About
Yoga for Life
We aspire to create a skilled and vibrant yoga community to support our students’ personal development.
Yoga for Life a small, local business that’s called Portland, OR home since 2010. We’ve offered 200-hour and 500-hour Yoga Alliance registered Teacher Training since 2011.
Our co-founder, Raj Patra, was born and raised in Kolkata, India in a yogic and spiritual family. Although yoga was founded in India, there are a surprisingly small number of yoga studios in the western hemisphere that are owned by Indian yogis. We educate yoga practitioners and teachers about Yoga in its authentic and universal way, enriched by centuries of wisdom.
Many of our practitioners and trainees have over 500+ hours of yoga education, and training in other healing modalities, such as Licensed Massage Therapy, Reiki, Family Constellation Therapy, Psychotherapy, etc. We’ve also offered International Yoga Retreats to Bali, Nepal, and India since 2015.
We conduct classes and trainings rooted in ancient lineages and traditions of Tantrik Shaivism and Vajrayana Buddhism.
Our classes and coursework invite practitioners who have a strong foundation in the practices and theories of yoga who want to further their potential.
We welcome all practitioners, regardless of fitness level with an authentic motivation to challenge their mind, body, and spirit.
Raj and Kelly’s yoga journey evolved significantly after their path crossed with Guruji Andrey Lappa, a Ukranian-born, Nepal-based Yoga Master, who had spent majority of his life in India and Nepal, and dedicated his effort to create and teach Universal Yoga - diverse lineages of yoga under the umbrella of Buddhism and Hinduism (Tantra) united into a comprehensive system with scientific precision and unlimited potential of spirituality.
Today, Yoga for Life is a beacon of the potential of Yoga in the west: ancient teachings of physical and personal practices delivered to modern western practitioners with integrity and respect to the lineage, building a vibrant yoga community to support students’ personal development, so they can realize their life’s purpose and live from a place of joy and well-being.
Our Story
Yoga for Life was founded in 2010 by Raj Patra and Kelly Suttell, sprouting from one Banyan seed that started it all: the day Kelly asked Raj “Do you want to go to a yoga class with me?”
One class turned into many, which turned into few yoga teacher trainings, and into teaching many classes together. Today, Yoga for Life is a beacon of the potential of Yoga in the West where ancient teachings of physical and personal practices are delivered to modern yoga practitioners with integrity and respect to the lineage.
Our co-founder, Raj Patra, was born and raised in Kolkata, India in a yogic and spiritual family. Although yoga was founded in India, there are a surprisingly small number of yoga studios in the western hemisphere that are owned by Indian yogis. We educate yoga practitioners and teachers about Yoga in its authentic and universal way, enriched by centuries of wisdom.
Our Mission
To teach ancient yoga techniques to modern, western practitioners.
What we offer is for those who want non-Westernized Yoga either through an innate or intuitive understanding, or through dissatisfaction from westernized yoga.
Our approach to Yoga education is rooted in deeper practices of Tantrik Shaivism and Vajrayana Buddhism. We only teach what we’ve experienced ourselves which allows us to educate our students from a place of deep understanding.
Our Vision
We aspire to create a skilled and vibrant yoga community to support our students’ personal development, so they can realize their life’s purpose and live from a place of joy and well-being.
We aim to cultivate a non-judgmental community where students are supported by their Sangha on their journey of Yoga and in life.
Our Values
We inspire and challenge the mind, body, and spirit.
Our coursework and classes are designed for curious learners who want more from their yoga practice. Deepening the yogic journey starts with seeing beyond familiar paradigms of hot/vinyasa, workout, and a closed-minded understanding Yoga.
We cultivate a community that expands the realm of understanding to see beyond Western approaches to Yoga. Our students have a strong foundation in the practices and theories of yoga and want to reach their full potential through skillful means of practice.
We welcome all practitioners, regardless of your fitness level.
Yoga is a life practice, not a fitness class. The journey of yoga goes well beyond the physical body. We design our classes and curriculum to incorporate Patanjali’s 8 limb path into our practice.
Often yoga in the West is primarily focused on the physical body, at Yoga for Life we conduct our classes, retreats and trainings as academic coursework that are both demanding and rewarding on a physical, intellectual and spiritual level.
To be kind, well-educated, and talented teachers.
Our role as teachers isn’t to meet you where you are – but to show you where you’re going. We identify with serious yoga practices and teachings in ancient lineages and traditions that provides a strong foundation for practitioners and teachers alike.
Raj Patra, YFL Co-Founder
Raj’s yoga journey started in Kolkata, India at the age of seven at Ghosh’s Yoga College which was established in 1923 by Bishnu Ghosh, younger brother of Sri Paramhansa Yogananda, the author of “Autobiography of a Yogi”. Incidentally, Raj grew up on the same street, blocks away from the birthplace and house of Swami Vivekananda, the personality single-handedly responsible for introducing Yoga and Hinduism to the United States in 1893. For Raj, yoga involved not only physical exercises, pranayama, and meditation, but a prescription of lifestyle, in close association with Hatha Yoga Pradipika, and helped cure ailments and improve quality of mental and physical connections.
Over the the past four decades Raj has studied in the lineages and inspirations of Yogananda, Sri Anandamayi Ma, Swami Vivekananda, Bishnu Ghosh, Dr. A. G. Mohan, Zhander Remete, 17th Gyalwa Karmapa of Kagyu Lineage, venerable Chöje Lama Phuntsok Rinpoche, and most importantly, Guruji Andrey Lappa, founder of Universal Yoga and teacher of Tantrika. Raj is well-versed in systems of Hatha yoga, Ashtanga Vinyasa yoga and its western derivations, Bikram yoga, Power yoga, Yin yoga, Shadow yoga, and the extensive system of Universal Yoga and Shiva Nata (Dance of Shiva), and has spent time in Ramakrishna Mission, Dakshineshwar Temple, Balur Matth Vivekananda Institute in Kolkata, and Karma Lekshey Ling monastery in Kathmandu, Nepal. Raj is a Reiki Master, and initiated in the Modern Mystery School.
With degrees in Physics and in Mathematics, and high profile corporate and hi-tech jobs since 1998 in start-ups and Fortune companies, Raj’s yoga practice and yoga teaching is grounded by the fundamental belief that stress through the rat-race of material success is the biggest contributor to the unhappiness and increasing health issues in the world, and that raising human consciousness is the means of attaining peace. “Yoga helps in not only re-balancing our lives, but also in raising an intellectual awareness that we are all connected beings living off of the same quantum mechanical resources.”
Raj’s mission is to educate yoga practitioners and teachers about Yoga in its authentic and universal way, enriched by centuries of lineage. His activities and energy these days revolve around teaching ancient philosophies in modern and scientific contexts, inspiring people to live life in conscious and meaningful ways, and relentlessly studying with and from yoga masters. Learn more.
Kelly Suttell, YFL Co-Founder
Creator of Kinetik Yoga™, and Integrative Healing Facilitator, Kelly started practicing yoga in 2003, after she started experiencing more chronic and acute neck and back pain due to the combination of congenital spondylolisthesis and a more sedentary professional life. After countless MRIs, physical therapy, acupuncture, and other rehabilitative modalities, Kelly turned to yoga. Since then, a holistic and complete yoga practice and life philosophy has been a key contributor towards preventing her chronic pain.
When not in the studio, Kelly is constantly reading about yoga and attending workshops, classes, trainings, and lectures from leading teachers, including A.G. Mohan, Guruji Andrey Lappa, and Zander Remete. Kelly has practiced a variety of styles and systems of yoga, including Ashtanga, Hatha, Iyengar, Mysore, Vinyasa, Universal, Yoga Nidra, and Yin/Tha yoga, but primarily teaches Vinyasa, Universal, and Yin/Tha. She aims for a teaching style that is heart-felt, compassionate, a caring, yet focused on anatomy, rehabilitative, and meditative.