If you had a teacher or class you enjoyed AT AHA YOGA please check our news tab for schedules and locations!

Inez

Inez Shedd Kwiatkowski, is the owner and founder of Aha Yoga, a Center for Health and Healing in Fair Oaks, California. She has been an inspired yoga teacher for the past 23 years. Some of her master teachers have included: Ana Forrest of Forrest Yoga, where she was an assistant trainer at Kripalu Yoga Center in Massachusetts

Aha Meditation & Breath
Aha Meditation & Breath will add to your overall health, well-being and help you experience a more profound enjoyment of life. This breath and meditation technique is a self empowering breath process that creates permanent deep healing. Everyone is welcome to join us in this magnificent breath and meditation class: Breathe better, have more energy and feel more peaceful and loving. This breathing process creates permanent, positive changes and permanently raises your vibrational field.

Aha breath work helps you to attain higher levels of consciousness. Aha breath work focuses on the energy and states you want to create, rather than paying attention to patterns you are trying to relieve. We use conscious intentions along with affirmations and invocations. We also work with pressure points on the body, and sacred sounding. All of these tools contribute to a more effective and complete resolution.
There are three parts to breath work:
1. Physical Mechanics – amount of air brought in
2. Clearing – clearing some of the major reasons why we shut down our breath to begin with

Once the lower sub-conscious begins to open and clear, it then creates an opening to the higher sub-conscious and that’s when we get to…

Soul Level – this connects to the level of the soul and helps heightened spiritual awareness

ANDREA KELLER

Andrea loves teaching yoga and it comes straight from her heart. She began practicing in 2003 and started teaching only after 8 devoted years on her own mat. Yoga has changed her life and helped her heal her mind, body, and spirit. It helped her end negative habits, patterns, and thoughts, and has brought peace, balance, and harmony into her life. She teaches because she wants to share the amazing journey of yoga with as many people as possible. She is grounded, peaceful, loving, playful, passionate, and compassionate. She will lead you through a challenging, yet peaceful class, focusing on synchronizing breath with movement. She is a 200-hour certified vinyasa yoga instructor. She continues to educate herself through workshops, trainings, reading, and her own yoga practice.

April Underwood 

CMT, CYT

April is simply a lover of movement, rhythm, dance, and fitness of all kinds!  April has been practicing and teaching various styles of yoga and fitness since 1991, and is trained and certified in Vinyasa Flow Yoga, Forrest Yoga, Pilates, and various other fitness disciplines including Insanity, and P90X!  She is also a post-rehabilitation specialist, working with clients recovering from injuries with the practices of Yoga, Pilates, and massage therapy. 

 A teacher of teachers, April is the director and co-author of the Transformative Yoga instructor training course, and teaches trainings and workshops several times a year.

 Although she has studied in depth with masters in the realm of breath, yoga, fitness, and overall wellness throughout the years, her committed personal practice has been the source of personal insights and knowledge that continue to evolve whatever she is teaching, to the ultimate dynamic, healing, and holistic practice for each individual.

April is also a licensed massage therapist and has a full time practice in Carmichael, California where she is also available to work with clients to help each person discover the yoga and fitness practice that is ideal for them.

Strength...Power...Grace...Serenity

BETH WILLEY

Beth first discovered the benefits and the power of yoga while preparing for the birth of her first child.  13 years and 4 children later, she is grateful everyday for her yoga practice and her powerful yoga breath.  Beth has practiced many types of yoga over the years, from studio classes to dvds at home.  A few years ago she discovered Bikram style hot yoga and she's been a dedicated practitioner since.  Beth fell in love with the discipline of hot yoga and finds practicing the 26 posture series to have a deeply meditative effect.  Following her heart, she was trained as a Bikram style teacher and has been teaching every since.  "I love teaching yogis of all fitness levels in this hot yoga series," says Beth, "I believe in the series and have experienced first had the benefits of the practice."   Beth teaches yoga because it provides balance in her busy and full life.  In addition to being the mother of 4 lively children, Beth is a wife, and is self-employed as a bookkeeper and small business consultant.  She and her family live in Fair Oaks.

Carly Mayer

“In dreams you often fall before you wake.”

You can always be taller or shorter, bigger or stronger, richer, smarter… or you can be YOU!  Yoga is not about changing who you are, but about learning to become the best possible version of yourself.  It is not about getting rid of the bad days or the hard times, but about learning how to make them just a little bit easier.  To become aware of yourself, your body and your breath, that is yoga.  My 200 hour yoga alliance certification with Yoga to the People in New York as well as my 4 years of teaching hot yoga, vinyasa and restorative has taught me that yoga isn’t just for the physically fit and flexible.  It can be for everyone.  In my class I urge you to let go of your expectations and your idea of “perfect” so that you can allow yourself to stumble and fall and maybe even have some fun!

Hometown: Seattle, WA

CECI ROBLES

Ceci Robles is an advanced yogi who has turned her attention to teaching others this joyful art & science.  Bringing special attention to breath, alignment and a warriors heart, Ceci is known for creative and smart  sequencing.  Her classes build physical strength and mental stamina. Her hands on assists and knowledgeable modifications of poses, asanas, allow each person to work to their highest abilities. Every class is a new adventure through twists, back bends and  inversions of spirit if not body.  All levels are welcome and will find the sweetness of a rich yoga practice.

Ceci is RYT 200, and yoga Alliance certified

Diana DeCesare

Diana DeCesare is a Holistic Health Coach, Reiki Healer, and Pilates Instructor. She was a NCAA Division One swimmer at Loyola Marymount where she got her BS in Pre-Physical Therapy. After working in the Physical Therapy Clinic for over 3 years, Diana realized patients needed more instruction and guidance to heal outside of their alotted physical therapy sessions. As a result, Diana decided to become a Certified Pilates Instructor through Body Arts and Science International. She is certified on all of the pilates apparatus and is focused on rehabilitation and injury prevention. Diana has overcome the challenges of injuries and being diagnosed with an auto-immune disease, and is therefore very knowledgable and compassionate when dealing with restrictions. Diana finds joy in empowering others to acheive better health through increased self awareness in all areas of one's life, including the mind, body, and spirit.

Karen Miscall-Bannon

Karen Miscall-Bannon began her yoga studies in 1985 with Eddie Modestini in Amherst, MA , in the Iyengar tradition, and discovered ashtanga vinyasa in 1999.  She practiced for 10 years on her own in rural upstate NY, and then moved back to Amherst, MA.  She began her studies with Patty Townsend at the Yoga Center Amherst in 2001, where she became certified at the 200-and 500-hour levels in Embodyoga®, and is certified at the E-RYT 500-hour level by Yoga Alliance.  She taught in the YCA’s teacher trainings starting in 2004, and co-led 200-hour teacher trainings starting in 2009 in Newington, CT. She recently relocated to CA where she is teaching classes, workshops, and is leading Embodyoga® 200-hour and 500-hour teacher training programs and a Mindful Yoga Therapy 100-hour teacher training with Suzanne Manafort.  Karen has extensive knowledge of anatomy, with a focus on yoga therapeutics, stemming from her bodywork practice of over 14 years.  Karen brings a deep love of yoga and yoga philosophy to her teaching, and is known for being able to make abstract concepts accessible to her students.  She gratefully brings what she has learned from her teachers and her own practice to her students, to assist them in deepening their awareness of body and mind through the practice of yoga.

 Gena Foreman

Gena’s approach to teaching is with passion and inspiration - her classes are a balanced fusion of informed, flow-style yoga with attention to healthy energetic alignment, spiritual intention and humor  - a culmination of over 20 years experience as both a student and teacher. An avid runner and mountain biker she came to yoga to relax and stretch; the feelings of peace, quiet, and strength interlaced itself into every facet of her life.

 In 2004 she completed her first 200hr Yoga Alliance approved training in the style of Forrest Yoga with Shannon Wells-Femenia. She has received certifications in Yoga Therapeutics, Functional Anatomy of Yoga and Yin Yoga and studied with master practitioners like Sianna Sherman, Ana Forrest, Ellen Heed, Paul Grilley and Heather Tiddens. Her workshops range from Yoga for Low Back Care, The Basic’s of Yoga and Foundations in Sun Salutations as well as co-teaching 200hr Teacher Trainings.

Through years of experience her yoga instructions are clear and concise, offering modifications to address injuries or the special needs of her students –  throughout her classes students learn that yoga is not a “one size fits all”  and that there are more than one way to be in a pose.

Gena is supportive and empathetic, known for her playful style of encouraging you to fearlessly navigate your edge to open your heart and boldly dive in!

Gena Foreman, E-RYT20

Stacy Whittingham

Stacy’s love of yoga continues to grow as she observes the transformational effects a regular yoga practice has on students, community, and within her own life. “Strengthening the body is wonderful, but strengthening the body, mind, spirit, and our community brings healing and wholeness. In this place, anything is possible.”

Stacy has received a good deal of her training through Rusty Wells of Urban Flow Yoga in San Francisco. Focusing on the Bhakti tradition, one of the four paths of yoga, music and devotion play a supporting role in all of Stacy’s classes. Bhakti is often described as the yogic path of devotion, emotion, love, compassion, and service to God and others.

Stacy has also studied with Michael Watson of Bermuda, Karen Miscall-Bannon of Embodyoga, Stephanie Snyder, and is influenced by the teachings of Sri Dharma Mittra, NYC, and Richard Rosen of Berkeley, California. Another great teacher who Stacy admires and has studied under is Mahendra Briksha of San Francisco. Mahandra Briksha specializes in breathwork and wellness cuisine.

In addition to vinyasa and yin yoga Stacy is also offers educational workshops focusing on “Practicing Kitchen Yoga” and the preparation of whole and living foods. She specializes in guided cleanses and offers private yoga sessions, nutritional consultations, and guided group cleanses. See www.stacyw.com for Stacy’s schedule and additional information. 

SHANNON TOBIN

Shannon Tobin teaches a powerful and playful class inspired by the Forrest Yoga traditions that ensures students are feeling inside the body, by concentrating on the core and connecting to the breath. 

Forrest Yoga is renowned as an intensely physical and internally focused practice that emphasizes how to carry a transformative experience off the mat and into daily life.  The practice challenges students to access their whole being and to use Forrest Yoga as a path to finding, and then cleansing, the emotional and mental blocks that dictate and limit their lives

Shannon will guide you through a challenging, safe and nurturing class intelligently sequenced with our modern bodies in mind.  Dissolving tension and tightness through breath and perspiration, you will leave feeling rejuvenated and restored.

Shannon's yoga journey began in 2004 and has brought changes and empowerment to her life that she never thought possible. She uses the empowerment of yoga to heal herself and others as the body and mind continue to evolve.  Shannon is passionate about Yoga education and has almost 1000 hours of yoga training in Forrest, Hatha and Acro Yogatraditions.

 Armed with her constantly evolving education, love, joy and compassion Shannon looks forward to meeting you on your mat.

Veazey