Vanessa Farris

I fell in love with yoga in the Spring of 2015 after experiencing a series of life-changing events.  I turned to yoga when I found myself feeling lost.  Lost about who I was, where my life was headed, and what I even wanted out of life.  When I was trying to cope with things that had happened, yoga was there. I knew I loved the physical aspect of yoga. But I wanted to know the why of yoga...Fast forward to the beginning of 2018.  My life completely changed again.  In a matter of a couple of months, I dropped everything to move from Youngstown, Ohio to Fort Wayne, Indiana.  It was then that I began devoting even more time to yoga, and that's when I decided that I finally knew what I wanted to do.  Not only did I want to help people with their traditional yoga practice; I wanted to help people deal with trauma, PTSD, and anxiety through yoga.

    I devoted my time in teacher training to understanding everything I could about yoga, and about how yoga can help heal us both physically and mentally.  Along with the 200 hour curriculum, I devoted extra time to educate myself more on what trauma is, how it affects us, and how yoga can heal us.  I made it my goal to center my teaching style around trauma sensitivity. What does being trauma sensitive mean? Does it mean you have to have had a severe traumatic experience or suffer from intense anxiety to take my classes? Absolutely not. Does it mean my classes are different than other classes? Probably not any more than what you typically find between instructors. All it means is that I have made it my goal to be aware that for a variety of reasons (including trauma and injury), people do not always want to be touched and may respond to things differently than others.  I strive to make sure my students feel empowered to choose how they want to approach my cues for asanas.  I believe it is my duty as an instructor to make my students feel safe during their practice.  I hope to find you on the mat with me.  Namaste.