Gaja Yoga Mind & Soul

As the owner and lead trainer of Gaja Yoga, Mind & Soul Düzce

My name is Sermin Bas-Bakirci and i was born and raised in Austria as a child of Turkish immigrants. In 2015 i moved to Turkey and started to work on my dream of a Yoga Studio, which became reality two years ago.

Gaja-Yoga is one of the leading Yoga Studios in the northwest area of Turkey. My success is due to my open communication with my students and the fact that i was socialized in Europe and have different cultural backgrounds and views. My experiences in life and teachings help me a lot too. For example: I was a professional handball player in Austria and coached my own team. I always believed that the right spirit amoung teammates brings success and i still believe this. For me as the owner and lead trainer of Gaja Yoga it is very important to teach my students that they can achieve anything if they believe in it. I want them to find an answer deep within themselves to the question of who am i? So that they can find peace in their mind and soul.

This can be achieved with different methods.

Very important at my studio is knowledge. Various booklets introduce the students to different topics like History of Yoga, Baghavad Gita, Yoga Sutras, Sanskrit terms and mantras, physiology and anatomy and so on. They not only learn them by themselves, we are always in a process of discussion and development altogether. This way we can also learn from each other.

Furthermore I work with the Asana book. I think the atmosphere in the studio must be special so mediating the teachings and leading the poses can happen in an environment of ease and calm. As a method I also let my students lead. This way they can experience the strength and the ability they have within themselves. Sometimes I let them work together in pairs or let one student lead the whole group. Besides the teachings and the poses themselves, I also think that daily meditations and pranayama techniques are very valuable, so they accompany the  whole process.

All my efforts are not only to educate people about Yoga, my goal is to introduce them to the power of Yoga, through which everybody can live a healthy and happy life.