Beryl Bender Birch, author and activist, graduated from Syracuse University with a degree in English and Philosophy and has been an avid student of classical yoga & Buddhism since l971.  She spent 4 months in India in l974, with her Jain teacher, Munishree Chitrabhanu, to further her studies of the Eastern Wisdom traditions.  She is the founder/director of The Hard & The Soft Yoga Institute, a prestigious and nationally recognized Yoga Alliance accredited school, that has been training yoga and meditation teachers since l980 and, more recently, is offering global online teacher training.  Beryl is a certified yoga therapist with the International Association of Yoga Therapists and the co-founder and board chair of the Give Back Yoga Foundation.  She is also the best-selling author of many books on yoga, including Beyond Power Yoga and Yoga for Warriors. Her current online yoga studio, Just This, is a refuge for yogis seeking peace, community, and connection.