Shayna Skarf

Her love affair began in 1999. Stationed in Mumbai as a service corps educator, she fell for the meticulous alignment and props (rope wall!) of Iyengar yoga. In Boston, New York, and London her practice deepened and yoga gradually shifted from peripheral hobby to central focus. Through international moves, career shifts, pregnancy, childbirth and graduate school, yoga remained her touchstone. In 2007 when Shayna attended her first Forrest Yoga class with Erica Mather in New York City, she was struck by the transformative power of Forrest’s modern system. After completing a PhD in English Literature in 2012 and teaching for several years at universities, Shayna recognized her true calling as a yoga teacher. She completed her first teacher training with Ana Forrest in 2014 (RYT-200), a year-long Mentorship Program with Erica Mather in 2015, and the Advanced Forrest Yoga Teacher Training at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in 2017. Shayna’s classes are designed to keep students breathing and feeling while safely exploring their edges. Meticulous sequencing, hands-on assists, and physical and emotional insights infuse every class that she teaches. She focuses, first and foremost, on deep breathing, alignment, fortifying the core, and taking care of oneself. Her classes balance active sequences with sustained postures to safely build strength and flexibility in the body. Shayna enjoys working with all levels, ages and shapes and firmly believe yoga is for everyBODY. She considers this transformative work to be not only a profession, but a sacred calling and is honored to share the gifts of Forrest Yoga with her students. In addition to Forrest Yoga, Shayna teaches Vinyasa, Hatha, Prenatal and Postnatal Yoga.