Claire Smoker
Claire invites a felt sense of connection - to the earth, to self, and to the present moment - through her embodied presence and grounded flows. She encourages students to tune into their experience, creating space to be curious and notice.
Carolina Czechowska
Born and raised in Stockholm, Sweden, Carolina (Carro) Czechowska has been immersed in the body/mind world from a very young age. She is a professional modern dancer, and since 2019, a member/collaborator of the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company. With eighteen years of experience teaching classical Pilates, Carro has taught at many studios, universities, and international retreats, and has participated in several continuing education workshops. In 2017, she opened her boutique-style studio, Body Bottega, focusing on private sessions on all original Gratz apparatus. Carro has studied yoga extensively and recently completed her 200 Hour SmartFLOW Teacher Training. Carro's goal for her students is to condition them to have a holistic and functional mindset about exercising, well-being, and health. www.BodyBottega.com
Ann Thu Cung
Hi! You can call me Ann Thu(“Anne Two”) or Thu (“Two”).
My first yoga class was in 2009. I kept looking around in class to figure out what and how I “should” move my body and barely noticed my own
breathing. What a journey it’s been since then...
Working as a consultant, yoga gave me a reprieve from the stresses of life. I looked to it for physical relief and found mental clarity along the way. A few years ago, I left my corporate and civil service careers and decided to teach yoga. I share yoga because it has the power to transform. As someone whose dealt with spinal injuries and bouts of depression, I found healing through yoga.
As a second generation Vietnamese American, bi, vegan, and so much more, I find yoga gives me space to simply be me.
Many who come to practice yoga are looking for change, physical, emotional, spiritual. I offer a space to create change from within, and in doing so we can change the world around us.
Having studied with esteemed teachers – Anna Lunegova, Conor Byrnes, Yuri Ogawa, Vrinda Priti – I am grateful to the Jivamukti Yoga lineage founded by Sharon Gannon and David Life. Jivamukti 75HR, Spiritual Warrior, RYS 200 and trauma-informed certified, I offer healing hands-on assists, carefully crafted flows, and a soothing space for others to practice.
Sophia Mallie
Sophia, a yoga instructor, singer and sound bath facilitator brings a deeply embodied approach to transformation. Her journey from the pursuit of perfection in dance to finding balance through yoga informs her compassionate teaching style. Through movement, breath, music and sound healing, she helps others feel at home in their bodies and cultivate joy from within.
Monica DiLullo
Monica (she/her) is a yoga instructor based in Oakland, with over a decade of experience in the practice. Having a background in dance, she passionately pursued it until a series of injuries during her youth led her to shift her journey. This turning point introduced her to yoga, not merely as a means of physical movement but as a profound source of connection and self-discovery. Over the years, Monica has ardently nurtured her yoga practice, delving deeper into its holistic benefits. Her mission as an instructor is to share this understanding and connection with her students. Rather than urging them to push their bodies to extremes, Monica encourages her students to listen to their bodies and practice mindfulness in the present moment. She guides them to inquire about what their bodies truly require, fostering a harmonious union of mind, body, and spirit.
Jill Lindsay
Originally starting her career as a high school biology teacher, Jill shifted her presence from the classroom to the yoga studio. After a bout with cancer, Jill realized the yoga she’d been practicing could help with pain management, mood regulation, and overall strength and wellbeing. Yoga became an anchor in her life, and her passion for yoga blossomed as her drive to teach persisted. Jill’s focus in her classes is to cultivate a healing environment and empower students to become more connected with their bodies and minds from a kind, compassionate, and humorous perspective. After receiving her 200-hour training from the White Lotus foundation in Santa Barbara with Ganga White and Tracy Rich, Jill expanded her discipline to teach therapeutic yoga. Her teaching style is informed by Harvey Deutch and received both her 100 and 50 hour advanced training under his mentorship and still works with him on various retreats and advanced trainings. After over 1,000 hours of training, Jill became a Certified Yoga Therapist through the Stress Management Center in Marin.
Therapeutic yoga is a process of meeting the yogi where they are, of empowering individuals by helping increase self-awareness and learning how to work within one’s own strengths and limitations. The goals of this practice can include reducing or eliminating symptoms that cause suffering while improving foundation and function. Therapeutic yoga is not just for the maturing or injured, it is a practice every body can benefit from by going deep in a safe and healing way.
Jabari Martin
As a former D1 college football player and track and field athlete, Jabari understands the power of the body and mind connection. Born and raised in the Virgin Islands, he kickstarted his career in 2010 as a NASM-certified personal trainer in Texas by working with professional endurance athletes. Jabari's career evolved into leading strength, conditioning, and corrective exercise, helping aging athletes become stronger and pain free. Alongside his career in personal training, Jabari has works as a Registered Dietitian. Jabari's commitment to nutrition led him to serve as a nutrition consultant to NBA Champion, Shaun Livingston, where he shared his expertise in optimizing athletic performance through diet. But he didn't stop there! Driven by his passion to provide athletes with the nutrition they need, he founded GRIT Superfoods, crafting nutrient-dense snacks tailored for peak performance.
Dominique Cowling
Dominique (she, her) is a Bay Area native dedicated to transforming trauma and violence into opportunities of embodied liberation. She is honored to share tools of mindfulness and trauma informed yoga for collective healing. For the past decade, her community based work has centered the self determination of BIPOC and LGBTQ2+ communities. As the former Healing Justice Program Director at Community United Against Violence she supported queer and Trans survivors of intimate partner violence, hate violence and violence from the police. In addition to being a dedicated student to politicized healing movements, she completed her yoga teacher training at Namaste Yoga + Wellness and Relax and Renew (Level 1) Restorative Yoga training with Judith Lasater. She believes that Restorative Yoga is one powerful way to support the nervous system and be a catalyst to the transformation we want to see for our future. Dominique's work is deeply guided by her relationship to spirit and the natural world. Through her business, Black Seeds Project she provides individual and group sessions in the outdoors. These sessions explore ways to deepen our relationships through the lessons from mama nature. Visit her website at brownsugayogini.com.
DeShauna Anderson
DeShauna is a Certified Professional Coach and Certified Yoga Instructor based in Berkeley, CA. With a background as a former Marriage and Family Therapist, she has extensive experience supporting system-involved youth, including those in foster care and probation. DeShauna is passionate about affordable housing, having previously worked as a property manager and understanding the complexities of the process for those in need. Her coaching style emphasizes mindfulness development, with a focus on intuitive, holistic practices, including breathwork, pausing, and client-driven techniques. In yoga, she fosters an inclusive, safe, and alignment-driven approach. DeShauna uses she/her pronouns, is married, has one daughter, and is surrounded by animals, plants, and geodes. Outside of work, she enjoys traveling, biking, and spending time with her family and friends.
Gabrielle Cardoza
Proud Latina, daughter of immigrants, born & raised in the Bay Area. I’ve been a yoga instructor in Oakland since 2017. My goal in class is to make sure students feel supported, seen, appreciated & loved in their practice above anything else. I strive for students to leave class feeling validated & empowered. My classes are designed to cultivate a balance of strength & grace while you explore your internal physical & mental boundaries on the mat. I believe that laughter, music, and playfulness should have a space in a modern movement practice just as much as mediation & breathwork does.
Andréa Hill
Andréa has been fortunate to live in the San Francisco Bay Area her whole life. She was introduced to yoga at the age of 17, when her friend brought her to her first yoga class and she has been hooked ever since. She continued to fall in love with yoga while working and traveling through Australia and New Zealand. She completed her first 200 Yoga Teacher Training in San Francisco in 2016, she has continued to expand her knowledge since then participating in different trainings. Andréa’s teaching is a balance between a traditional practice and an individual style, mirroring her personality; playful, open-minded and yet supportive and calm. She remains a humble student of yoga and celebrates each opportunity to share her practice with her students.
Rose Allen
Rose (she/her) began her movement practice at the age of seven, studying ballet intensively through high school and falling into modern dance in college. She gravitated to yoga asana as a natural complement to her dance practice after graduating, finding that it strengthened and balanced her body and awareness in her dancing. Her choreographic dance background strongly influences her teaching resulting in creative, playful, yet adaptable sequencing. Rose hopes to share her passion for movement and yoga asana with humans of all ages and abilities and to support her students in finding ways of moving that help them find their power, grace, and curiosity in their movement and the rest of their lives.
Rose completed her 200-hr yoga teacher training at the former Vibe Yoga with Jonathan Rickert. She has completed additional training in Trauma Center-Trauma Sensitive Yoga, Mama Tree Prenatal Yoga, Restorative Yoga, and Yoga for Teens, among others.
If she’s not at work or in the studio, Rose can often be found planning her next travel adventure or hanging out with her rescue pup, Katsu.
Jill Lindsay White
Originally starting her career as a high school biology teacher, Jill shifted her presence from the classroom to the yoga studio. After a bout with cancer, Jill realized the yoga she’d been practicing could help with pain management, mood regulation, and overall strength and wellbeing. Yoga became an anchor in her life, and her passion for yoga blossomed as her drive to teach persisted. Jill’s focus in her classes is to cultivate a healing environment and empower students to become more connected with their bodies and minds from a kind, compassionate, and humorous perspective. After receiving her 200-hour training from the White Lotus foundation in Santa Barbara with Ganga White and Tracy Rich, Jill expanded her discipline to teach therapeutic yoga. Her teaching style is informed by Harvey Deutch and received both her 100 and 50 hour advanced training under his mentorship and still works with him on various retreats and advanced trainings. After over 1,000 hours of training, Jill became a Certified Yoga Therapist through the Stress Management Center in Marin.
Therapeutic yoga is a process of meeting the yogi where they are, of empowering individuals by helping increase self-awareness and learning how to work within one’s own strengths and limitations. The goals of this practice can include reducing or eliminating symptoms that cause suffering while improving foundation and function. Therapeutic yoga is not just for the maturing or injured, it is a practice every body can benefit from by going deep in a safe and healing way.
Ellen McCoy
Ellen has been practicing yoga for over 20 years. Initially drawn to the physical aspect of the practice, over time, she started to experience the benefits of body awareness and mindfulness that came with regular practice. Receiving her RYT® 200 in 2023, Ellen studied with teachers who collaborated to share their combined knowledge of teaching, anatomy, philosophy, and history. She continues her studies by working with many of the same teachers, expanding her awareness of alignment and movement. Eager to share her enjoyment of yoga, Ellen sequences classes for students to feel comfortable and confident and hopes to bring a sense of body awareness and play to the practitioner.
Annie Carpenter
BIO.
Known as a “teachers’ teacher,” Annie is the creator of SmartFLOW Yoga, an intelligent marriage of mindful movement with compassionate, wakeful alignment. Annie creates practices that are at once advanced and challenging, yet safe and playful. Practicing yoga since the 70s, she worked with the Martha Graham Company in the 80’s and continues to be a dedicated student (geek!) of anatomy, evolutionary movement, meditation and classical philosophy. Annie is the author of RelaxDEEPLY, a CD of restorative yoga, and Yoga for Total Back Care,” a DVD produced by Yoga Journal, and several SmartFLOW manuals. She contributes regularly to Yoga Journal. An influential Teacher Trainer since 2003, Annie is based in CA and teaches globally. www.anniecarpenter.com
Reba Gray
Reba stumbled upon yoga around 2002. She was living in Boston after returning from the Peace Corps in Mali, an experience that taught her about the real power of community. Seeking ways to process her time abroad, and looking for community within a busy city, she was fortunate to discover both in a yoga studio. She practiced and trained to teach for eight years before moving to California.
She grew up in Maine, but has been obsessed with the California lifestyle from a young age--cue palm trees, Highway 1, beaches. Reba moved to Oakland, California in 2010 to deepen her practice and diversify her yoga studies (and to escape the east coast winters). She mainly teaches alignment-focused vinyasa flow yoga, meditation, and pranayama practices, and has studied yin yoga. She also enjoys collaborating with the Love Your Brain Foundation, supporting those with traumatic brain injury (TBI) by sharing yoga and meditation practices. Reba is continually participating in advanced trainings and mentorships with many teachers in the Bay Area, and expanding her offerings as her practice evolves. Visit her website at rebagray.com for more information.
Leslie Howard
BIO.
Leslie Howard is an Oakland-based yoga teacher, specializing in all things pelvic. She leads workshops and trainings nationally and has written a book about the female pelvis, Pelvic Liberation. She is a regular presenter for the Yoga Journal conferences and a regular contributor to Yoga Journal magazine. Her own struggles with healing her hips and pelvis led her to intense study of the anatomy, physiology, cultural messaging, history and energetics of this rich place. Her teaching is informed by over 3500 hours of yoga study with senior Iyengar yoga teachers, notably Manouso Manos from 1998-2008 and Patricia Walden. She considers Ramanand Patel her most important influence and mentor. She has designed two very successful studies for UCSF on yoga to alleviate incontinence and pelvic pain. To learn more about Leslie, visit: www.lesliehowardyoga.com
Kim Lally
A self-confessed adrenaline junkie, Kim found yoga as an antidote to too much running. She started with Bikram and cherished the 90 minutes of pure focus on movement with breath. The peaceful calm and emotional release was transformative. Eventually, she switched to CorePower where the sequencing was more creative. Finally, Annie Carpenter's SmartFLOW Yoga transformed her body and mind. In 2016, she completed her 200 Hour Teacher Training with SmartFLOW. Kim loves to sprinkle some introspection, a meditative quote and some brain/body exercises into each of her classes. Anatomy and Alignment are her secret geeky passions, along with her family and a daily walk with her adorable dogs.
Jody Hahn
BIO.
Jody took her first yoga class in 2001 in Los Angeles, inspired by a friend who had demonstrated a handstand at work. She remembers that first class well – the physical challenge and the focus required, mixed with an exciting feeling of clarity. She did not do a handstand that day but she was hooked on yoga, and two years later graduated from The Center for Yoga Teacher Training Program in LA. She has been teaching ever since.
Her classes are infused with the philosophy that we are, all of us, engaged in a process at all times which can be illustrated by finishing any statement with “yet”: “I can’t do this (yet)”… “I’m not flexible (yet).” If we can be involved in the process and not focused solely on the outcome, then both the process and the outcome may be surprising and rewarding. We are explorers – discovering poses, discovering mental clarity, discovering how we deal with challenges and, maybe, discovering some spiritual awareness. Oh, yeah – and it helps to keep a sense of humor about all of it.
Keisha Courtney
Keisha found yoga when she was in a high-visibility, high-stress career as a TV news reporter. Her yoga practice helped her cope with anxiety not only in my job, but also in her daily life. She says she is thankful for her practice every day as it reminds her not to take myself too seriously, to breathe, and to be present.
She received her 200-hour training certificate from Namaste Yoga and Wellness Center, and has been trained by alignment instructor Whitney Walsh, who her classes are heavily influenced by.
Students who attend her alignment-focused vinyasa classes can expect a high energy class that will pique their curiosity about their own movement. Also, many of her students say her playlists tend to be the icing on the cake!
Keisha is an E-RYT 200 teacher, YACEP, and founder of The Driven Yogi, a continuing education platform that trains yoga teachers how to become safer, more effective, and inclusive instructors.