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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Tuesday
July 7, 2026
futurism.comRich People Can Afford Good Education for Their Kids. They’re Raising Them on AI Slop Anyways.Alpha School, a $75,000/year private network backed by wealthy tech figures and promoted by the Trump administration, uses AI tutors to compress education into two-hour sessions. Former employees report the AI curriculum is poorly structured, students need far more than two hours daily, and the scho✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
ReligionForBreakfastThe Camel and Needle: Did Scholars Mistranslate Jesus’s Famous Saying?A methodical demolition of two viral misreadings of a single Gospel verse — with manuscript evidence, Aramaic lexicography, and a medieval fabrication trail. Rare case of biblical scholarship that's genuinely satisfying to follow.✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50actually everything you hate about people.”
Another is that the worst thing about the
internet is “knowing what everyone thinks about
everything.”
The Architecture of Generosity
A companion to The Digital Caste People talk about yoga economics as if the central question is price. Class rates. Membership tiers. What a teacher should earn. Price matters — but it isn't the variable that governs everything else. Overhead is. Overhead determines what prices…
Read the essay →
Portable Yoga
When you’re practicing far from the “real” yoga scene, yama and niyama are the parts that still work anywhere—and they tell you what’s healthy.
Read the essay →Monday
July 6, 2026
futurism.comMeta’s AI Data Center Caught Infecting Town Water Supply With Deadly BacteriaMeta's data center in Cheyenne, Wyoming contaminated municipal wastewater with Cupriavidus gilardii, a rare multidrug-resistant bacterium with a 31% mortality rate, during a fill-and-flush cooling system startup. The incident prompted city officials to ban fill-and-flush discharge for all data cente✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
theguardian.comCuban zoo celebrates birth of Bengal tigers amid energy crisisCuba's national zoo celebrated the rare birth of four Bengal tiger cubs, including a white tiger, amid severe fuel shortages and energy crises. Zookeepers maintain animal care despite receiving only 25% of needed diesel fuel, adapting by using horses, buggies, and electric tricycles while relying on✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
npr.orgMilitant LGBTQ+ rights group 'the Lavender Panthers' was founded on this day in 1973In 1973, gay preacher Ray Broshears founded the Lavender Panthers, a street vigilante group protecting LGBTQ+ people in San Francisco's Tenderloin from violent attacks. Though controversial and problematic, the group exemplified community-led mutual aid filling gaps left by a homophobic society, and✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
bbc.co.uk'Here to stay' - Fans react to the rise of soccer in the USThe BBC reports on growing soccer popularity in the United States as the 2026 World Cup draws large stadium crowds and widespread interest. Fans discuss whether soccer's rising profile in American culture represents a lasting shift in the sports landscape.✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
The VergecastWe finally have a Trump Phone | The Vergecast LivestreamA hands-on autopsy of a phone that shouldn't exist, revealing what modern smartphone hardware actually costs to build right — and why branding alone can't fake it. The Trump phone becomes a perfect accidental case study.✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50
UsefulChartsWho Would Be King of America if George Washington Had Been a Monarch? [Updated]A deceptively playful 'what if' that keeps cashing out into real history — slavery, Civil War allegiances, DNA science, and Black aristocracy hiding in plain sight. The Washington family tree is a funhouse mirror held up to America itself.✦ Read ad free and get the full MichaelFilter · $5.50“The day began with absence. The annual Independence Day parade down Constitution Avenue — something I had planned to photograph — was canceled because of extreme heat. Washington had just endured some of its hottest days on record, with the heat index nearing 108 degrees.
Though it seems nobody has contracted the potentially deadly bacterium as a result of Meta’s fill-and-flush, the city’s response to the incident underscores the degree to which people across the US are scrutinizing data centers — and the undeniable impact they have on their neighbors.
Be the Filter
It’s about how to learn from imperfect teachers without swallowing their whole worldview along with the useful stuff.
Read the essay →
Stop Making Ashtanga a Cult! Part 1: The Problem
Michael Joel Hall offers a different approach to Ashtanga Yoga grounded in humanist values, personal agency, and inclusivity, rather than dogma or hierarchy.
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.
