Hi, I’m Michael.
I teach insight practices — yoga, meditation, and a few less obvious ones — to people building things in leadership and technology.
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About
Twenty years teaching yoga, running a studio, and thinking about what insight practices actually do. They sharpen attention — and attention is the bottleneck on every hard problem, personal or professional. I write about that intersection, work one-on-one with leaders and builders, and run The Yoga Club in D.C.
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Friday
July 10, 2026
nytimes.comForeign Actors Aim to Exploit Divide on A.I.State actors in China, Russia and Iran have sought to exploit the U.S. public debate over the effects of the technology.✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
nautil.usWhat Makes Humans StupidStupidity is not the absence of intelligence but its misapplication—using sophisticated tools, theories, or systems to make simple problems harder rather than easier. Unlike ignorance or honest error, stupidity involves the elaborate defense and institutionalization of wrong approaches, requiring in✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
Name It. Move On.
It’s about telling the truth about your mood without turning it into a lifelong identity—or a daily beatdown.
Read the essay →
Keep the Method, Lose the Throne
Ashtanga’s method is a gift; the guru-centric machinery is optional. I didn’t just say so — I built the self-owned platform that unbolts one from the other.
Read the essay →Thursday
July 9, 2026
wtop.comThe District Fringe Festival returns with comedy, drama and puppetsThe District Fringe Festival offers emerging playwrights and performers an affordable platform to stage new work across three D.C. venues over three weekends. By charging creators just $400 versus typical $5,000+ theater rentals, the festival prioritizes accessibility and audience-building for untes✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
thecancunsun.comCancun Projected To Be The Number One Destination In Mexico This SummerDespite headlines about decreased international flights to Mexico and travelers delaying plans around the 2026 World Cup, Cancun is projected to be Mexico's top destination this summer, contradicting the narrative of decline. The article highlights the disconnect between media framing and actual tra✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
nautil.usIf You Want Animals to Understand You, Speak SlowlyResearch analyzing 2,000+ vocalizations across 98 species found animals communicate at roughly 2.7 Hz (three vocalizations per second), a rhythm likely evolved because brains process sound structure best at this speed. Humans speak faster due to complex language needs, but revert to this ancestral r✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
thecancunsun.comForget Sargassum! These Are The Top 3 “Seaweed-Proof” Activities In Cancun This YearA travel article addressing how tourists can adapt their Cancun vacation plans when sargassum seaweed makes beaches unusable. The piece suggests alternative activities that aren't beach-dependent, reframing disappointment as opportunity for different experiences.✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
quantamagazine.orgIs Life Just Different?Philip Ball examines the concept of biological agency—the idea that living organisms devise their own goals and act on them—as a way to distinguish life from non-living matter. The debate centers on whether organisms are simply genetic automata or genuine decision-making agents that integrate contex✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
theguardian.comUK judges begin hearing appeal over Trinidad and Tobago anti-gay lawUK judges are hearing an appeal over Trinidad and Tobago's colonial-era law criminalizing same-sex intimacy. A 2018 ruling struck down the law as unconstitutional, but was overturned in 2023; the case now tests whether 'savings clauses' preserving British colonial laws after independence remain vali✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
Practicing Without the Teacher’s Count: Making the Sequence My Own
I ran a values audit on myself and didn’t like how cheap talk is. So instead of posting that practitioners should be able to practice alone, I built the tool that makes it possible — every pose, both sides, counted breath by breath, on a platform I own.
Read the essay →
Flight Simulator
It’s about why yoga practice makes some people weirdly calm when life throws them—sometimes literally—off the horse.
Read the essay →Practice with us this season
Two ways to go deeper before the year turns — a full Ashtanga study season in DC, and an intimate Mysore retreat on the coast of Mexico.
Self Practice by the Sea
A Mysore retreat on the Riviera Maya.
Four mornings of practice, four nights on the coast, a private home with a rooftop pool. Small on purpose — four spots only.
Ashtanga Study Group
Three series. One room. One season.
Sixteen Tuesday cohort nights and sixteen Sunday all-levels sessions — Primary, Intermediate, and Advanced A, side by side. Choose your cohort.
Books by Michael Joel Hall
Six books on Ashtanga, systems, and the craft of a practice. Functional Ashtanga is free; the rest are $10 each, or all six for $50. EPUB + PDF, instant download.
Functional Ashtanga
The manifesto and the method — the whole project’s front door, built on one principle: agency, not compliance.
Free
Self Practice
The method as a manual — how to build an intelligent, sustainable self-practice from the first breath.
$10
Ashtanga 2.0
The philosophy — a postmodern deconstruction of yoga’s authority, and the grounded mysticism that survives it.
$10
Mechanism, Not Magic
The thinking underneath the practice — yoga as a system for clear, honest leadership on and off the mat.
$10
How to Build a Yoga Club
The playbook for the room itself — how to build a practice space that lasts, without burning out or selling out.
$10
Your Life Is Art
The systems primer — stocks, flows, and feedback loops, and the craft of composing a life.
$10
Press
Interviews, bylines, and the occasional controversy.
What is Ashtanga Yoga? The Benefits of This Challenging Practice
“Ashtanga demands fitness, flexibility, and focus — a calming, yet sweaty form of moving meditation.”
Read →Yoga Teacher Recovers, But Attack Highlights a Job’s Health Care Issue
The catalyst for my ongoing advocacy around economic precarity in the yoga teaching profession.
Read →Building Resilience in This Political Climate
A practice sequence for finding strength and clarity when the news is loud.
Read →Responding to Rand Paul on Free Yoga for Government Employees
“They are in less pain, physically and mentally. They go on and do a better job.”
Read →Does Yoga Really Foster Transformation?
On why I practice — to cultivate the conditions required for transformation.
Read →Mysore, the Place and the Practice
A long conversation with Chris Parkinson about my journey, cross-training, and the trajectory of yoga in D.C.
Listen →The Newsletter
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Get in Touch
Questions, collaborations, speaking, coaching inquiries — send a note.
