Judi Friedman is a certified Iyengar Yoga teacher and a Yoga Therapist certified by the International Association of Yoga Therapists. She has been teaching since 2003. Prior to teaching yoga, Judi was a corporate attorney. After 15 years of living a very stress-filled life of practicing law while raising her two sons, Judi developed a chronic pain condition. A wise therapist suggested that she try yoga as a means to balance her life, reduce stress and decrease pain. Judi’s very first yoga experience was an Iyengar Yoga class – she was immediately drawn to the intelligence and accessibility of the method, as well as its clarity, precision and layers of possibility for self-exploration and transformation. After taking classes and practicing on her own for a few years, Judi began teaching, to share her passion for the life-changing possibilities that yoga offers (practicing yoga did relieve her stress and helped her manage and eventually lower her pain)!

Judi teaches weekly group classes and workshops at Breathe Pilates and Yoga in Chappaqua, NY. She also specializes in teaching private yoga sessions (both at Breathe, and in her students’ homes in northern Westchester and Connecticut). Judi helps her private students progress in their practices, and as a Certified Yoga Therapist, heal from injuries and manage common neck, shoulder, back, hip, knee and other kinds of pain.

Judi served on the Board of Directors of the Iyengar Yoga Association of Greater New York in various positions, including Vice-President, from 2012 - 2018. One of her greatest joys is mentoring aspiring Iyengar Yoga teachers - supporting them through the years' long rigorous training and assessment process, and seeing them become wonderful teachers in their own right.

Most recently, in 2024 Judi graduated from the Foundations in Contemplative Care training at New York Zen Center. She infuses her teaching with the principles underpinning her training in caring for those who are suffering - presence, love and compassion.

Judi is dedicated to the principle that yoga should be accessible and safe for everyone, regardless of age, stiffness or injury. She describes her teaching style as clear, dynamic, challenging and joyful. She strives to live and teach the principles expressed in Sutra 1.33 of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali (as translated by B.K.S. Iyengar): “Through cultivation of friendliness, compassion, joy, and indifference to pleasure and pain, virtue and vice, respectively, the consciousness becomes favorably disposed, serene and benevolent.”