I was first introduced to Iyengar yoga 14 years ago while pregnant with my son, Cole. Through that practice I enjoyed better balance during my pregnancy, both emotionally and physically, and an overall sense of well-being right up to Cole’s delivery. I will never know for certain if it was due to yoga, but my labor was fairly short, I did not require an epidural, and Cole came into the world ten minutes after we got to the hospital!

     After the early years of sleep deprivation were over and Cole was enrolled in preschool, I decided to turn back to yoga as a means of stress reduction and exercise. I took Hatha yoga classes at the Ridge Athletic Club in Bozeman, Montana, and practiced for about seven years. I again enjoyed a sense of balance and well-being, even in the midst of a divorce, and realized as I left each class that yoga was something I wanted to integrate to a greater degree in my life and share with others.

     In the fall of 2011, I enrolled in Nancy Ruby's teacher training through YogaMotion, committing to the nine-month, 200-hour certification program. As life would have it, I was diagnosed with breast cancer in the spring of 2012, three months short of finishing the program. I underwent surgery and finished up the teacher training workshops, beginning cancer treatment in the summer of 2012. I used aspects of my teacher training throughout the next seven months and credit much of my sanity and recovery to the techniques I learned. I finished the coursework for certification and graduated from the program in June of 2013.

     You Are Here Yoga is an extension of the perspective I have gained from this training, and the beautiful gift we call Life! I look forward to sharing it with you.