How to Teach Breathwork Safely and Effectively: A Guide for Yoga Teachers
As a yoga teacher you may know that a single pranayama, or breathwork session can shift someone from fight-or-flight to deep calm in minutes. But when

Co-founder of ISHTA Yoga and a teacher of teachers for two decades, Sarah leads every Gaja yoga program with depth, precision, and heart.
Sarah Platt-Finger, E-RYT, is Gaja Collective’s Director of Yoga Programs and the lead teacher of its Yoga & Breathwork Teacher Training and 300-Hour Yoga Teacher Training. She is the co-founder of ISHTA Yoga in New York City, which she established in 2008 with Yogiraj Alan Finger. ISHTA, the Integrated Science of Hatha, Tantra, and Ayurveda, blends alignment-based flow with breathwork, kriya, meditation, mantra, mudra, and visualization.
A gymnast as a child and later a student of Chi Gong and Tai Chi during three years in Taiwan, Sarah completed her 500-hour certification in the ISHTA lineage in 2004 and was initiated as a Yoga Master in 2013. As ISHTA’s Teacher Training Director she built its New York program and expanded it to London, Sweden, Germany, Japan, and Australia, and she served as Managing Director of its two New York studios.
Sarah is the co-author of Living in the Light: Yoga for Self-Realization (2023), and for many years served as the private yoga teacher to one of the world’s best-known voices in mind-body medicine. She has directed yoga programs for a leading wellness education company, is a Lululemon legacy ambassador and a Yoga Gives Back ambassador, and serves on the board of Exhale to Inhale, a nonprofit bringing trauma-informed yoga to survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault.
At Gaja, Sarah leads the 200-hour and 300-hour yoga teacher trainings, guides students through Gaja Yoga Foundations and The 7 Spiritual Laws of Yoga, and hosts live experiences such as Embody the Sun. She lives in Boca Raton, Florida, and teaches weekly online classes.







As a yoga teacher you may know that a single pranayama, or breathwork session can shift someone from fight-or-flight to deep calm in minutes. But when
Key Takeaways How to open the heart chakra safely requires a trauma-informed approach that prioritizes nervous system regulation, self-awareness,
Ask yoga teachers from different traditions how many poses are in Sun Salutation and in what order, and you might get different answers. Classical
Live seminars are for enrolled students; Studio classes are open to members. All live online.