Mike
Mike Matthews hails from the Mojave Desert, where he spent his youth playing baseball and football, fly-fishing and riding dirt bikes; working at his family's A&W restaurant and sitting shotgun in his grandfather's pick-up during all-night trips to the produce market in downtown Los Angeles; listening to Dodger games on the radio; surfing and skateboarding, chewing tobacco, reading Kerouac--and, with his family, exploring the many Spanish missions of California and Mexico, often observing the Catholic ritual of Perpetual Adoration.
He was introduced to yoga by his sister Mimi, who encouraged him to take a restorative practice in order to begin healing from sports injuries, particularly those brought about by running, and also to ease the pain of several illnesses. In the mid-nineties he moved to San Francisco, where he practiced various styles of yoga, both traditional and contemporary. One morning he arrived early to practice and was surprised to find a teacher of one of the more contemporary styles practicing what he later learned was Ashtanga yoga. It was she who sent him to Arkady Shirin, the Siberian-born yogi, who became his teacher for the rest of the decade. This relationship was one of the most pivotal of his life. Still, in 2001, heeding the dictum that it is no credit to the guru to sit at his feet forever, he told his teacher, "I can't help you anymore." He left San Francisco and traveled across the country, hitchhiking, jumping trains, riding the Greyhound. He settled in Massachusetts, where he began showing others what he had learned from his teacher--this at a community center in South Boston; additionally, in spring and summer, he held classes on the rooftop of his flat in Cambridge. In 2005 he moved to Austin and began teaching at various studios around town. Several years later he established a traditional Ashtanga yoga shala in the front parlor of his apartment in the Clarksville neighborhood of Austin: this he did for two years before founding the Ashtanga Yoga Center of Austin. Mike has been recognized by Austin Fit Magazine as one of Austin's fittest people, and by Austin Magazine as one of the the top five yoga teachers in Austin. He has taught thousands of students, and been mentor and teacher to many teachers in the Austin community. He holds a B.A. in Literature from Loyola Marymount University, and an M.A. in English and American Literature and Language from Harvard University.
Sarah
A native Texan, Sarah Shufelt grew up in the seaside city of Corpus Christi. As a child--the youngest of three--she enjoyed swimming in the ocean, digging in the sand ("only occasionally making sand castles"), and running through the dunes that boarder the seashore. Her early disciplines included ballet, piano, and competitive swimming. She moved to Austin in 2002 in order to attend massage school. When that didn't take she began working at a local yoga studio, during which time she shaved her head "just to see what it would look like without hair." It took Sarah two years from the time she began attending yoga classes in 2004 to commit to a consistent Ashtanga yoga practice. When first beginning, she attended led classes--the primary series--with various teachers in Austin. Soon thereafter, she took Mike Matthews as her teacher and began a daily practice. After completing a 200 hour hatha yoga training in Austin, and two separate 200 hour Ashtanga trainings (one in New York City; one in Mexico), she began, in 2008, a teaching apprenticeship with Mike. Sarah's other spiritual pursuits have included Vipassana meditation; additionally, she finds spirituality in nature: camping, hiking, swimming and relaxing on the front porch of her home in Bastrop, Texas. She likes a leisurely read, which usually turns into a nap. Over the years she has developed a deep respect for the Ashtanga yoga method and its benefits, and has dedicated herself to sharing the practice with her students.