Yoga and skateboarding are very different, yet so very alike. Both practices require effort, focus, balance, and a desire for improvement.

One of the key differences between yoga and skateboarding, however, is the instruction. Skateboarding instruction comes from watching and rewatching videos, and then going out to wage war on your own knees; whereas yogic instruction is delivered by a friendly, peaceful person who wants nothing more than to teach you how to love and appreciate your knees and every other part of your physical and spiritual being. One such teacher is Kyle Miller. Kyle has been teaching people to bend themselves into pretzels while smiling for well over a decade, and Jonah, one of her students, asked pro skater Alex Olson (also a student) if he wouldn’t mind interviewing her for this issue. He didn’t mind. Om Shanti.

First off, who are you? Where are you from?

I’m Kyle Miller and I’m from Santa Monica, California, and Alex, I love you so much. I’m a yoga teacher, a breathwork teacher, a human being…

Spiritual practitioner?

Spiritual practitioner. Yes.

That’s cool. And how did this interview come about, why is this happening?

Because of this very good friend from high school who’s doing this thing and he…

You can say his name. They obviously know who it is if he’s guest editing.

Jonah. I’m saying his name. He’s famous.

He’s not that famous that you need to whisper it… How do you know Jonah in the first place? Start there, then we’ll get into your yoga, don’t worry.

Jonah is my very good friend since high school and it’s been beautiful to watch Jonah open up. He’s really leaning into self-work and…

And you’re helping him along the way?

Well, we like to talk about it; it’s cool.

Oh, okay.

Like, he likes to talk about it.

Right. So how did you get into yoga?

Well, it’s funny you should ask, Alex, since you’ve been taking classes with me for 10 years.

10 years.

Yeah, I’ve been teaching since 2007. Even longer.

That’s when you started? I just remember you being a yoga teacher one day.

Right. Well, I moved to New York and when I was 22 and I had a regular job, which was horrific.

What was the job?

It was a customer service job in Midtown. I would take the subway to 34th and I was like, this is not for me. At the time, I was getting really into yoga and I went to Jivamukti for the first time and it had a profound, life-changing effect on me.

Jivamukti. That’s Hare Krishna yoga, correct?

Well, it’s Bhakti, it’s very devotional, very classical. It was an incredible yoga school, and I learned all the philosophy and it made me wanna be a yoga teacher.

And then you went to India.

Yeah, so then I launched into a very lean period in my life and studied so much yoga.

You’re fast-forwarding, it’s like you don’t wanna talk about it.

I’m not fast-forwarding. I went to India… I actually cannot believe I did that alone. I landed there on Christmas Day and stayed for two months and I did lots of practice. One-on-one in the mountains and it was so beautiful, and I guess I had a spiritual awakening. It made me believe in God. Going there, watching my teacher really live kindness and compassion and nonharm, and really living consciously… it made me believe in god.

Is that kind of awakening more achievable when you’re in the mountains with less craziness?

Well, yeah, but there’s a funny thing they say: even if you were in the Himalayas alone in a cave, there’s still mosquitoes buzzing in your ear.

Right.

Like, there’s no way to escape the world. Anyway, I was so humbled and purified from that experience, and when I came back it gave me the confidence to be a yoga teacher.

Was it as competitive back then as it is now, where everyone becomes a yoga teacher?

No, but you know, all my friends and peers work hard to lift each other up. Although, I feel like every market in this day and age is oversaturated. Do we need another yoga teacher? Do we need another sweatpants line? Do we need anything? Do we need more skateboards?

No. No, we don’t. [Skateboarding is] very oversaturated, unfortunately. So, in New York, you were working at Yoga Vida teaching?

Yeah so, I decided to leave Jivamukti after training.

Then you did private teaching?

Yes.

And it snowballed from there?

Yeah. Ashley Olsen was my first student.

Oh, wow.

And she was incredibly loving and supportive of my career.

Were you still at Jivamukti then?

Yes, I was working at the café in Jivamukti for free. You know, I was young and it was amazing times, but I saw from working in the café, honestly, there was darkness there and I was starting to see behind the veil. I was realising if I stay here, I’m going to be humbly bowing and kissing feet and, you know, that’s it. So, I went to Yoga Vida which was a new studio and it totally gave me a stage. People that pop into my Zooms have taken my poses from Yoga Vida just like you; so many people came through there and that’s where I met all of my peers.

And from Yoga Vida you went to LA?

Yes.

I was going to your classes a lot and that was like, what, 2012?

Yeah.

And then you left.

And then I left.

You were one of the first of the pack to leave.

Yeah.

Run back to home.

Many have left by now.

And then so you went to start your own thing?

Yeah, I was like, ‘I wanna go back home.’ I love it [in LA], you know? Right now, I’m in Santa Monica. My ex-partner and I opened Love Yoga together. She slid into my DMs and was like, ‘I’m moving, I wanna move to LA, let’s open a studio together.’

Was it intimidating going from New York to LA? LA is like the [yoga] epicentre of the US.

It kinda is but New York has a lot of really amazing teachers too, but LA is where we’ve been doing yoga the longest. They’re like the psychopaths of yoga, you know? The people that do yoga, like, OGs in LA.

Is LA the birthplace of Western yoga?

It’s very much a hotspot; for me, it was kinda like starting over, ‘cause out here Jivamukti didn’t have such an impact. I wasn’t known. I was cold calling studios being like, ‘Do you need a yoga teacher again?’ And during that time, we were looking for a space to open up our own studio. And then I had my studio for five years with my partner.

What was different between Love and other yoga studios?

We tried to be really inclusive, like design-forward, younger, whereas a lot of the studios in LA, there’s this OG energy to them and a little bit older and we were going ‘younger’.

When you say OG, do you mean the teachers were a lot older and a lot more rigid?

The teachers and students were older. Like it’s the adults that practise.

Right, right. I’m always happy to see those people.

Yeah, totally. So, that was amazing, like a whole freaking experience. And with Covid, I decided to kind of liken it to the moment of leaving Jivamukti, which set my career in motion as…

Hold on, Kyle. So, you opened Love. You’re there for five years.

Yeah.

And so, what’s happening in those five years?

We were building a community; we opened a second studio.

So, everything’s on the up.

Yeah.

And then Covid hit?

Right. We’re hanging on to it and planning to reopen when the powers that be allowed it. And then I busted out on my own and took a chance.

Ok, so, the pandemic happens and there’s this huge boom of yoga teachers just doing private classes, they’re doing their classes with their students.

Yes, just on Zoom.

This is a big, important detail that changed the landscape of yoga.

Yes. It’s obviously an extremely challenging time to be a small business owner with two studios. So intense and so crazy. I have so much respect for anyone that’s still in business. Yoga studios in California have been shut down this entire time. They opened for one week, like a blip, and that’s it.

Right.

So, I needed to start dreaming about what my career and lifestyle would look like if I didn’t have the responsibility of the studio—which is a fucking beast.

And you pivoted.

Yeah, I pivoted.

You pivoted from having brick and mortar to digital where you can teach from anywhere.

I can teach from anywhere; all I need is my laptop and people get to come right to me. I love it. I know there are some teachers—and some students too—that hate it and think it’s awful, but for some reason I really like it and we have fun on my Zoom. It worked for me. It’s officially been one year and the same people keep coming; we actually have a community.

And now you’re making merch.

I have merch design by Alex Olson, don’t worry about it.

Yeah but, you know, I was trying to tell you to take this streetwear approach to your yoga and build it from there [by doing] limited runs.

Yeah, limited runs.

What about the whole #metoo movement happening within the yoga community that’s not really being talked about?

Well, I’m talking about it a bunch. It really started to dawn on me, like, watching all these documentaries on cults, from Wild Wild Country to the Bikram documentary. I read the book by Yogi Bhajan’s number one girl [Premka: White Bird in a Golden Cage: My Life with Yogi Bhajan] who was calling him out; and Pattabhi Jois, he’s had allegations… It’s just like, every person that was in a [power] position. And these are the people that really shaped modern yoga, all of those teachers, and they’ve all taken advantage of their power in different degrees and ways and it’s really dark.

Right.

Yogi Bhajan and Bikram Choudhury, they… I don’t believe that started out with the intention of taking advantage, but I think their egos start to spin out of control and they get out of tune, y’know?

Well, you watch any of those documentaries they all start at a genuinely good place, most of them.

Yeah, it starts that way, and then they have this power and influence over people—next thing you know they’re collecting Bentleys and being inappropriate to women. It’s really fucked up.

Yeah. I’ve noticed there’s not really any women that have been, like, big teachers, not that I know of, not like the Bhajan or anything like that.

Right. Well, there were very few women yoga teachers 50, 60 years ago, but now it’s all women.

Why weren’t there female yoga teachers way back when?

Because of sexism and because they were coming out of India. The women weren’t coming out of India to teach yoga. It’s coming from a different culture. Like, one hundred years ago a woman couldn’t have a bank account. It’s insane.

Is there anyone now you would consider a major female yoga teacher?
Alison West, she’s like that; she’s kinda like Syamala Roa who is that level of teacher that’s the older generation and she founded YogaWorks, so.

Oh, really?

Oh yeah, she made an impact.

Where do you see yourself going with yoga?

Well, I just wanna keep teaching. I love teaching yoga. There’s a lot of good in yoga and there’s also a lot that needs to be weeded out, and it’s definitely been dumbed down and appropriated in a certain sense. I follow this one woman on Instagram and she’s really educating me about cultural appropriation and the whitewashing of yoga.

I know about that. I hate it.

I know, you’re like, more orthodox and classical than I am. I’m super practical in my approach, but I studied it all. I love the Sutras. I really feel that I’m honouring it, but I’m open to listening to this woman talk about the whitewashing and the Instagram of it all, which she doesn’t even really get into but it’s implied and is obviously a part of my life.

I won’t say the studios I went to, but I would go to these classes and be like, ‘This is so far from what the source is, it should be called something else.’

Totally. Like, it’s also called ‘yoga fitness’. Which is fabulous too. That’s amazing there’s so much variant and, you know, power; but it’s not exactly yoga.

It’s just the shell of it.

Right, it’s under this weird teaching filter of, like, a perfect, white girl beach existence. I dunno it’s weird, and I am literally that girl, so it’s strange.

So, the woman you follow on Instagram is talking about the white privileged female taking and making money off it.

And then the Indian people are totally pushed out and not celebrated teachers, it’s appropriated and it’s whitewashed; it’s like a thing of white supremacy, and she’s not wrong, and I’m happy that I can hear all of this. She wants it exactly like you said, connected to the source. It should always come back to the bigger picture: what is yoga and what are we practising, and I think giving credit to those who found it and where it’s coming from. There are teachers that have dedicated their whole lives to this, who love this, who work every day to embody consciousness, and that’s what it’s really all about. And then there are people who are using the image of yoga to make money or project something. And then there are people that really love and have their heart in it and in the right place, and then there’s people that don’t.

Where do you think Jonah falls in line in yoga? I’m kidding.

He’s in the right place, truly.

One last question. If someone wanted to get into yoga, what would you tell them?

Well, when you started showing interest and asking me about yoga, I recommended some of my favourite books, like The Yoga Sutras. So that, and I’d tell them to just take yoga, be around yoga, and find teachers that resonate with them.

You’re a good teacher.

Thank you, Alex, and you’re a very good student.

See more from the Jonah Hill Guest Editor Issue of Monster Children by grabbing a copy of the mag or boxset here.