This month’s Yoga Manchester People features Amie Davies who is a regular student at Thursday evening classes at Withington with Paul Jones.
Q1. Tell us a bit about yourself (tell us some things about where you’re from, where you live, hobbies, family and pets, what you do for a living)
Hi I’m Amie,
I live in Manchester but grew up in Cheshire where my parents still live. I’m an actor and writer, but also work at the Lowry, teach writing classes at Oldham Coliseum and do various other jobs here and there too!
My hobbies mostly involve art, drama and music. I’m currently learning to play the flute and practice aerial hoop.
I have a cat called Murphy, after Murphy’s Law — where ‘anything that can go wrong will go wrong’! He’s 4 and incredibly friendly and loyal to me.
Q2. What are you currently listening to? Tell us about it (What’s in your CD player, on Spotify or who’s your favourite musician/band, perhaps your current, favourite radio station or the sound coming from someone’s phone on the back of the 86 bus?)
I’m enjoying the new Vampire Weekend album, but have been reminiscing recently and got in to Spotify’s 90’s playlists.
Q3. What brought you to yoga and how long have you been practising? (Tell us about your first class, or what brought you to it, or how your practice has changed)
I don’t remember my first yoga class because my mum introduced me to yoga when I was little. She was a yoga teacher and trained with BKS Iyengar so yoga has always been part of my life and is used as a tool in my acting career.
At the end of 2017 I challenged myself to do some yoga everyday. I did this for a whole year and found the mindfulness aspects were most beneficial.
At the start of this year I felt a bit lost and decided to visit a teacher training open day. I found it fascinating and applied for the course there and then. I started at the beginning of March. Since then I’ve tried to step up and visit more classes each week.
Q4. What is your yoga super power? (Tell us about a posture or feature of your yoga practice that you’re really good at, or that you enjoy the most)
I really like a good Trikonasana!
I enjoy this posture because it stretches the sides of my body. I started doing this type of stretch as an actor because I’m sure it improves the quality of my voice.
Q5. If you could be a character in a well-known film, who would you be and why? (You might need to give a brief explanation of what the film is about, if it’s an obscure one)
Easy! I would be Marty McFly from Back to the Future so that I could have a very cool car and go back in time and have adventures!
Q6. Where in Manchester (or where in the world) is heaven? (This might be a museum or park you like to visit, a restaurant you frequent, an area of the city that has fond memories or Leo’s Fish Bar at 2am on a Saturday morning)
Ideally my heaven needs to have sun, sea and sand but if I just wanted to get away from everything to relax and find some peace I’d go to my parents and spend some time in their garden.
In Manchester, any indiscriminate beer garden when the sun is out will do…
Q7. If you could go back in time to see something or change something, what would it be?
I’d go back to the Dark Ages to see the Druids and Vikings, mostly to check out the jewellery.
I wouldn’t change anything because I don’t want to mess with history and risk not existing anymore!
Q8. Where do you want to be in 5 years.
I don’t have a 5 year plan right now. I’ve recently made some changes in my life, undertaking yoga teacher training being one of them, so any plans are out the window and I’m just seeing where life takes me. Maybe ask me again in 5 years…