Celebrating
PIONEERS
OF POWER:
15 YEARS
38
april 2019yogajournal.com.auHOW POWER LIVING WENT FROM HUMBLE BEGINNINGS
TO AUSTRALIA’S MOST ABUNDANT YOGA COMMUNITY
RUNNING ANY YOGA studio for 15 years is
cause for great celebration. But Power
Living is not your average yoga studio.
Navigating their way through a changing
yoga landscape for well over a decade,
they now have eight studios around
Australia with over 12,000 students
practicing each week. Power Living has
undeniably been a pioneer of modern
yoga, contributing in many ways to the
way Australasia recognises and practices
Power Yoga today - and for good reason.
Power Living’s Founder Duncan Peak
is not your average yogi. You’ve likely
seen countless images of his impressive
inversions and maybe wondered if all that
yoga stardom has gone to his head. But
Dunx (as he’s affectionately known) is
known for smashing stereotypes, and
continues to walk his talk, never
forgetting his humble beginnings. Peak
began his own teaching journey in his
late twenties, teaching donation classes
to his friends at the local surf lifesaving
club. Challenging stereotypes of yoga as a
peace, love and mungbeans practice, hebrought new strength, courage and a
creative vision to shape what Power Yoga
has become.
By 2004, Peak had opened his first
official studio and now, 15 years later,
heads Australia’s largest and most
successful yoga community. Starting
with Neutral Bay’s longest standing
Power Yoga studio and then on to a
series of eight studios with an abundance
of daily classes across Sydney,
Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. Power
Living was also the first of its kind in
Australasia to create a successful teacher
training program, transforming the lives
of thousands of graduates globally
through its 200hr-500hr YTTs.Building Australia’s biggest
yoga communitySo how does one become an innovator of
modern yoga, you ask? According to
Peak, by working hard! In the beginning
he was teaching up to 18 classes a week
and running the studio whilst workingfull-time as a business consultant. But
despite working 70 plus hours a week
and sometimes even sleeping on the
studio floor before an early morning
class, Peak felt plugged-in, leading by
example, staying inspired and
continuing to train and learn from his
own masterful teachers. He says, “It
started from wanting to share how yoga
had helped me find a lot of inner peace,
mental and physical health and greater
connection to life.”
As Peak observed the practices and
stereotypes of yoga, he saw both the
demand for more powerful, flowing
styles of yoga and the need to expand
ideas around who yoga is for. Whilst
developing Power Living’s power vinyasa
style, he was also at the forefront of
expanding the idea of what yoga (and
hence what a yogi) is. Yoga, he believed,
could benefit every body, helping with
everything from weight-loss and
improved physical strength to more
mindfulness in daily life and a deeper
relationship with one’s self. He took