Chase Bossart has devoted over 20 years to living and teaching therapeutic yoga in the tradition of Sri Krishnamacharya/Viniyoga. First introduced to Yoga as part of a study abroad program in Chennai, India in 1991, Chase became hooked on its simple yet profound teachings and returned repeatedly to study with Mr. TKV Desikachar at the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram in Chennai. Eventually spending more than 4 years in Chennai studying the therapeutic application of yoga, Chase strives to make yoga available to populations that do not normally have access to it.

“As a philosophy major in college, I went on a study abroad program to India,” Chase said. “One of the courses was Yoga Theory and it just happened to be taught by Mr. TKV Desikachar. Though I knew almost nothing about yoga before the trip, I became completely absorbed by the clear, concise and simple answers that Yoga has for life’s most knotty questions. Yoga not only describes who we are, what our relationship with the world is and why we suffer, but it also gives great advice about what to do about it! I was hooked and have spent the rest of my life delving into it.”

Founder of the Yoga Well Institute and Co-Founder of Yoga As Therapy, North America (YATNA), Chase trains yoga teachers, therapists and health practitioners how to modify movement, breathing and attention techniques to meet the individual capacities and needs of each student. The idea of viniyoga is that all the tools of yoga be adapted to the individual’s capabilities and needs and then developed gradually over time at a pace appropriate for each student. This individualized approach to practicing and teaching yoga is essential if the student is to realize the full potential of yoga practice for healing, self-discovery and personal transformation.  Chase applies this approach to help even severely affected people to participate in their own healing.

Chase believes that understanding the traditional world-view/philosophical perspective of yoga is important and strives to make these ideas easily digestible and applicable to everyday modern life.

“It is easily observable that different experiences during the day affect us mentally, physically and emotionally,” Chase says. “For instance we react to the same road very differently with traffic than we do when it is without traffic. Similarly, different Yoga techniques also affects us in different ways (for instance, inhale speeds up the heartbeat while exhale slows it down). So, Yoga is really just a (serious) game of conscious linking in which techniques are intentionally engineered experiences. If we have an understanding of how experiences influence the way our bodies, minds, emotions, etc. are functioning then we can use all kinds of different experiences to encourage healing. It is not only endlessly fascinating, but unlimited in its applications.”

With extensive experience in the therapeutic application of yoga, Chase travels frequently to present workshops and trainings on a wide range of yoga and yoga therapy topics. Chase also regularly develops yoga interventions for scientific research and formerly served as the Director of Therapy and Education at the Healing Yoga Foundation in San Francisco. Based in California, Chase has an M.A. in Religious Studies from UC Santa Barbara, where he focused on Indian philosophy and wrote his thesis on Patanjali's Yogasutra.  He is a faculty member for the Loyola Marymount University's Yoga Therapy Rx Program.