Rising Stars: Meet Kinjal Patel of Santa Monica

Today we’d like to introduce you to Kinjal Patel.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
I’m Kinjal, a yoga instructor in LA. I grew up in Connecticut, and am a New England child who feels so lucky now being next to the Pacific Ocean! The ocean soothes me like nothing else.

I am the first of my family to be born in the US. My family is Indian, Gujarati specifically. I grew up bilingual in English and Gujarati, and I also speak Hindi. I grew up watching my grandparents do daily spiritual and yoga practices. I think the first time I ever heard the word “yoga” used in the family was when, as a college student, I said I was going to go take a yoga class. For my grandparents and other elders in my family, yogic practices are done as a part of routine and ritual, and so it wasn’t really called out: it is simply woven into the way of life.

I spent a lot of time happily reading as a child: reading taught me the world was bigger than my immediate circumstances, and it allowed me to exercise my imagination. I also really wanted to be a basketball player. Even though I was 5’10” by the 7th grade, I didn’t get too far with that aspiration. Alas.

I went to Brown for college and received my MD at Columbia. I completed my internal medicine residency at Columbia and a nephrology (kidney disease) fellowship at Harvard. As the first in my family to attend college in America, I was a low key poster child for the American dream. And also, often I felt like I was on an elite academic conveyor belt. But I met some of my best friends and got to learn from the most brilliant, dedicated educators in the world. It was really amazing, when I look back on it all.

While I was in medical school, Congress passed the Affordable Care Act/Obamacare. I was SO optimistic about reforming healthcare access in America. The promise of health policy improvements brought really exciting energy to us younger doctors! I was working in a director level role right out of clinical training, and that’s what first brought me out to LA.

Less than three years into that work, my grandma was ill, and still in Connecticut. I wanted to be near her and I wasn’t feeling strong conviction around my job. So I left my work, and went to her. After she was feeling better, I decided to take a break and do a yoga training. I joined a 200 hour summer intensive training in July 2018 at Pure Yoga in NYC.

That initial training is where I met my dear teachers, Yogi Charu and Kay Kay Clivio. I had no aspiration to be a yoga teacher when I joined, I just wanted some time with myself–I was a green, disillusioned doctor. By the end of that training month, I knew that I had to keep studying yoga. I started teaching yoga as well. I completed another 500 hours of training over the subsequent year. I also had my sweet grandparents’ blessings and advice as I kept learning. Connecting to yoga as an adult gifted me a dialogue of love and belonging with my ancestors and origins.

By the end of 2020, I knew that yoga was my path. I wanted to dedicate my professional life to helping people be their shiniest, happiest selves by empowering them with yogic tools to elevate their inner life. My clinical background combined with my yogic knowledge makes me uniquely suited to help my clients achieve their best health. For this purpose I founded my wellness service business, Rani♡Nani in December 2020. Rani means queen in Hindi and nani is maternal grandmother. My beautiful nani is my queen, and she is my wisest and favorite yoga teacher.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
My grandfather, my nana, who I called Dada, passed in July 2023. Because he and my nani, who I call Ba, raised me, he was my acting/functional dad. He was my best friend, and my most adoring cheerleader. And he loved that I taught yoga. He had an asana (yoga pose) practice that still inspires me. When he left Earth, it was hard for me to keep focus on what I wanted to build with my life, my yoga business .

If we are lucky, we have people in our lives who know our whole heart, our intent and our dreams. He was that type of person for me. I was that for him as well.

He had a full life and was eighty seven when he passed, so it was not untimely. And Ba is doing well, and will be ninety one in August. But I miss Dada everyday. Yoga and my spiritual life has grounded me and held me in the process of grief.

I feel that my teaching and empathy for others has transformed in the past couple of years because of these personal experiences. Now I feel like doing my best work is one important way I may honor him.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Teaching yoga for me comes from a place of service. It’s the same part of me that wanted to help people be healthy as a doctor. My clinical background distinguishes my yoga offerings, because I happily bring both perspectives to help my clients. I love seeing others claim their ability to safely heal themselves. I am lucky: I get to do the best work!

I see clients one on one privately for personalized sessions. I start with each new client by understanding their values and goals. This guides what I recommend, and we iterate on it together. I am a great fit for clients seeking to prevent or better manage chronic conditions, for those wanting to improve emotional well-being, and for those who don’t feel like they are getting all they need by learning yoga through group studio classes. This is the most direct way to up level your health.

For healthcare systems, yoga is a safe, effective tool to offer patients to compliment a western medical practice. I take referrals from clinician colleagues to work with their patients 1:1 to enhance their recovery and outcomes. My yoga services are a terrific compliment to rehabilitation programs and physical therapy. I also work with clinicians directly to support their personal habits, in harmony with their busy schedule.

I have offerings designed to support professional communities in feeling effective at work and fostering creativity, aka corporate wellness. This includes yoga and meditation sessions (virtual or in-person), stress management and resilience workshops, guided breathwork for focus, and lifestyle coaching grounded in both science and yogic wisdom.

I also teach group classes at studios, which is a great way to meet me and explore working together further! I am currently on schedule at Light on Lotus in Mar Vista and at Yogazan in Santa Monica: both are wonderful studios that run with integrity.

What was your favorite childhood memory?
There are three specific parks I remember spending a lot of time at with Dada. One of them had these perfectly slopped hills. Walcott Park. Dada taught me how to roll down the hills. Take your arms over the front of the body, keep the legs straight, and then just tumble down. Unmatched joy. We’d both roll down the hill, and then run back up, and do it again, over and over. That grass was so soft and it smelled great. Then when I was tired, we’d go home and have a snack with Ba.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.raninani.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kinjaldoesyoga/?hl=en
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kjalp/
• Twitter: https://x.com/kinjaldoesyoga

Image Credits
Nadia Tyson
Kat Mills Martin
Bee Skipton