Vijaya Hariharan

Vijaya Hariharan is the Head, Academic division of Yoga Bharati. She is also a Senior yoga therapist with over 19+ years of teaching experience.  She is a Cost Accountant by profession with over 12 years of industry experience in Internal audit and MIS.

Her initial exposure to Yoga was in the year 1991, at a Yoga camp for nasal allergy at The Yoga Institute in Mumbai. The yoga camp was an eye opener and she realized that the ‘mind had a powerful role to play in how the body behaved’.  She also got relief from her nasal allergy with regular practice. Later, shifting to Bangalore and having taken a break from corporate life to spend time with her children, she joined a regular yoga class for her practise. Here, she was exposed to the philosophy behind the practise. Wanting to know more about the philosophy and praxis behind the practise, she did her YIC in 2003 and started her teaching career in 2004. She has experience in handling women’s health issue at a Vyasa centre for 5 years. Later, she went on to do her post graduate diploma in Yoga therapy, She is a ERYT200, YACEP from Yoga alliance,  Yoga Teacher and Evaluator from Yoga certification Board under Ayush Ministry, India.

She has been guiding participants in different psychosomatic aliments like muscular dystrophy, women’s health issues, cancer, and mental health conditions. She also conducts prenatal sessions and also guides her participants on the lifestyle changes as per Yogic texts. Her sessions are holistic in nature , help the participants to bring out the Joy in spiritual path. With her thirst for knowledge,  she also did her training in Ashtanga, vinyasa yoga and Iyengar yoga. Wanting to understand more about the concept of integral Yoga, she has done short term courses from Sri Aurobindo centre India culture, Chinmaya mission foundation and Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram. 

She has been a student of Yogashree Raghuramji since  2013  learning Vedanta. With her exposure to Carnatic music in early days, she found her interest kindled in mantra chanting and prayer sessions. She regularly guides her participants and her team in these sessions. She has conducted various workshops on women’s health issues, pranayama, meditation sessions at various places. She has also presented papers on Yogic philosophy at the annual conference held at the Vivekananda Kendra, Kanyakumari and Indic Yoga. With emphasis on holistic Yoga, her aim is to guide participants into a deeper awareness of Yoga as a way of life which also help to  promote a peaceful and harmonious society.