When Kino MacGregor asked me to take a look at her new project, I of course said, “Yes!” I have always admired Kino’s work ethic. When it comes to innovative ways to spread Yoga around the world, she always seems to think a few steps ahead. When I saw the new project, I immediately thought, “Kino is starting her own yoga channel. Brilliant.”
When it launches, the OmStars channel will be the first of its kind. OmStars, an online Yoga channel started by Kino and Yoga teacher, Kerri Verna, will provide a comprehensive online platform that will allow practitioners to effortlessly integrate authentic Yoga experience into modern life.
The channel will provide:
Practice – Yoga, Meditation and Movement Courses
Insights – Study Knowledge and Wisdom Courses
Wellness – Vegan Cooking and Balanced Living Courses
Culture & Lifestyle – Travel, Fun, and Play
If you don’t know Kino, she is an international yoga teacher, author of three books, producer of six Ashtanga Yoga DVDs, writer, vlogger, world traveler, and co-founder of Miami Life Center. She has over 960,000 followers on instagram and over 90 million views on YouTube. With more than 15 years of experience in Ashtanga Yoga, she is one of a select group of people to receive the Certification to teach Ashtanga Yoga by its founder Sri K. Pattabhi Jois in Mysore, India.
I caught up with Kino and asked her a few questions about her new project.
AYP: What is OmStars and its purpose?
Kino: OmStars is the world’s first Yoga TV Channel. A little over two years ago, I was flipping through all the content online and I couldn’t find anything that spoke to me as a yogi. A lightbulb went off in my head. What if there was Neflix for yogis? The first thing I did was text my best friend and partner in crime, Kerri Verna, and ask if she wanted to build this dream with me. When she said yes, we started the two year process of putting it all together.
AYP: What makes it different from your videos on YouTube or other websites offering yoga instruction?
Kino: Besides being the exclusive home for all our online videos going forward, OmStars is a unique platform that will feature a whole roster of guest hosts who are leaders in their fields from all over the world. All our content is organized into seasons and courses so you are never left to search through a bunch of random classes. On OmStars we guide and curate your journey into the world of yoga.
AYP: On OmStars, you talk about living the Yogi’s life. What is the yogi’s life? How is it different from anyone else’s life?
Kino: The yogi’s life is marked by a commitment to the moral and ethical standard of the yogic path. This is most succinctly found in the eight limbs of the Ashtanga Yoga method. A yogi will never be perfect but they are held to a higher standard in the ups and downs that everyone faces in life. A yogi cannot simply turn a blind eye towards suffering that they create, whether intentional or unintentional. As soon as awareness is shed on a certain part of their life, that violates one of the ethical foundations of the traditional method, the yogi is bound to reflect, learn and evolve.
AYP: Who is the “modern yogi” that you speak of on OmStars? What are some challenges unique to the modern yogi?
Kino: The biggest challenge of being a “modern” yogi is straddling the two worlds of yoga’s historic, traditional past and contemporary living in the technology age. As most yoga practitioners balance family commitments, professional responsibilities, civic duties, social media, financial sustainability and numerous other things, the modern yogi is asked to wear multiple hats. Rather than yoga being restricted to a small sub-set of society, as more people practice yoga worldwide, the yogi gets modernized. The challenge of the modern yogi is to keep the traditional heart of the spiritual practice while balancing the necessary facts of living in our global society.
AYP: There is much criticism,in the world of Yoga, regarding unrealistic portrayals of the modern Yogi. Many feel that the media does not show diverse practitioners of all color, shape, size, socioeconomic status, age, sex and ability. Will your website speak to these groups?
Kino: We believe that the message of yoga is ideally told by yogis. Rather than leaving the story of yoga in the hands of large corporations or broadcast television executives looking for ratings, we seek to tell the story of yoga and the yogis who are practicing in a real, raw and authentic manner. We believe that this will create both fun, watchable content and add depth, dimension and meaning to the portrayal of yoga. While Kerri and I represent only one subset of the diverse body of practitioners around the world, we have a plan to invite guest hosts and feature yogis from all walks of life.
AYP: OmStars will feature a rewards program. What is the purpose and how does it work?
Kino: One of the things, that I find is missing from the online world, is an incentive and accountability structure. When you practice at your local studio, you are held accountable by your community and incentivized to return to class. We seek to offer something similar with our reward points. Our practice tracker logs every minute spent on the mat practicing which then translates into reward points that you can use in the shop, where we will have our OmStars products for sale and also give people the option to donate their points to charity.
15 min watched = 1 point
We have 4 levels:
0-432 points = Gamma
864 points = Delta
1153 points = Beta
1728 points = Alpha
AYP: As an Ashtangi, will there be tools specifically geared towards the lineage?
Kino: Yes! I’ve already filmed an Ashtanga Yoga Primary Series course that will launch within the first few months of the site going live. While we won’t be an Ashtanga-only channel, we will have lots of Ashtanga yoga on the channel because I’ll be teaching and designing a lot of classes. We have a plan to invite some of the top Ashtanga teachers to film for us!
AYP: You are using Kickstarter to fund the creation of this site. Where can we go to give? Why should we give?
Kino: We’ve hit more roadblocks than open highways during this project. We had two companies offer to build OmStars with us only to rescind their offers. We had a tech start-up incubator say they could build out the site only to take our money and run. And that’s just scratching the surface of the difficulties we have faced. When we finally found the right web team to build the site we realized that we needed additional funding to cover the costs. We decided to use Kickstarter to take this dream straight to our community. We want the channel to be a community endeavor and for everyone who is a part of our yoga world to be involved and inspired. If you believe in us and if you believe in OmStars we hope you’ll support us by pledging at any level. We have some awesome rewards or you can also choose to pledge without a reward. Kickstarters that are well funded within the first 24 hours have a 10 times greater likelihood of succeeding so we hope everyone’s enthusiasm will really turn out for us on the first day!
Go to OmStars right now to learn more about this amazing new project by Kino and Kerri!!! You don’t want to miss this!
Learn more about Kino
Learn more about Kerri
Shanna Small has been practicing Ashtanga Yoga and studying the Yoga Sutras since 2001. She has studied in Mysore with Sharath Jois and is the Director of AYS Charlotte, a school for traditional Ashtanga in Charlotte NC. She has written for Yoga International and the Ashtanga Dispatch. Go here for more information on AYS Charlotte. For information on workshops, please e-mail shanna@ashtangayogaproject.com.
5 Comments
Jen
How is it the first? I think it’s great that there are options out there, but this is one of several options. There are already several. OneOEight includes all the things listed above, and CodyApp is fairly versatile as well, with asana, nutrition, meditation, etc. Then there’s DoYouYoga, etc.
Kino MacGregor
Hey Jen. While all the other platforms are awesome they mostly focus on classes. We are calling ourselves a TV channel because we seek to be the first to include reality style TV content. Kerri and I have filmed for many of the existing platforms and even pitched the idea of TV style content to many only to get turned down. Our category of content called “Culture” will eventually include reality series based in the yoga lifestyle and this is what makes our content “TV” and distinguishes it from the other platforms. If it weren’t for the TV reality component we would just have focused on the other distinguishing features of the platform (like the practice tracker and reward points), rather than on the first TV channel idea. Thanks for asking and sorry we weren’t clear enough.
Tina
Hi! Great idea! Will it be available in italy as well? When will it be launched?
Kino MacGregor
Yes it will!!
Monica
This is exciting! I’m looking forward to its start. What a great idea you came up with! Congratulations and thank you for working in this:)