SPOTLIGHT FESTIVAL:  KENTUCKY YOGA FESTIVAL

Registration is currently open, and the next scheduled price increase is March 22, 2026. Early registration provides the best access to limited-capacity sessions, excursions, and immersive study opportunities.

**Use code yogalove to receive 15% off all passes including immersions **

Programming moves between classroom learning, embodied practice, and guided experiences on the surrounding red rock landscape of the Coconino National Forest. Rather than presenting yoga as performance or spectacle, the intention is to support learning environments where participants can engage fully with the teachings, with one another, and with the place itself.

The festival continues to serve both dedicated students and professionals seeking continuing education, mentorship, and renewed inspiration within their practice.

Who are some new presenters or offerings you are excited about? 
Each year we welcome emerging teachers alongside established leaders in the field. I’m particularly excited about presenters working at the intersection of yoga with neuroscience, trauma-informed care, indigenous wisdom traditions, and sustainable leadership.

It is a special honor this year to host Pandit Rajmani Tigunait, spiritual head of the Himalayan Institute, who will be teaching after more than a decade away from public travel and large teaching engagements.

We are also expanding our pre- and post-conference immersions, which allow participants to study in smaller groups over extended periods of time. These offerings reflect a noticeable shift toward deeper learning and sustained mentorship rather than brief introductory experiences.

What advice would you give to someone who wanted to start their own local yoga  festival? 
Begin with community, not scale.

Strong festivals grow from authentic relationships—with local teachers, partners, land stewards, and attendees. Start small enough to learn operational realities firsthand, and establish clear values early so decisions remain consistent as the event grows.

Equally important is creating fair systems for compensation, communication, and participant experience. Sustainable events are built through trust and consistency over time rather than rapid expansion.

The theme of our Summer 2026 issue is Community. Can you share with us what the  word community means to you? 
Community is shared experience, creativity, and accountability.

Personal practice develops privately, but it is strengthened through right relationship. Community forms when people gather repeatedly with a shared intention—to learn, to contribute, and to support one another’s growth.

Over time, those relationships create continuity. Teachers, students, and organizers become stewards of something larger than any single event.

Why are yoga festival communities important? 
Yoga festivals provide spaces where learning becomes relational rather than theoretical. Practitioners from different backgrounds and traditions come together in ways that rarely happen within local studios or online environments.

These gatherings strengthen professional networks, support personal wellbeing, and help sustain teaching lineages through direct experience. They remind participants that yoga is practiced within community, not apart from it.

Community in Practice: Inside the Sedona Yoga Festival

For Heather Sheree Sanders, founder and producer of the Sedona Yoga Festival, community is not an abstract idea, rather it is something built gradually through shared experience, return, and participation.

Now entering the 15th year, Sedona Yoga Festival continues to evolve beyond the traditional model of a yoga gathering. Set among the red rock landscape of Sedona, Arizona, the event blends continuing education, embodied practice, and outdoor excursions into an experience shaped as much by place as by programming.

“Our intention has always been to create an environment where people can study deeply while also reconnecting with one another,” Sanders explains. “Practice doesn’t happen in isolation. It unfolds through relationship with peers, with self, and with the natural world.”

The 2026 festival reflects a growing desire within the yoga community for depth rather than breadth. Alongside daily classes and lectures, expanded pre- and post-conference immersions allow participants to work closely with presenters in smaller learning environments designed for sustained study.

This year also marks a rare teaching appearance by Pandit Rajmani Tigunait, spiritual head of the Himalayan Institute, whose participation follows more than a decade away from public travel engagements. His presence underscores the festival’s continued commitment to honoring lineage while welcoming emerging voices shaping the future of practice.

Sanders notes that successful festivals are rarely built through scale alone. “They grow from trust,” she says. “From listening to local communities, respecting the land, and creating systems that support both teachers and participants.”

That philosophy shapes how she defines community itself: not simply as gathering, but as shared responsibility and shared creativity. Attendees often return year after year, contributing to an evolving network of practitioners, educators, and leaders who support one another beyond the weekend event.

In an era increasingly defined by digital connection, gatherings like the Sedona Yoga Festival offer something difficult to replicate online: direct experience. Practice shared in real time. Conversations that continue long after sessions end. A reminder that yoga, at its core, is relational.

For Sanders, that continuity is the point. Community is not created in a single moment—it is cultivated through presence, participation, and the willingness to return.