Simon Borg-Olivier: A Masterclass in the Yoga Almost No One Teaches

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IN THIS EPISODE

Aaron sits down with Simon Borg-Olivier, a man whose practice predates most of the modern yoga industry, for a conversation about coming home to natural movement and natural breath. Simon shares the unlikely path that led him from underwater swimming in Malta, to a Tibetan lama in his late teens, to weight training and gymnastics injuries, and finally to a stretch class where an Iyengar substitute teacher changed everything. From there, the conversation turns toward the principles he has spent four decades refining: moving where you don't bend easily, leaving alone the places that already are, and treating your practice as a work-in rather than a workout. Expect to have a few of your assumptions about flexibility, core engagement, breath retention, and even what "advanced" practice looks like gently turned upside down.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

✦ Why hypermobility is not flexibility and why bending where you already bend easily is one of the most common (and quietly damaging) habits in modern yoga

✦ The difference between a workout and a "work-in" and why one leaves you depleted while the other leaves you energised

✦ How Sthira Sukham Āsanam ("firm but calm") translates into the actual mechanics of the abdomen, the diaphragm, and the breath

✦ Why most people are unknowingly stuck in fight-or-flight through chronic abdominal tension and what that does to immunity, digestion, and reproduction

✦ The science (and tradition) of Jālandhara Bandha, head down, neck back, and why it matters for pranayama

✦ Why Simon teaches less stretch, less tension, less breathing, less thinking, less eating and what we gain on the other side of less

✦ The simple Five-Region Reset, fingers/shoulders, neck, pelvis, core, face, that you can drop into any practice, any time, anywhere

TEXTUAL & LINEAGE REFERENCES

✦ Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali — Sthira Sukham Āsanam (II.46), and Simon's note on the Siddhis appearing in the third chapter (Vibhūti Pāda) - a reminder that supernatural breathing is not the first step

✦ The 8 Limbs - Yama, Niyama, Āsana, Prāṇāyāma - and why most of us are still working at the foundation

✦ B.K.S. Iyengar - Simon's first formal yoga path in the early 1980s

✦ Yoga Synergy - co-founded by Simon and Bianca Machliss, one of Australia's oldest yoga schools

Cross-traditional influences - Tibetan teachings received in his late teens, Japanese Aikido, and Chinese Qigong and martial arts woven into his Five-Dimensional Flow framework

FIND SIMON

Website → https://simonborgolivier.com

Membership (free + paid tiers) → https://healthhappinesslongevity.co

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Website: OmSom.yoga

We operate a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, Australia, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. We'd love to connect with you wherever you are on your journey.

HARI OM