Women in business: meet the yoga teacher turned tech entrepreneur

Hazel Buckley had been teaching yoga for over a decade when she decided to go digital. She tells us how she discovered a new sense of peace and purpose in life through yoga and why she decided to take her practice to the next level.

How did you get into yoga?

My mum was a reflexologist and she always had a big interest in well-being. She was very much into healthy eating and healthy living, so I became interested in yoga because it was around me since I was a kid.

I took my first class with her when I was 17 and I was absolutely hooked. I loved it.

How did you start teaching yoga?

I studied computer science at UCC in Cork, but it was always in the back of my mind that I wanted to become a yoga teacher.

After I graduated, I started working in tech and I moved to London for a new job. However, six days after I got there, I found out my mum was diagnosed with cancer and I moved back to Ireland.

Moving back home and losing my mum triggered something in me and made me realise that I really wanted to be a yoga teacher. So I went into my teacher training and I followed my passion.

How did your wellness app come about?

I always wanted to bring my yoga classes more online because I’d see people leaving the class so happy and content, but then they may not practice yoga again for a whole week.

We often feel that it has to be a long practice in order to get the full benefit, but that’s really not the case. Showing up on the mat regularly is more impactful than doing one big class once a week. It doesn’t have to be such a big, big task.

I wanted to encourage people to have a home practice and to start slowly bringing a little bit more yoga into their everyday life.

I started to upload videos on my YouTube channel and then during the pandemic, when people couldn’t go to a studio, I started my online memberships that grew into The Yoga Tree app that we launched a month ago.

How was the process of building the app?

Building an app is like building a house – however long you think it’s going to take, it’s going to take way longer than that, and however much you think is going to cost, it’s going to cost much more than that.

I wanted to create a space for people to feel good and tap into different tools and different techniques to help them feel their best and I was lucky I had a background in tech because it gave me the confidence I needed to talk to my app developers and communicate with them.

I built it from scratch because I really wanted to have more control over the look and feel of it and now it’s like my fourth baby now. I absolutely love it!

Wellness apps have grown in popularity since the start of the pandemic. What makes The Yoga Tree special?

The Yoga Tree is a wellbeing app and its main pillars are yoga, meditation, self-care and nutrition.

What makes it really unique is that we have a section called ‘bespoke wellness’ where you can personalise your experience depending on your wellbeing goals, yoga experience and nutrition goals.

Teaching yoga over the years, I’ve learned that everybody is unique and everybody’s body is unique. So that’s why in the app, we’ve got over 500 videos, all varying different intensities, different experience levels, different themes and different focuses.

The nutrition is a big part of it as well. I am mostly plant-based and I love to help people introduce a little bit more plant-based food into their diet.

We have recipes that can help them improve their diet with support from our nutritional therapists and every day, we have a different self-care tip to inspire them to bring a bit of positivity in their life.

What feedback did you receive so far?

I have been blown away! The feedback has been really positive. A lot of people like the bespoke wellness section, because they can tap into what videos and practices are right for them.

Talking to my members and gathering feedback from them is extremely important to us because it helps us improve and tweak the app to create the best experience for them.

As we gather more data we plan on including more AI in the app. We can then offer suggested yoga videos, meditations and wellbeing practices according to our members’ behaviours.

What advice would you give to those who have never tried yoga before?

I think the most important thing is to listen to your body. Don’t push it too far, if it doesn’t feel right sit out the pose or take it back a step.

Yoga gives us a great opportunity to tap into how our body responds and how our body’s feeling. Through the practice of yoga we feel more grounded and more present.

I would say to people start off with short videos. Five minutes or maybe 15-minute videos, to keep the intensity low and see how you’re feeling.

Don’t be hard on yourself. The most important thing about yoga is being present and not whether you can touch your toes or not.

Over time, all that flexibility and strength comes. Enjoy the practice and be kind to yourself.

The Yoga Tree Community App is available now on App Store and Google Play.