KARMA YOGA TEACHERS ARE LISTED HERE IN LAST-NAME ALPHABETICAL ORDER.

Rachel Arnold teaches a creative and energetic vinyasa flow class that combines movement with breath, expression, and a bit of humor. She graduated from the 200-hour Yoga of Energy Flow Teacher Training (taught by Daniel Orlansky, Carrie Tyler, and Aaron Cantor) and has completed teacher trainings with Alice Senko (Hot Hatha) and Josh Summers (Yin Yoga). Rachel has also taken a variety of master classes and workshops with Barbara Benagh, Ana Forrest, Dharma Mittra, and David Swenson. Rachel has a Master of Music Degree and she enjoys teaching cello and performing with several ensembles in the Boston area. She also makes quirky crafts out of clay, felt, and any other medium that inspires her.

Rachel Bairstow found her way to Forrest yoga in 2007, after spending several years studying various styles of yoga, including Kripalu and vinyasa. After experiencing first-hand the empowering, transformative effect of Forrest yoga on her life, Rachel trained with Ana Forrest to help bring these vital teachings to her community. She encourages her students to adopt an inquisitive attitude to their yoga, to feel deeply into the unexplored parts of themselves, and to create change in their bodies and in their lives through the power of breath and intention. Her invigorating and intense classes are balanced by her heartfelt, compassionate approach to teaching yoga.

Alissa Bigelow began her yoga practice in Southern California more than 14 years ago under the direct guidance of her teachers Seane Corn and Max Strom.  Inspired by the intrinsic healing powers of yoga to transcend dark into light, Alissa steps onto her mat each day as both a student and a teacher.  Trained to teach in the PURE yoga tradition of strict Vinyasa Flow, her classes can be both vigorous and restorative. Her intention is to open the heart, mind and body to all possibilities and all probabilities.  She offers her students the opportunity to honor their own truth, moment to moment, linking each breath to the next through movement and awareness of the light within us all.

Elizabeth Brown M.A., has been teaching at Karma for five years. She began her formal training in 1992 with Sarah Powers, Tias Little and Paul Grilley in the Ashtanga, Iyengar, and Yin traditions. In 2001-2003 she lived in Siddha Yoga meditation centers in Oakland, California, and in Ganeshpuri, India, where she met John Friend and began training in Anusara Yoga. She currently studies formally with philosophers Dr. Douglas Brooks and Professor Paul Muller-Ortega; this work informs her classes, which include students from ages 5 to 80 years old. With over 1000 hours of training and ten years of yoga teaching in Northern California, Vietnam, Cambodia, Burma and Boston, Elizabeth leads international yoga and service retreats in Peru, Bolivia, Mexico and Tanzania. She brings a rich understanding of therapeutics, a strong meditation practice, and the desire for all students to align with their own innate freedom. Her classes are fun, dynamic, and strong. Her lightheartedness is contagious; students move easily to the next level of practice.

Steve Darwin was drawn to yoga in 1997 when personal health and business pressures became overwhelming.  After 3 months of a committed 5 day a week practice he noticed that all aspects of his life began to change.  Business decisions became clearer and his health began to balance.  Yoga created an awareness of alternative health opportunities that he still explores to this day – diet being key. As a direct result of his practice his once small and stress filled business has more than doubled in size and is managed with half the effort.

Christine Evans strives to help students at all levels of practice connect the mind, body, and spirit through a steady sequence that's balanced with meditative breath, cathartic sweat, and rooted in Forrest Yoga. She started studying yoga when her life was in need of grounding, and Forrest Yoga helped her find strength, space, and connection in her body that translated into finding vitality and peace off the mat. She completed the 200 hour Forrest Yoga Teacher Training with Ana Forrest, the Body Awakening, a 500 hour yoga and myo-fascial yoga therapy with David Vendetti, and Cranio Sacral I at the Upledger Institute. Christine received her Master’s in Divinity from Harvard while studying religion and the body. She currently works with yogaHOPE, a non-profit yoga outreach program dedicated to bringing the practice of yoga to underserved women in life transition as well as with the chaplaincy at Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

Hannah Emlen is a licensed Anusara-Inspired yoga teacher who has been teaching yoga since 2003. Originally from the coast of Maine, she has recently returned to New England after living in Austin, Texas for the past five years. Her greatest aim is to instill truthful, accurate and radiant living both on and off the mat. She is devoted to recognizing, embodying and sharing the abundance of life, and the transformational power of yoga. Hannah’s classes blend biomechanical precision, artful expression, breath and silence, and she strives to offer asana practices that are both physically challenging and nourishing to the spirit. In addition to the brilliant instruction of so many Anusara teachers, including John Friend, Christina Sell, Charly Pivert, and Elena Brower, her teaching style is supported by many years of study with Baron Baptiste. She holds a BA in Music from Swarthmore College, and is completing a Master's degree in Clinical and Somatic Psychology. She is currently pursuing Anusara Yoga certification. For more information, please visit: www.yogaforinspiredliving.com

Jenn (Pici) Falk is a Yoga Alliance certified Vinyasa instructor with 12 years of practice and 6 years of teaching under her belt. A former collegiate distance runner and lifelong athlete, Jenn turned to yoga for guidance to balance out her body and mind. She finds that all types of yoga provide healing if one should open themselves to it, and welcomes people of all levels to be challenged and inspired by it. She hasn't studied with any one teacher, but rather takes in a variety of knowledge from all over the yoga map, and looks forward to continuing the journey and focusing deeper in her studies with topics such as body/energy work, pre/postnatal yoga, ayurveda, yoga therapy and beyond.  She creates her “flow” series for the day depending on the students’ energy, the moon cycles, and her own creative inspiration. Jenn uses music (mostly Icelandic) to guide the flow of each class and loves tuning in to her students' moods and energies.  She has taught at Karma Yoga Cambridge for 5 years, and has led yoga trips to Iceland and Dominica, with more of those to come.  She lives in Somerville with her husband and son.

Larisa Forman was born in Yakutiya, Russia, and started practicing yoga in 1994. Since then, she has received her 200 hours teacher training in PranaVayu Yoga with David Magone in Boston and is a graduate of Advanced 600 hour Life of a Yogi teacher training with Sri Dharma Mittra in NYC. Larisa loves yoga, Sanskrit, pranayama and meditation. Om Shanti.

Andrea Fotopoulos, Anusara–Inspired Yoga Instructor, first stepped onto the mat and into the practice of yoga in 1995. She had no idea then how it would profoundly shift her own life. She received her original 200 hour training certification in Hatha Yoga in 2004, but soon after immersed herself in training and skillful action in Anusara. She steadily surfs the waves of her own unfolding as an Anusara-Inspired Teacher to which she has offered hundreds of hours of study, playful self inquiry and a desire to serve others to really see their own beauty. Her classes are focused on the beauty of alignment and the playfulness of spirit as a gateway to becoming more powerful. Andrea teaches her students to always start with a solid foundation from which they can expand themselves into their own greatness. She believes the way to align with your heart is through fun and playful engagement of all that life has to offer. She is profoundly grateful to all her teachers for their wisdom and ability to laugh, especially John Friend, Stacey Rosenberg, Abby Tucker, Paul Muller-Ortega and Douglas Brooks.

James Gotz has been practicing vinyasa yoga daily since 2003, and under the guidance of his teacher Bo Forbes since 2005. Initially a (successful) tool to lose weight and manage the stress of his legal career, yoga now provides James with a blueprint for mindful living and a healthy body, mind, and spirit. A graduate of Bo's Elemental Yoga Mind-Body 200-hour and advanced 500-hour training programs, James regularly assists Bo in national workshops and continues under her supervision at the Center for Integrative Yoga Therapeutics. Through a dedicated focus on alignment and safety, James guides his students in Elemental Yoga’s approach towards optimal mind-body growth. A heart-opening, humor-filled and empowering style infuses his challenging-but-slow-paced classes and private therapeutic sessions. Besides his regular class, James generously gave his time and expertise as a Flow Yoga instructor so that all donations from the 'Karma' Class he taught on Sundays at 6 p.m. went directly to rescue projects for locally-abandoned animals.

Caroline Harvey has been a teacher, writer/performer and health practitioner for over a decade and works as a yoga and dance instructor, a doula (birth attendant) and is in private practice as a Somatic Therapist. Caroline holds a Master’s Degree in Arts & Cultures from UCLA and is a grateful student of yoga pioneer Ana Forrest, Insight Yoga founder Sarah Powers, and Michael and Anneli Molin-Skelton, creators of the dance practice SpiritWeaves. Caroline is a registered member of the United States Association for Body Psychotherapists and is honored to be a Teaching Assistant for the Upledger Institute for CranioSacral Therapy, the most comprehensive CST training venue in the world. When not on the yoga mat, Caroline teaches and performs poetry nationwide. She is an Artist in Residence at Berklee College of Music, was featured in two documentaries and appeared on Season 5 of HBO’s Def Poetry. Caroline names creativity, honesty, self-awareness and transformation as her pillars of integrity; her classes are challenging, smart, nurturing and safe. To contact Caroline, visit www.carolineharvey.com.

Kythe Heller bio coming soon.

Krystin Hicks believes that yoga is accessible to everyone, on and off the mat. The physical work of the asanas is what originally drew her in after suffering some serious dance injuries that needed rehabilitation. Yoga soon opened venues that allowed her to heal emotionally as well as physically, and she was left craving the deeper understanding of a yoga practice off the mat. The ongoing process guided her into places she thought she would never venture, including a yoga teacher training in 2006. Krystin has an extensive dance background and in her classes she incorporates movement that is similar to both dance and yoga, which sometimes means stepping outside the boundaries of the mat and allowing movement and the intuition of your own body to affect the practice. She teaches with a light heart and an open mind; she invites you to do the same when you practice with her and as you flow through life.

Ryan Hill simply adores yoga, in the geekiest way.  His classes express how each asana (or yoga pose) is a vehicle with which to practice putting the mind inside of the body and aspiring to heal.  Anybody can get into that :)  He has found that by focusing on the breath's rhythm and subtleties of sensation he can create a space that moves beyond the mind's drama.  Ryan believes that when we can participate in each posture with a sense of surrender to what's available to our body, we can more decisively walk on the path that our lives provide us and experience a happy body, free of injury.  After extensive study at South Boston Yoga, Ryan participated in their 500-hour teacher training in 2009.  Nothing makes him more enthusiastic than expressing his experience.  Ryan teaches actively around Somerville/Cambridge.  He sends his deepest gratitude out to the teachers who have influenced him most, opening the doors of his heart:  David Vendetti, Cat Kabira, Peter Crowley and Barbara Benagh.  More at ryanhillyoga.com

An Li Liu bio coming soon.

Karma Longtin was born in Florida to a family of hippies and named after the "karmic" link found in her parents' astrological charts. After moving to Boston ten years ago, she turned to yoga as a way to heal her intense back and joint pain, discovering a solace that inspired her to become a teacher in 2002. Karma embraces many different styles of yoga including power, vinyasa and restorative hatha and plans to continue on her path of exploration with a power yoga teacher training at Open Doors this fall. Her classes focus on the connection of body, mind and breath in order to tap into your prana flow and deepen your practice. She encourages everyone to find the practice that is right for them in order to realize their own path to self-discovery and personal transformation.

Kate Minogue was looking to deepen her meditation practice when she was introduced to yoga in 2005. The practice deeply challenged her but soon revealed its power to soften and strengthen in ways she never would have imagined! Now a devoted student of asana, meditation, and the life-affirming philosophy of Anusara yoga, Kate practices yoga because it helps her to be her best self: physically, mentally, and spiritually. She teaches yoga because she loves to share its potential with others! Her classes are welcoming, challenging and playful, inviting students of all levels, exactly as they are, to experience more power and freedom. Kate completed her 200 hour Anusara Teacher Training with Bernadette Birney in 2010, and has trained with John Friend, Marc St. Pierre, Sarah Faircloth, Kelley Gardner, and Stacey Millner-Collins, among many others. She studies philosophy and meditation with renowned scholars Paul Muller-Ortega and Douglas Brooks. Kate is also an avid musician and songwriter, and loves to offer her voice, flute and guitar playing in kirtan.

Dr. Long Nguyen has learned and practiced meditation, qigong, and martial arts since his early teens in the temples of south Vietnam. However, for a period in his life, the stresses of life distracted him from his path. After discovering the healing effect of yoga, Long regained his original self, reconnected with his inner-being and resumed the practice of internal arts.  He went on to be certified in the Sivananda Yoga tradition in the Himalayas.  He further developed his yoga practice while studying in the US. and has trained with Anna Forrest, John Friend, and Pattabhi Jois.

To develop his spirituality and character, Long trekked to Gomukh, the glacial origin of the Ganges, and meditated in the sacred caves of the Sivananda tradition in Gangottri.  He has climbed the Yen-Tu mountain to meditate in the sacred caves of Chua Huong, and visited other sacred places in Vietnam and India. Long had learned meditation with Thay Thich Nhat Hanh and Thay Thich Thanh Tu, as well as with other American teachers.

As a Harvard-trained researcher in mind-body medicine, alternative medicine, and public health, Long’s teaching combines scientific knowledge with the traditional wisdoms that he had learned from his internal arts teachers in his native Vietnam.  Long is a recent graduate of the post-doctoral fellowship in Integrative Medicine jointly offered by Harvard Medical School Center for Integrative Care and the General Internal Medicine Division of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.  He is also a graduate of Harvard School of Public Health’s Masters of Public Health program.  Dr. Nguyen, PhD, MPH is an active researcher and author of several research articles in Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM), mind-body medicine, and health care of the underserved.  He has strong research interests in the roles of healthy living and self-practices in reducing national overall cost of health care. He was a member of Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative’s health care think tanks in 2009 & 2010.

Dr. Nguyen has taught Yoga, Qigong, and meditation to students at HSPH, and adults in greater Boston areas (visit www.atman-yoga.com & www.drnguyen.org  for details).

Josh Summers is a licensed acupuncturist, a yin yoga instructor and a mindfulness consultant.  He recently co-authored, The Buddha's Playbook: Strategies for Enlightened Living.  After college, Josh spent several years living abroad in India, Taiwan and Burma where he studied both yoga and meditation. As his interest in vipassana or insight meditation developed, so too did his interest in more contemplative forms of yoga practice. With a professional background in Oriental Medicine and a personal passion for the dharma, Josh fell in love with Yin Yoga as a beautiful synthesis of these two interests.  He now teaches throughout the United States and Europe.  www.joshsummers.net

Marc St. Pierre's journey began over 10 years ago when he asked a friend about where would be a great place to "do some real yoga." His friend guided him to City Yoga Los Angeles in California when the studio was a little over a year old. "I had such great fortune to meet Anthony Benenati, Sue Elkind, and Naime Jezzeny, some of the 'founding yogis'; each of them had so much to offer and it was a sensational place to be...the birth of Anusara Yoga!" "It was like being a conspirator in a great revolution....like making yoga history!" Vive la Revolution! Marc is a Certified Anusara teacher known internationally and had the good fortune to establish Anusara on the fantastical island of Maui, where he lived for seven years. Marc now travels and teaches and cannot believe this is his "job!" Clearly, and with enormous gratitude for the Anusara community, and for John Friend, Marc celebrates teaching yoga as his vocation and service. "Marc is a loving and knowledgeable kick in the pants!"

Mary Thomas received her training in the traditions of Hatha and Power Yoga through the Open Doors Power Yoga 200hr Teacher Training Program. Mary is also Usui Reiki I attuned. Mary is honored and humbled by adding teaching to her personal practice and hopes to bring her personal vigor for the practice of asana, meditation, and its benefits to each of her classes. Mary believes in the power of yoga to heal, transcend suffering, transform, and liberate the Self mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. The following teachers inspire Mary's practice and teaching: Bonnie Argo, Baron Baptiste, Barbara Benagh, Bec Conant, Seane Corn, Shawn Cornelison, and Ana Forrest. Committed to community and Seva (self-less service) Mary currently volunteers as a yoga instructor for P.R.E.P.-a First Episode, Early Psychosis Program in Boston, Massachusetts that provides treatment to emergent adults who are experiencing psychotic symptoms for the first time. In addition, Mary is in attendance at Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts studying Human Development and Early Childhood Education. She loves traveling also finds delight in cooking vegetarian soul food, learning how to surf, running, and learning Spanish. Reading is her favorite pastime.

Lama Geshe Wangdu was born in Tibet. In 1985, at the age of 14, he moved to India to study Buddhist psychology, philosophy and meditation in the Sera Mahayana Buddhist Monastic University in south India. He spent over 15 years in the Monastery and earned the venerable title Geshe (Doctorate of Buddhist philosophy). He now resides in the United states and teaches Buddhist philosophy and meditation. He also gives all occasion blessings and prayers, as well as hospice care giving. Lama Wangdu is very active in movements for world peace and has been a world peace Ambassador in conferences in South Korea and a youth Ambassador for peace in Washington D.C. At a private audience with the His Holiness The Dalai lama in Dharamsala in 2006, Lama Wangdu received formal appreciation for his work in fostering interfaith and global peace.

Jesse Winder is a certified yoga teacher who has been practicing and teaching clients in the Boston area for over fifteen years. He founded Karma Yoga Studio in Cambridge in 2002 to serve as a welcoming community center offering a wide range of yoga styles and related Eastern methods of fitness. Over years of studying and teaching, Jesse developed the PhysioYoga method (see PhysioYoga under class descriptions), a unique yoga style that combines two seemingly disconnected approaches: the ancient hatha yoga traditions with modern-day, evidence-based scientific research in biomechanics and sports medicine.

Jesse has come to believe that, in addition to the wisdom of traditional yoga training, scientifically-verifiable facts and serious attention to injury prevention should be cornerstones in our contemporary teaching and practice of yoga. To this end, Jesse studied for over 6 years with a certified physical therapist and Iyengar-trained yoga teacher, Kim Amlong, while developing the PhysioYoga concepts. His classes are heavily focused on three issues: proper anatomical alignment, joint protection and health, and effective body mechanics.

These areas of emphasis make Jesse's classes ideal for yoga novices, people with injuries, and core-conditioned athletes in training looking to achieve an optimal balance between strength and flexibility. Jesse has had the distinction of teaching PhysioYoga for the past eight years to medical clinicians in the Alternative Medicine Immersion Program at the Natural Standards Center, the foremost authority in peer-reviewed research in integrative medicine.

Jesse has an avid interest in and vast knowledge of holistic nutrition, herbology and alternative systems of medicine, and is also a certified chi kung instructor. His interest in yoga actually developed while studying Eastern meditation and the internal martial arts, which led him to include many of the synergies present between the two practices into his classes. Constantly updating his knowledge, Jesse will complete the Harvard Medical School Clinical Training in Mind-Body Medicine program in June 2012.

As part of his personal 'karma yoga' ('service to others' in Sanskrit), Jesse donates his time and resources to issues close to his heart: economic justice and animal rights causes in his local community. He teaches numerous free yoga classes to various programs aimed at underserved populations, including Harvard University's Phillips Brooks House, co-founded and sits on the Board of Directors of C.A.R.E. (Community Animal Rescue and Education), the first and only Cambridge-based animal rescue and adoption organization, and volunteered weekly for the homeless meals program at the First Church in Cambridge.

In accordance with ahimsa, Jesse lives a vegan lifestyle and incorporates environmental sustainability and social justice goals in all of Karma Yoga Studio's business practices. He is a firm believer that business should only be conducted as an agent of progressive change in our society, and hopes the currently budding age of social entrepreneurship and ethical investment practices will help transform our world for the better. For his role as a local business leader, he has had the distinction of speaking at the Harvard University Leadership Institute Forum on Entrepreneurship and Innovation.  He lives in Cambridge with his long-term partner and over a dozen rescued animals.