleasant life experiences. Early 2021, my Grandfather passed away, and then unexpectedly my Dad passed, 10 days later. If that wasn’t enough, in the April we lost my father-in-law. At a similar time, I was approached about returning to TV. People were working remotely and successfully making shows, something that was unheard of in the past. I decided to make the transition back to what I knew so well and to distract myself from life’s little challenges. During all of this time, I was missing teaching. I have always loved helping others and improving their strength and technique so when another opportunity came up at the end of 2022, I took it and returned to teaching. The TV work was okay and I ended up being a Line Producer and fulfilling my goal. I enjoyed it to an extent but it was stressful and quite a negative environment to work in. I found myself frustrated all the time and doing it just for the income and not doing it because I really wanted to. It became difficult to get work and for the first time in my career, I was fighting for positions and being unsuccessful. Doors kept being closed when before they were open. I soon realised there was a reason for this. I was being steered into a different direction, one I was destined to follow from the very beginning!

And so here I am. Divine Yoga was created.

When I started practising yoga in Sydney, the studio I pretty much lived at was where I carried out my yoga training. They had a strong emphasis on alignment and technique and my teachings are the same. Correct alignment is the foundation of every posture and without it you have the potential for injury. This is one of the reasons why I have been called to create Divine Yoga so I can bring my knowledge to others.

I have decided to leave the TV world behind. Cut my ties and pursue what I am supposed to do - help others. I am passionate about yoga, about teaching correct alignment and about sharing my knowledge, making others stronger, more flexible and just as passionate as me.

I look forward to meeting you on my journey.

Gemma xox