Blog - Pragya Bhatt | yogawithpragya

Yoga: A Gem for Women (Book Review)

November 19, 2025

Supta Baddhakonasana from Yoga: A Gem for Women

If you’re a yoga practitioner, chances are you’ve come across Yoga: A Gem for Women. It’s a book that most women yoga practitioners turn to, even if they are from other lineages.

There’s no single comprehensive resource that helps women understand how yoga can support fertility, pregnancy, postpartum recovery, and beyond. Reading this book when I was exploring my own health and trying to find solutions changed this book for me. It gave me a softer view of a woman’s health and taught me to gave me a holistic view of how yoga nurtures women through all of it.

If you’ve followed my fitness journey, you know the long story of my unexplained infertility. I’ve spoken extensively about how yoga and other alternative healing methodologies helped me during that time. That’s when I turned to Yoga: A Gem for Women again, hoping to find a solution and some solace.

When Agi Wittich started a book club to read Gem again, I decided this was the perfect time to read the book cover to cover, something I hadn’t done before. Agi, herself a yoga practitioner, has also been influenced deeply by Geeta Iyengar’s teachings. You can watch our conversation about her pregnancy and postpartum experience, and the influence of yoga on her life.

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RIMYI Experiences

Reclaiming the Teacher Within

November 8, 2025

This is the last night of the workshop. As always, I feel like I’m taking a lot back with me – things I may not even be aware of yet, but that will manifest themselves in my practice, my studies and in my life.

Something I really like about classes at RIMYI is that they aren’t so much about learning asanas, but about the wisdom woven into the teachings. Students often ask

How do I practice?

How do I know I’m doing it right?

How do I sequence?

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Postpartum Pregnancy/Parenting Notes RIMYI Experiences Wellness

The Pigeon

November 7, 2025

A pigeon, symbolizing motherhood and calm reflection.

There’s a pigeon who has laid eggs outside the window of my bathroom. Every time I open the door of the bathroom, no matter how quietly, she gets disturbed. I feel bad, acutely. When I was shown into this room Dheeraj told me they noticed the eggs for the first time when they came back from Diwali break, and they didn’t have the heart to push them out. Every time the pigeon flutters in alarm and walks away from her eggs I feel an ache in my heart. I know how the pigeon feels. I don’t want to be responsible for its fear, I want it to know her eggs are safe.

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RIMYI Experiences Yoga

Day 1: A Full Day of Practice and Learning

November 7, 2025

For many students who have come to this workshop, this is their first time. Students have come from as far away as Surat – a testament to their commitment to growth and Iyengar yoga. Their enthusiasm is awesome.

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Books Postpartum RIMYI Experiences

Back to the Mothership – RIMYI After 7 Years

November 6, 2025

Back to the Source

In 2019, on my last trip to the Iyengar Yoga institute in Pune, I would have never thought it would take me 6 years to come back to the Iyengar institute in Pune. Over the years many visitors I was in touch with have told me about the changes – there’s a new entrance, even a waiting area. The old order (Pandurang Sir), has given way to the new.

A pandemic and a baby later, here I am, back in Pune’s verdant climes awaiting the commencement of the weekend workshop at the Iyengar Yoga Institute in Pune.

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Temple Tours Travels

Shri Mahaveerji Jain Temple: A Family Pilgrimage

November 6, 2025

Shri Mahaveerji Jain Temple in Karauli, Rajasthan in the evening.

I’ve visited very few Jain religious sites, the most notable being my visit to Shravanbelagola. A few months ago I also got the chance to visit the Shri Mahaveerji temple in the Karauli district of Rajasthan, another important Jain pilgrimage site.

The temple is regarded as a Digambar Jain Atishaya Kshetra, which means signifying a miraculous site within the Digambar Jain tradition. Lord Mahaveer, the 24th tirthankara (an enlightened spiritual teacher who has conquered the cycle of birth and death), is the principal deity here.

The Road to Mahaveerji

…began with a plan.

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Kena Upanishad Yoga & Vedanta Philosophy

Uma Devi: A Feminine Light for Navratri

October 8, 2025

The Kena Upanishad

We’re almost done studying the Kena Upanishad in my Vedanta class. The Kena Upanishad is the third upanishad we’re reading (after the Katha and Mundaka) and the 5th Vedantic text (including the Bhagavad Gita and Tattvabodha). This text delves into the nature of Brahman, and through the dialogue format common to Hindu scriptures, helps the reader understand that the Self is Brahman. For the last few weeks we’ve been discussing a story that comes in the third canto of the text. It’s a story about the demi gods becoming proud of their strength after winning a battle. In this story the Guru appears as a woman, Uma Devi. This story is relevant during Navratri, when we worship the various manifestations of Durga. I was also pleasantly surprised to find a literary example of a female Guru.

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Yoga & Vedanta Philosophy

3 Lessons From 5 Years of Vedanta Study

October 8, 2025

On the walls of te Sringeri Matha temple.

My Vedanta Journey So Far

I’ve been studying Vedanta since 2020, when I began my master’s program, which is where I met my teacher. The first text we studied was Tattvabodha, then the Bhagawad Gita…and a couple of Upanishads later, we’re now almost done with the Kena Upanishad. My Vedanta study is in the guru-shishya style – Subhadra ma’am is a direct disciple of Swami Dayananda Saraswati, and she teaches us just like she learned from him. When she asked me to start teaching, her directive to me was the same – teach everything I’ve taught, just like I’ve taught you. Learning in this style is slow but steady. Brahman, Aatma, guru etc are some of the the cornerstones of Vedantic philosophy, and my understanding of these ideas continues to evolve as I deepen my studies.

Subhadra ma’am often says that the subject of Vedanta is the Self. Everything we study, every concept, every story is relevant to our experience as human beings. Once this is clear, then Vedanta becomes a lived subject. Here are a few concepts that are the cornerstones of the Vedantic path. These concepts form just a small part of what we explore in class, and I know my grasp of them will continue to mature as the study unfolds.

Three Key Lessons from My Vedanta Journey

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Asana Postpartum

Durga’s Strength: A Navratri Reflection on Yoga Practice

September 30, 2025

A picture a student sent to me depicting Durga in all her glory.

The Various Seasons of Yoga

I’d love to say that now, when my daughter is one and a half, I have a fixed routine for yoga practice. Pre-pregnancy I would wake up at 4.30 to practice. Now those days seem like ancient history. Today my days are a disorganised mix of teaching, practice, working out, trying to get a full night’s sleep, writing, school runs…I’m grateful I can practice with some regularity, but often pine for those days when I turned in at 9 and woke up at 4.30, ready to give my practice my all.

I have started attending RIMYI online classes again, a practice that feels especially grounding during Navratri. More often then I’d like, I end up following along with the pre-recorded Iyengar yoga sessions. I’d love to say it’s an hour and a half I have to myself, a time when I can immerse myself in the yoga. But the truth is Kalindi often joins me on the mat, and wants to type on the keyboard or play with the TV remote. She clings to my legs when I’m in downward dog, or lies down on the mat, making me want to cuddle with her. Often I find myself speeding through a class to avoid interruptions.

This morning’s class was a restorative session, and at the end of the class when we were lying in supta baddhakonasana with our arms stretched out and chests wide open, Raya spoke about Navratri, drawing our attention to Durga’s strength. What he said was perhaps the most relevant thing I’ve heard in a long time.

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Asana Postpartum Pregnancy/Parenting Notes Prenatal Wellness

Yoga Teacher Rosa Santana on Supporting Mothers and Other Insights

September 23, 2025

Beautiful Rosa with her beautiful daughters.

Motherhood and Yoga: Lessons from Rosa Santana

In my continuing quest to understand motherhood and become a better-informed parent, I’ve been reaching out to yoga teachers who can shed light on this path for me. Recently, I had an illuminating conversation with Rosa Santana, a mother of three daughters and a lifelong yoga practitioner.

“You never stop being a mother,” she says. Her own journey is inspiring—she was a gym rat long before she stepped into yoga, and she took her first yoga class while six months pregnant. She admits it was a terrible experience at the time. Up until then, she had taught step aerobics, which gave her fitness discipline but didn’t prepare her body for the nuances of pregnancy.

My Key Takeaways From My Conversation with Rosa

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