Devi Healing Arts
My passion for holistic health emerged when I worked with activist groups in wilderness areas. We learned how to keep ourselves healthy while we worked to preserve the health of the planet using holistic healing modalities. From this moment, I found my calling. I realized that I wanted to connect the work we were doing to heal the planet and transform the larger culture with work to heal and transform ourselves internally.
I studied Herbal Medicine, Yoga, and Ayurveda while I was completing my undergraduate degree at the Evergreen State College in Washington State. I met Baba Hari Dass and the yoga community at Mount Madonna Center in the Santa Cruz Mountains, while working on a senior thesis on Yoga and Ayurveda. I felt pulled to connect to this ancient lineage of Yoga and moved to Mount Madonna Center in 2003 to deepen my study and practice. I completed Yoga Teacher Training at Mount Madonna Center in 2003 and have been on the teaching staff for the training since then. I continued my yoga training with Vinyasa-Flow Teachers including Shiva Rea, Duncan Wong, Sharon Gannon and David Life. My teaching style blends the ancient wisdom that I immersed in at Mount Madonna Center with the fluid and playful vinyasa flow style that I learned from my western teachers. I continue my immersion into the roots of Yoga thru studies of Classical Hindu Tantra, particularly as it inspires the practices of our yoga tradition.
In 2004, I completed a 1000 hour training in therapeutic massage at the Finger Lakes School in Ithaca New York. My training included eastern and western modalities of bodywork as well as a strong focus on anatomy, kinesiology, and medical massage. I moved to San Francisco in 2005 and began a full-time practice as a bodyworker and yoga teacher. Since then, I have been blessed with a diverse practice that includes everyone from children to athletes to elders. I feel that my bodyork is informed by yoga and my yoga teaching is informed by bodywork.
In 2006, after teaching yoga to at-risk youth for a year, I decided that I wanted to understand more about working with trauma and emotional patterns. I entered a Masters Degree program in Integral Counseling Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies. I have recently completed the program and am beginning a new synthesis in my work that can support deeper levels of healing and transformation.
My intention is to meet my clients and students where they are, whether healing from an injury, enjoying some gentle self-care, or seeking a deeper connection to the divine.
