Meet Jenni Rawlings
Jenni Rawlings is a yoga teacher with an emphasis on anatomy, biomechanics, and movement science. She teaches playful-yet-strong yoga classes that integrate opportunities for new and novel movements to continually challenge the body & the mind.
Jenni’s experience
Jenni Rawlings, E-RYT® 500, YACEP®, is passionate about exploring the intersection of yoga, anatomy, biomechanics, and movement science – and about making research-backed concepts feel clear, practical, and engaging for yoga teachers and students alike. She shares this work in depth inside her vibrant membership community of curious, engaged yogis, and also offers valuable educational content to the wider yoga world through her blog, social media, YouTube channel, and other platforms.
Jenni has been teaching yoga since 2008 and practicing since 1997. Through her online platform, she teaches yoga classes and hosts yoga challenges, offers a wide range of evidence-based continuing education courses for yoga teachers, and leads Strength for Yoga – a strength training program specifically for yogis – in collaboration with Exercise Science Professor Travis Pollen.
Jenni is a Yoga Alliance Continuing Education Provider (YACEP®), co-author of Strength Training for Yoga, and creator of the Yoga Meets Movement Science podcast.
In her earlier teaching days, Jenni took allll of the yoga anatomy and alignment trainings out there (yes, just about all the ones you’ve heard of 😉), attended massage school, and much more. Many of these early trainings reflected the outdated “alignment for safety” model that we now know isn’t supported by current evidence. She still took valuable insights from each one, but they also fueled her drive to learn more, dig deeper, and update her approach based on the best available research.
Since then, she has continued to study, learn, and evolve her approach to yoga – integrating insights from the latest research she actively stays on top of, her 500-hour YTT with her main yoga mentor Jules Mitchell, MS, a 6-month mentorship with Chris Beardsley (Director of Strength & Conditioning Research), anatomy and physiology courses at Northwestern University, and movement and therapeutic trainings too numerous to list here.
Alongside her yoga teaching, Jenni owned Drishti, the nation’s first stand-alone yoga clothing store, from 2002–2017. After that, she shifted her full professional focus to yoga teaching and education. She holds dual B.A.’s in Religious Studies and Cultural Anthropology from UC Santa Barbara.
Originally from California, Jenni spent a couple of years in Chicago before moving to Durham, NC and then settling in Carrboro, NC, where she lives with her husband and two dogs.
Travis Pollen, PhD
Jenni collaborates with Travis Pollen on a variety of projects – most notably Strength for Yoga, the platform they created to support yogis in bringing strength training into their movement practice.
Travis is an Exercise Science professor at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, an injury prevention researcher, personal trainer, and author. He also holds a master’s degree in Biomechanics and Movement Science and is a former American record holding para swimmer.
Travis has been a yoga student for over 16 years and co-founded Strength for Yoga to bridge the gap between yoga and strength & conditioning.
Guest Instructors in Jenni’s yoga class library
Magnus Ringberg
Joe Miller
Laura Baehr
Lauren Anderson
Emily Benaron
Ariana Rabinovitch
Jenn Pilotti
Trina Altman
Laurel Beversdorf
Lizette Pompa
Francesca Cervero