BIOS

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Melissa teaches a slow-flow style of yoga as a practice of surrender. She believes in its power to help us let go of thoughts that take us out the present moment and release resistance that hinders our range of motion and thinking. Ultimately, yoga can break down our deeper layers of ego and personal history and connect us with our true nature. Melissa’s classes are often challenging, but absolutely welcoming, non-intimidating, and safe with a focus on the process and not the outcome. She meets her students at whatever their level of experience and physical ability with a focus on safety and body awareness - so that they can keep coming back to the healing space of the yoga mat.

Melissa’s classes often start in child's pose, where students start to cultivate a beginner's mind. She leads students through flowing practice that connects asana and breath, gradually builds in intensity, and provides an opportunity to move more fully into the experience of the body in the present moment. The embodiment of the surrender practice is a sweet, dissolving savasana.

Melissa has been teaching yoga full-time since 2006 and was the Co-Director of the Southeast Yoga Conference for 12 years. Through her yoga classes, her yoga conference role, an appearance on local television, and interviews on public radio, Melissa has been a long-time advocate for yoga in Atlanta.

Led to yoga over 20 years ago during a time of Divine Discontent in her own life, Tra has been an avid yoga student ever since and has been sharing yoga’s powers to help facilitate self-healing and wholeness with others for 15 years. As a certified yoga therapist and life coach, Tra’s teaching integrates yoga with positive psychology and behavior science to help empower people to recognize and shift patterns that can lead to physical and mental pain and suffering. In her classes, Tra invites students to explore the ways in which they extrapolate meaning from their experiences and to cultivate a greater sense of freedom through self-understanding. Tra’s classes are infused with practical applications of yoga’s deeper teachings and explored through breath work, movement and postures, and mediation.

As a yoga educator, Tra has been developing and leading 200-hour and advanced level yoga teacher trainings throughout the United States since 2011. Tra has been a contributing writer to Elephant Journal, Yoga Therapy Today, and Natural Awakenings and is a featured teacher on the international YogaMate website. As a lover of travel and exploration, Tra leads soul-full yoga adventures and experiences to amazing locations throughout the world. When she’s not on the road teaching programs and leading yoga retreats, Tra teaches weekly classes and sees private yoga therapy and Thai bodywork clients in Atlanta and Decatur, Georgia.