Our Story

Founded in 2017 Sahaja - Yoga Mats that give back, became a certified B Corporation in 2019,  created & designed by a yogi for yogis with the intention to give back to others. We are passionate about our community and are ardent supporters of our big blue planet, Mother Earth.  We are all light givers, and we can all, contribute to the lives of another being.  Our goal is to light up 108 Million Live and you can make a difference in another person’s life, as with every yoga mat we sell we give back to others.  We began by giving solar light to families who had no access to electricity in Mozambique.  Unfortunately due to Covid, logistics we have now moved our giving model to iChange to select charities, that you our Light Givers help us to choose, here in Australia as well as abroad.  We act locally and give globally.

In May 2024, we decided to let our membership for being a Certified B Corporation go due the increasing membership fees.  We will still always live by the business for purpose value, as it is what we have done since day one.  We felt  that we could better donate the money to where it could do more good for our community.

Sahaja is a Sanskrit word and means spontaneous, inherent naturalness and being free, our true nature.  The state of absolute freedom and peace when we are in our own natural nature, a state of bliss that is natural.  It is a non-dual state, a harmony of opposites.  A union of Shiva and Shakti, Yin and Yang, Light and Dark; and our logo embodies that.  Our logo is open to welcome all and to also represent the "S" in Sahaja.   Sahaja Yoga Mats that gives back, came to life through movement, love and community and has turned into a lifelong Seva (Dharma) Project.

 

Every Sahaja yoga mat that gives back design incorporates elements of Sacred Geometry to help you’re your alignment, hand and foot placements, that are naturally organic for the mover on the mat.  Every design concept is original by our Founding Light Giver Judes and has come from a place of heart, inspired from ancient yogic texts, tantric philosophy and the energetic body. Each yoga mat has been created with love. 

How Sahaja yoga mat that gives back came to be

Sahaja yoga mats that gives back, was born from a time of darkness, when our Founding Light Giver Judes, went through a traumatic yoga journey.  In 2005 at the age of 26, she quit her corporate job in Sydney, Australia and moved overseas to follow her calling to be a yoga teacher. It was unfortunately during those years she experiences years of mental, verbal and emotional abuse at the hands of her yoga teacher.  Someone she trusted and revered.  She sees positive now though from those years of abuse as she knows first-hand the aftereffects, the mental health stigma and the hardship to overcome the mental anguish, stigma and darkness of not wanting to live anymore. 

Everyday was a struggle to overcome suicidal depression and on good days, how to live with post-traumatic stress, as well as to the handle the triggers from the trauma that some days would immobilize her.   With the love and support of family and friends and incorporating “Sahaja”, she was able to return to her own inherent naturalness and her own light started to shine again.  She has come to accept living with mental health issues and hopes that others reading her story, will also have the hope and courage to continue.  Our Founding Light Giver would not be here today if it wasn’t for everyone around her, loving and lighting her up, as well as her personal yoga practise.  So many people shined a light for her when she was in need and helped her in her darkest hours, that she would like to pay it forward by lighting up other peoples lives and hopefully making a positive impact like others did for her.

Judes, is an international trained yoga teacher who has taught and travelled extensively around the world sharing her love of yoga to others.  She has studied and received direct transmissions from Anand Mehrotra, Mahasiddhi Ishaputra, Himalayan Siddha Akshar, Shantala Sriramaiah, Shiva Rea, Sarah Powers, Baron Baptiste, Sean Corne, Byran Kest, Thom Knowles and many more.  She has been blessed with the opportunity to meet with BKS Iyengar, when she lived in India.

Judes has experienced first-hand the power of yoga, the positive and negative, and has been blessed to have experienced so much during her life, from teaching celebrities, to training 500 plus yoga teachers at a time, all the while fulfilling another one of her passions, travelling.   She is grateful she has been able to travel and live around the world doing what she passionately loves, yoga.  Her yoga experience was both one of light and darkness, yin and yang.

Judes has over 3500 documented teacher training hours, has been training yoga teachers since 2009  and is a Sattva Yoga Master teacher.  She is also a Jyotish, Vedic Astrologer and uses this gift to create presonalised programs for people based on their own birth charts.  She teaches: Sattva Himalayan Kundalini Yoga, Himalayan Meditation, Prana Vinyasa Yoga, Yin Yoga and is a Vedic chanter from the Challekere brothers’ lineage.  Her main teacher is Anand Mehrotra founder of Sattva Yoga.  Judes is grateful to Shiva Rea one of her teachers.  As when she first met Shiva in 2014 in Los Angeles, she was broken and disheartened with the yoga world. Shiva introduced her to Prana Vinyasa and the term, Sahaja.  Which inspired the company name Sahaja.  Judes follows the teachings of The Dalai Lama, Job Kabat-Zinn, Timber Hawkeye, David Frawley, Swami Dayananda Saraswati and Thich Nhat Hanh.  She is inspired by all her teachers, her students and her dear family and friends.   She continues to study and broaden her knowledge, studies and own practices.  She also gives where she can and donates a percentage of her workshop earnings to international and domestic causes. You'll often find her leading classes to raise funds for local charities, with her hand in some mud making pottery or with her meditating, vedic chanting, yoga puppy: LaiFu.