Morgan stumbled into hot yoga after half a lifetime of dance and quickly fell in love.  She found that yoga filled the movement void in her life after dance and helped her gain a greater understanding of her body as well as correct her long standing alignment issues. 

After two trainings and eight years of teaching locally in Richmond, Morgan took a break from yoga to reevaluate what was most important and what yoga meant to her.  After a roller coaster of life events, she started practicing at Humble Haven and was quickly enthralled with the talent of each and every teacher.  Hoping to hone her craft, she signed up for Humble Haven’s 2023 YTT.  She is excited to begin this new chapter of her yoga journey.

Have you met our Director of Operations? Rachel B. comes to Humble Haven with a teaching background in spin and HIIT classes. In 2021, Rachel jumped on our schedule teaching bootcamp and yoga build classes. She quickly fell in love with Journey into Power practice so much so that she completed her Level One Baptiste training in 2022, and at the end of 2022, she began working full time for Humble Haven as our Director of Operations. She sees herself as a forever student both as an instructor and in her everyday life. If you find yourself in one of Rachel's classes, she's going to make you work, but she's also going to make you giggle. Life is always going to come with its challenges and Rachel's solution is simple: just do more yoga. Keep showing up for the practice, and for yourself. Come drink the kool-aid, you won't regret it. Outside of Humble Haven, Rachel volunteers with Ring Dog Rescue, a non-profit organization and rescue group for Pit Bull-like dogs, where she helps them find their forever home. If you are ever looking to adopt, foster, or simply learn more about pit bulls, she's your girl.

My husband Billy and I found Humble Haven Yoga in the summer of 2020 and started joining the Zoom classes in an attempt to survive the pandemic shutdown. For the next year, we found community and strength with people we had never met while practicing at home together. We will be forever grateful to Suzanne, Camille, Jennie Ray, Margo, Tarole, Andrea, and everyone else for what they did to make that possible.

Cyn found yoga at the onset of the pandemic during a time when she was in dire need of healing, self-re-discovery, and community. She began her consistent yoga practice in 2020 and quickly fell in love with the practice, as it allowed for her to tap into and strengthen aspects of her life that were dormant. Yoga brought her a sense of holistic healing, community, physical and mental strength, deeper self-love, and self-awareness. Cyn was so in awe of the transformation that yoga sparked in her life and she wanted all communities to have access to this practice and the benefits that yoga can provide. In 2021 Cyn completed her 200-Hour Yoga Teacher Training through Humble Haven. As a teacher and as a life-long learner, Cyn’s goal is to provide communities of color with equitable access to this practice, build community on and off of our mats, and empower individuals to unleash the power that lies within each and every one of us.

Every movement is a decision. Julia has brought this mantra from her BFA training at VCU into her yoga practice and teaching.

When her big brother brought her to her very first yoga class, Julia experienced her first “yoga high.” It came from the feeling of companionship and trust she felt in class. Her practice has stayed rooted in these values, and as a teacher she intends to hold space for her students to feel thoroughly supported by themselves and their fellow practitioners.

Julia completed her 200-hour teacher training with Humble Haven in early 2021, and she continues to learn from the incredible mentors at Humble Haven and around Richmond. She is guided by her deeply held belief that when we move with intention together on our mats, we become more intentional, connected members of our community off our mats.

Although Billy didn’t find his way to a yoga mat until his late 40s, yoga has become an integral part of his life and wellness, both physically and mentally. Following an injury in 2018, Billy had to take a break from practicing Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and decided to try out hot power yoga. Not only was he immediately hooked on the practice and how it made him feel, he discovered that the benefits of breath, strength, and flexibility improved his performance and helped prevent injury in jiu-jitsu. He completed his 200 hour teacher training in 2019 and taught at a local studio for several months up until the pandemic. Since then, he has taught both on-line and in person for the gym where he and his wife, Donia, train jiu-jitsu. He also teaches an introductory jiu-jitsu class there in the evenings.

Emely began her yoga journey in 2013, soon after moving to RVA.  What started out as a once a week practice quickly became an every day practice once she found hot power yoga and Humble Haven Yoga.  She came to yoga out of curiosity but soon noticed the profound changes happening not just on her mat but in her life as well.  She finally took the plunge in 2019 and became a RYT-200 by completing her yoga teacher training at Humble Haven Yoga.  One of the main take-ways from that experience was that there is always more to learn and space to grow.  The beauty of yoga is being able to step on your mat and letting the practice guide you.

Jennie Ray began her personal practice having suffered many injuries and more than a few non-elective surgeries. Her recovery was enhanced and knowledge of the true transformative power of yoga was instilled. She is one of three Tier Two 750 Hour Baptiste Certified Educators in Virginia. She has also received 200 hour Certifications from Studio Bamboo Institute of Yoga (Va. Beach, VA) and Humble Haven Yoga (Richmond, VA).

Katie first found yoga in college when a friend brought her to a hot power class and she was soon hooked. After dancing her entire life, combining movement and breath just made sense. When Katie moved to Richmond from northern Virginia in 2015 she struggled to find a yoga “home” until finding Humble Haven a few months later. Completing HHY’s teacher training in 2018, she is thrilled to be able to share her love for yoga with others. Katie’s favorite thing about power yoga is the balance of effort and ease and she tries to carry that balance with her on and off the mat. When not practicing yoga, Katie can be found drinking coffee, cuddling with her dogs, or running. 

Camille is an NYC transplant, having moved to RVA in December of 2017. Like many yogis, Camille's practice was born in the midst of a life-career-relationship transition, over the summer of 2007. In an effort to figure out life's next steps, Camille took a summer sabbatical of "funemployment" to close out a rocky chapter in LA with intention, trading traffic on the 405 for a few months of life-planning, beach cruising and yoga. Those months spent on the water and on her mat were the catalyst for courageous change in her life.

Landing back in New York at the end of that summer, she found a home at Lyons Den Power Yoga, as a student, then eventually, a teacher of Baptiste Power Yoga.The practices of asana, inquiry, and meditation have consistently provided her with the tools to handle transformative shifts both on and off her mat. More often than not, these shifts have been disruptive, uncomfortable, messy AND necessary. In addition to her Baptiste training, Camille most recently studied with Albina and Roger Rippy for her 300-HR YTT.

As a teacher, Camille aims to help students create a balance of effort and ease, in both their bodies and minds, through the practice of moving past their physical comfort zones into a new place of discovery. Camille's teaching style is a combination of tough love, anatomy-nerd and spiritual TED talk, rolled into one, supported by a well-curated playlist.

Things Camille loves, apart from teaching/practicing yoga: her family (husband Jonathan and daughters Grace and Leonora), salty snacks, watermelon club soda, hanging with friends, Peloton and searching for authentic Asian food in Richmond.

Tarole is an Arkansas native but has lived all over the country. She comes to Richmond by way of Charlotte, NC. A certified personal trainer, spin instructor, and yoga instructor, Tarole's passions lie within the health and fitness industry. In her spare time, Tarole likes to spend time at home with her three fur-children, read/watch Harry Potter, and try new recipes. She loves the outdoors, even if it means sitting on the front porch with a glass of wine. Tarole is excited to start her journey with Humble Haven Yoga and hopes to expand her practice not only as a teacher, but also as a student.

Power yoga instructor, Margo Buchanan uses her physical practice on the mat, as a way to check in with what is going on off the mat.  Growing up as a competitive gymnast, Margo fell in love with the strength and endurance that the challenge of power yoga gives her.  However, after completing Level One with Baron Baptiste, she experienced a transformation in her personal power, recognizing her ability to create a life that nourishes her.  She supports and encourages her students to push past discomfort and into possibility.  Margo received her 200-hour Teacher Training at her home studio, Down Dog, a Baptiste afilliated studio in Washington, DC and is currently working towards becoming a Baptiste Certified Instructor.  She is also certified to teach yoga to children of all ages and uses her yoga philosophy in her clinical work as a child therapist in her day job.  

Suzanne's love for yoga began in 2009 while living in Washington, DC.  After practicing both Bikram and Power Yoga regularly for a few of years, Suzanne decided to earn her 200 hour teaching certification through Down Dog Yoga.  What has always drawn Suzanne to this practice is its ability to build communities and empower the individual practitioner.  To continue her goal to teach yoga to every body, Suzanne continued her quest as a student by becoming a licensed practitioner of Yoga for the Special Child in 2014 and completing her 85 hour prenatal teaching certification in 2015.  Suzanne's goal as a teacher is to empower and encourage exploration both physically and mentally.  

suzanne@humblehavenyoga.com

As an active person since childhood, Andrea found her first few yoga classes to be boring – just being honest here! ;) AND there was something that kept her coming back! The space of mental ease and physical release that yoga practice offered was certainly a benefit that kept her returning to asana, the physical practice of yoga. Eventually developing a steady practice in 2014 and relocating to Richmond in 2016, Andrea’s path led to Humble Haven’s 200-hr teacher training in 2017.