About Izumi Sato
Izumi in California, USA
Izumi Sato is a lifelong adventurer and practitioner of yoga who loves to explore the art of sharing happiness and freedom with others.
She is dedicated to empowering her students to find their potential and grow their ability to learn from their own experiences.
By looking into the body, mind, and heart, we can develop in expressing joy and love.
Izumi brings many years of studying devotional classical dance in India, learning Bharatanatyam under Padma Bhushan Guru Saroja Vaidyanathan, into her teachings.
Her studies in classical dance and music in India, her MA in Dance Education at the University of Hawaii, and an additional BA in Cultural Anthropology in Kyoto, Japan, makes Izumi deeply practiced in her offerings.
Over 20 years of performing and teaching dance, Izumi specializes in the energetic arts of mudra (hand) gestures, the flow of movement and stillness, and in cultivating the space to be nonjudgmental when exploring the body-mind.
Her yogic journey started in 2000 at a conference near the sacred waters in Himachal Pradesh, India.
In 2013 she began diving into yoga teaching and offers flow-based yoga classes, from gentle to power, creating meditative classes for everyone.
Her devotion and wide research into the Ramayana led her to be a part of Mount Madonna’s Ramayana production as a choreographer, teaching Bharatanatyam since 2018.
Izumi pours love into various communities throughout the United States, visiting schools and juvenile detention centers to educate and empower children to accept and celebrate differences.
She knows that planting seeds of appreciation toward all world cultures and people is how we will live harmoniously, shaping a world that rejoices in our interconnection.
Izumi supports Tibetan Children Education Foundation.
Experienced Registered Yoga Teacher 500
E-RYT 500 with
10 years / 3300+ hours of teaching yoga.
Offering Group classes at Breathe Together Yoga, 49ers Fit, Visa, and Apple.
Izumi's Journey
Hawaii
Connecting with students, developing curriculums for teaching at university and lesson plans for Shakuntala theater at high school, training students for the public performance as she taught Bharatanatyam at the University of Hawaii, Manoa where she earned a Master degree in dance focused on education with her Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholarship.
India
Dedication and focus on studying Bharatanatyam, a classical dance, expression of heart, mind, and body as an offering to the divines let her live in India for 7 years. She is grateful for the bliss and love of her guru, Padma Bhushan Saroja Vaidyanathan, and for the support and scholarship from the Indian government.
She also had a focused interest in researching Ramayana in India and around Asia.
Japan
Izumi's heart connects to her home in Shizuoka where she grew up with a nature-loving and liberal family near the foot of Mount Fuji and in Kyoto where she erupted her curiosity for learning about people in various cultures around the world, Cultural Anthropology during her undergraduate study.