Chandler yoga teacher stretches student to the limit

Don’t tell Desirée Rumbaugh that yoga is a passé fitness fad. For this former housewife and part-time parks-and-recreation instructor, yoga is a practice that's toned her body, expanded her mind, developed her spiritual side and brought her a life unlike anything she ever imagined."

At 25, I was dealing with screaming children and oatmeal on the floor. I was driving a minivan to birthday parties and soccer games," she says, laughing between sips of hot pomegranate tea at her kitchen table in Chandler. "Traveling the world as a yogi? C'mon."

Now 49, Rumbaugh is an in-demand teacher of Anusara yoga, a style whose name translates to "following the heart." Her touring schedule puts her on the road weekly, leading workshops and retreats across the globe. She's just returned from St. Louis; come March, she's headed to Costa Rica.

"It's an extraordinary life," says Rumbaugh, her left knee drawn close to her chest, her bare toes dangling off the edge of her seat. Her body is lithe and strong, carrying nothing extra.

Rumbaugh's journey from stay-at-home mom to touring teacher began in Orange County, Calif., in the late 1980s, when the Valley native with a dance degree from ASU attended a class on a "new" workout called yoga. It was love at first pose, and, within just a few years of serious practice, Rumbaugh moved back to the Valley and opened Arizona Yoga in Scottsdale. She owned the business 14 years.

"My wisdom doesn't come from an ancient cave in the Himalayas. It's coming from the heart of a true suburban mother," says Rumbaugh, who appears on this month's cover of Yoga Journal magazine.

That wisdom hasn't come cheaply. In 2003, her son, Brandon Rumbaugh, and his girlfriend, Lisa Gurrieri, were murdered while camping off Interstate 17 near Bumble Bee. The case remains unsolved.

"I've been tested to a point that a human almost cannot bear," says Rumbaugh. "That kind of pain changes you. When something hurts that deep within you, you ultimately come to two choices: You succumb to the pain, or you come out with more expansiveness inside."

She credits her emergence from the incident, in part, to yoga. She says it has a transformative power that goes far beyond strengthening the body. "There's a mental-emotional-spiritual component that strengthens who you are," she says. "I've worked really hard over the past 4 1/2 years to see what happened differently. That's a gift of yoga, teaching me not to play the victim in life, teaching me that I do have a purpose to go forward with."

Part of that, she believes, is carrying some of what she's learned to the thousands of students she interacts with each year.

"Everyone has loss, everyone has pain," she says. "People give you all kinds of vague advice to get through things, but I can say, 'Here is a concrete practice you can physically get down on your knees and do.' I did it when I didn't know what else to do, and now I know. It's a path to take you from where you're hurting to someplace you can live in again."

Rumbaugh's home is an earthy, soothing town house filled with brightly colored paintings and sculptures by her mother, daughter and late son. Sometimes, it's a bed in the guest room of yoga-network friends in whatever city she's passing through.

"You have to live in the world. You can't remove yourself. It's the world and everyday lessons that refine us," she says, her face luminous.

"No one is happy by accident or by luck. If you live long enough, bad things will happen," she says. "Happiness is right between the eyes."

'Yoga to the Rescue'

What: Chandler resident Desir饠Rumbaugh demonstrates yoga poses and signs copies of her "Yoga to the Rescue" DVD
When: 7 p.m. today
Where: Borders, 2402 E. Camelback Road, Phoenix
Cost: Free
Information: (602) 957-6660 or www.desireerumbaugh.com