EmmaStrembickyj

Emma Strembickyj's path into yoga has led her to a life of purpose, connection and fulfilment. Today, she teaches Hatha Vinyasa, Yin, meditation, Kriya and breathwork across five leading Melbourne studios, and facilitates retreats, workshops and special events, often alongside some of Melbourne's most respected teachers and wellness practitioners.

She is deeply grounded in the life she has created. It was not, however, always this way. For much of her life, Emma searched outside herself for the freedom, connection and belonging she could not yet find within. Yoga would eventually become her lifelong journey back to awareness, truth and love. Her own loving truth.

The search for freedom

Emma's early training as a ballet dancer gave her discipline, expression and a profound sense of freedom through movement. But as life progressed, that discipline began to face powerful headwinds.

"I was well and truly in an eating disorder by 15, and drinking and using drugs by about 15 and a half. I married at a very young age and became a mother while still feeling like a child inside." A descent into substance abuse and addiction eventually brought Emma to a point where something had to give. What she had been chasing, she can now see, was a feeling, the expanded freedom she had once experienced while performing.

"Substances gave me a false illusion of that beautiful state I craved."

The mat that kept her

Yoga entered Emma's life quietly. She began attending classes, and in the stillness at the end of one of those early practices, something inside her finally let go.

"The deepest part of me sighed out and rested. I cried because I hadn't felt that kind of peace in such a long time, or perhaps ever. It was the feeling I knew was truth."

For years, yoga ran alongside the addiction before slowly beginning to replace it. Emma would sometimes arrive at class after using, carrying shame about where she had been. Her teacher never turned her away. "I'd rather you be here on your mat than doing what you would otherwise be doing," she told her. The mat became a place Emma could return to without judgement, a place that continued to hold her before she knew how to hold herself.

Over time, the practice guided Emma towards sobriety. She has now been free from alcohol and substance abuse for more than a decade. The false freedom she once searched for through substances was gradually replaced by something real: presence, awareness and a deepening relationship with herself.

Byron, and the turning point

Following a period of family grief and difficulty within her marriage, Emma found herself at another crossroads. Her yoga teacher encouraged her to travel to Byron Bay and undertake teacher training at the Byron Yoga Centre.

Emma completed 500 hours of training, returned to Melbourne and began teaching. She has continued to study, practise and develop her teaching ever since. "I've completed countless trainings over my many years of teaching. I'm committed to continuing my education, and every year I undertake further training of at least 100 to 300 hours."

"I never sacrifice my personal practice for my teaching. Even after teaching a full day, I still make sure I find at least 45 minutes to spend on my own mat."

Bali, and the body's ledger

One of Emma's most profound lessons came during a teacher training in Bali. Her father had often told her, "You're the strong one. You don't cry." Those words had lodged themselves deeply within her body. Over time, the range of movement in her right hip had significantly reduced to less than a third of its natural capacity.

During pigeon pose, her teacher recognised that Emma was holding far more than physical tension. "How long are you going to keep that in there?" the teacher asked. With a single touch, something broke open. Emma began to cry and continued releasing emotion for hours. Within two days, the full range of movement had returned to her hip.

"I had the lived experience of how deeply the body can be bound by our emotions." That experience transformed her understanding of yoga. The body was not something to conquer, force or perfect. It held stories, memory, grief, protection and truth. When given safety, breath and space, it could begin to speak.

Teaching from wholeness

Today, Emma teaches full-time across Melbourne and leads retreats, workshops, meditation, breathwork and transformational practices. She treats every room she holds as sacred. "When you trust me to hold space for you, I find that sacred. I get to witness you unravel and allow your body to express a shape, emotion or truth you may not have believed was available to you."

Emma does not teach from the idea that yoga will turn someone into a different or improved version of themselves. She teaches yoga as a process of remembering, a way of moving beneath the noise, armour and conditioning to reconnect with what has always been there.

Ask Emma what the practice has ultimately given her, and the answer comes back to one thing. Herself.

"Why wouldn't I want to love this being?"