[2] Beryl Bender Birch was educated at Syracuse University, where she read English and Philosophy.
[5] In 1981 she began to teach Ashtanga Yoga at the New York Road Runners Club; she later became Wellness Director there.
[2] She and her husband, the runner Thom Birch (1954–2006),[7] cofounded New York's "The Hard & the Soft Astanga Yoga Institute".
[2][4] Publishers Weekly writes of Birch's book Power Yoga: The Total Strength and Flexibility Workout that "... some readers may find Power Yoga narrowly prescriptive or severe.
She finds the account of the ashtanga primary series in Beyond Power Yoga condensed and "sometimes confusing", but writes that the book provides a non-threatening introduction to the seven other limbs of ashtanga yoga beyond the physical.