The yoga teacher

As the Cannes film festival is about to roll into town, I took a few quiet moments to chat to Faye about why she swapped her job in the film industry... 

DH: Life changing stuff, what prompted you?

Faye: Having worked in the industry for over 20 years, I happily gave that up three years ago to become full-time mummy to our beautiful daughter, who we adopted from Guatemala when she was just three and a half months.

   I figured that having waited so long for her, and having had such a long and fulfilling career whilst waiting, it was time to make some real and profound life changes. I had started practicing yoga 11 years ago with the incredible Christian Pisano and his wife, June Whitaker, who are two of the best Iyengar teachers in Europe.

   Obviously once our daughter arrived it was difficult to carry on with classes, so I made a conscious decision to intensify my daily practice at home. Around that same time I came across the teachings of Vanda Scaravelli, who studied for many years with Iyengar before establishing her own, innovative approach to yoga through the proper alignment of the spine. I found this inspiring and have since attended several workshops with different teachers she trained.

   The decision to start teaching was born of a desire to share the extraordinary benefits of yoga. I myself had turned to yoga when going through an extremely painful period of my life, battling with the frustration of infertility and numerous highly stressful cycles of IVF.

   For me personally, the most amazing thing about yoga was that my body (which had so stubbornly refused to do what a ‘normal’ female body is supposed to do) started transforming and literally ‘bending’ itself to my will. Within a relatively short space of time I started to feel myself become more supple, stronger (an incredible feeling for someone with weak wrists and ankles!) and more aware.

   At first I found it difficult to feel the much-cited ‘union’ between body and mind, as I was so busy concentrating on the postures; but as soon as these started to become more familiar I did indeed begin to find peace, firstly in my practice and then gradually in my everyday life.

    This is the joy I get from teaching. I humbly watch as women whose arms ached from just hanging out the washing regain strength and flexibility. As stressed-out men clear their minds and find enough calm to balance on one leg. As those lacking in confidence find it within themselves to lift their legs into a headstand.

DH: What brought you down to the South of France?

Faye: I was born in Bristol and lived there until my early twenties when I moved to London, and then on to Madrid. After 10 years there, and just when the city (particularly that city, which never sleeps!) was getting too much for me, I came to Monaco to work, met José and moved here to be with him.

DH: So how long have you lived in the area?

Faye: That was back in 1996. We moved to Bar sur Loup in 1998 and are blissfully happy in our luscious green valley, overlooked by the beautiful Courmettes hills (which is where we were married in 2002).

DH: What’s the best thing about living in France?

Faye: I love the quality of life, especially what that means for our daughter – the fact that we can walk most of the way to school, having lunch in the garden even in November, the colours and the amazing diversity of landscapes to be found within the space of an hour or so’s drive.

 

DH: And the worst?

Faye: I’d say that the worst things are the crippling social charges, which make it so difficult to set up a small business or to attempt anything slightly out of the box.

Those charges have practically killed the film industry here, as foreign companies find it cheaper to bring in their own crew - with flights, hotels and per diems (and on higher salaries) - than to pay the average 65% on top of a normal salary. I guess one of the advantages of all that is our health system, but I’m sure there must be a kinder way to achieve that!

DH: What are your likes and dislikes?

Faye: I love coming back into myself. It is so easy to forget that we each have a place within ourselves where everything is light, everything is peace and everything is easy. We really do all have that place, but we forget to seek it out, and yet it’s so easy to find. I dislike confrontation, cynicism and bad energy. Especially when that bad energy comes from me!

DH: What’s your favourite food or guilty food pleasure?

Faye: I hated food until I was about 26, and wouldn’t go into a restaurant unless they served scampi and chips. Then someone took me to a vegetarian Indian restaurant and I discovered different tastes and textures and I was hooked. Indian remains a real favourite. My really guilty food pleasure is mustard flavoured crisps. I just can’t have them in the house!

DH: What’s your favourite gadget or thing?

Faye: My favourite thing (the one thing I won’t do without no matter how tight the budget has become since giving up the film world) is my Eve Lom cleanser. I’m not really into gadgets, although I do love my Macbook.

DH: How can people contact you to find out more about your yoga lessons?

Faye: The best way is by phone on 06 85 25 80 61, or email faye@bbox.fr

Although I am always on the lookout for a good group space, surroundings are extremely important to me – I’d rather not teach in a grubby hall with no windows and sweaty judo mats on the floor. I prefer to teach at people’s homes, either on a one-to-one basis, or else to small groups (maximum four people), which allows for a much more individual and hands-on approach.