Today we’d like to introduce you to Kenna Crouch.
Hi Kenna, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstories with our readers?
I grew up dancing in the San Francisco Bay Area, then attended UC San Diego, majoring in Dance and Sociology. Toward the end of college, I began to dance professionally with the Patricia Rincon Dance Collective, performing and teaching locally in San Diego as well as internationally in Europe and South America. Parallel to my dance career, I began to study and teach Yoga, a natural complement to my dancing and a rich addition to my budding career. Barre fitness classes were also on-trend at the time (this was the late 2000s, early 2010s), so I jumped in quick to lend my technical dance expertise and expand my business offerings.
Regarding Dance, my areas of study include Ballet, Jazz, and Contemporary forms. The Yoga lineages I have studied are Hatha, Anusara, Vinyasa, and Katonah, as well as Yoga Therapy, combining to well over 1,000 hours of study and many more hours of teaching. A big point of pride in what I do is that I can make the material accessible to literally anyone because it is truly a practice for everyone. In addition to classes, both group and private, I have led workshops, immersions, teacher training, and retreats. I have been a lead teacher in my community, mentoring and supporting other teachers in refining their skills to offer Yoga, Barre, and Dance as empowering and healing.
After a decade-plus of teaching in countless studio, resort, and corporate spaces, things changed in 2020 when the pandemic hit and I got pregnant. Lots of my teaching shifted to outdoors and online. This has been a blessing, as I have been able to transition to mainly working from my home and computer, making my independent business more robust while also transitioning into Motherhood and full self-employment.
I currently offer weekly classes from my outdoor home studio in Leucadia plus virtual options, making what I offer more accessible and sustainable for all involved. Future plans include more international travel to teach and study, plus a diverse online library of everything that I teach: Yoga, Barre, Sculpt & Dance. This will be the basis of my Embodiment Membership and an additional launchpad to further programming such as retreats, immersions, and teacher trainings. The future is a hybrid of both in-person and online education and movement opportunities.
At the end of the day, my goal is to facilitate joy and health in people’s day-to-day lives through the art and science of Yoga and Dance on both the personal and communal levels.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
In retrospect, the journey has been progressive but not without its bumps in the road. The main difficulty for most anyone working in the Arts or Wellness is financial viability. Culturally, there is a shift happening, but it is too slow. Professional dancing does not afford one to live generally in coastal Southern California without additional income streams, so teaching Yoga and Barre has been crucial to my ability to continue in this career path.
It is extremely valuable to be a teacher in a studio community as it opens doors and expands your network. It can, however, be grueling and anyone in the industry has experienced burnout from teaching multiple sessions in a day and driving around to different locations. For me, the antidote to burnout has been prioritizing my own practice, travel for creative inspiration, and a determined mindset to not settle for less than my worth. Of course, to get there, I had to put in the time and stay humble. Eventually, I built a positive, professional reputation and following, which enabled me to negotiate fair pay and then branch off to more independent work in which I am truly my own boss with all the freedom that that affords.
Teachers and (non-commercial) artists do some of the most important and inspirational work in this world, yet pay and more generally respect are lacking for too many. This is the biggest challenge to be surmounted to this day and I hope my successes and continual advocacy for those in my profession help to advance this career and put it on par with others. What we do is a special mixture of business, education, performance, and therapy and it deserves the value and recognition that can solidify it as a smart career path that not only earns well but helps others. This is what I believe our world needs.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
My unique background in Dance has given me a technical prowess that my students seek out. I possess a deep understanding of the body, anatomy, and biomechanics, so my specialty is teaching from this perspective, which keeps one’s practice safe, functional, and dynamic. I also love language and ideas, so the body of philosophy that comes with Yoga is something I have always loved to incorporate into my teaching. This is what helps many apply what they learn about themselves in class to their daily lives, making what I offer holistic and integrative.
I am known for the balance of strength and grace I bring to my teaching. I see each unique person before me and make him/her feel a part of something greater. I help my students access spirituality without preaching or dogma. I help them relate to Greater Nature while also discovering what is important to them and their individual journey.
I am most proud of the fact that I have worked with such diverse subsets of the human population—teens, working professionals, moms, athletes, seniors, and female parolees—to name a few. Everyone is looking for the same thing in the end: to feel included, to be well physically, mentally, and emotionally, to embrace change, and find peace in a chaotic world. What sets me apart from others in what I do is that I teach people to move, think and relate to themselves and others in ways that encompass but go well beyond just fitness. My students come to me because they know the full package is there: body, mind, and heart. There is a wellspring to tap into and the right guide is instrumental in making that experience accessible, safe, and life-changing.
Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
Movement makes me happy! Self-expression. Creativity. Community. I am a people person who also loves the personal, bodily experience.
I also adore animals because they teach us, unconditional love.
I am inspired by Mother Nature’s beauty and resilience.
I love anything that sparks my senses and gives that vibrancy of feeling alive and in the moment: good music, quality food, physical contact, and intelligent conversation.
I love to learn, read, write, converse, and relate; all of this is brain-stimulating and propels my creativity.
My family, friends, students, husband, and baby make me happy because they are my reason for being on this planet and doing what I do.
Pricing:
- Drop-in class outdoors: $20
- Zoom class: $15
- Private: starting at $125/hour
- Monthly all-inclusive online: $100
- Other: case by case
Contact Info:
- Email: kennacrouchembodies@gmail.com
- Website: www.kennacrouch.com
- Instagram: @kenna_embody
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kenna.crouch.9
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCR2Hlv6djTY8RXezMgNloQA
Image Credits
ToeSox
Micaela Malmi
Alessandro Sigismondi
