Our Teachers
I was born and raised in Naugatuck, Connecticut and moved to California in 1983 on a spiritual and artistic quest. A friend invited me to check out the Bay Area, and I jumped on the invitation because I was struggling to find my next career steps. I quickly became an integral part of the Center for Spiritual Enlightenment (CSE) and have taught hatha yoga in the CSE community for 25 years.
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I studied many different styles of hatha yoga throughout my life. My teaching style reflects my background in Iyengar Yoga, the Ashtanga Yoga of Baba Hari Das, the Ashtanga Yoga of Patthabi Jois, Integral Yoga, Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy and Dance.
My teaching experience through the past 3+ decades has included time at CSE, the Oracle Corporation, Stanford Research International (SRI), Stanford University, the Harker School, Yoga is Youthfulness, Willow Glen Yoga, Los Gatos Park and Recreation, Corporate Power Camp Retreats, American Musical Theater, and various local gyms, small companies, and schools in the Bay Area.
I am a certified yoga therapist (C-IAYT) through the International Association of Yoga Therapy, and in my yoga therapy practice I use yoga and mindfulness practices to support my clients to achieve the best quality of life possible. From 2003 through 2018, and beginning again in 2021, I have led yoga retreats in the Santa Cruz mountains at the Sequoia Retreat Center, the Quaker Retreat Center and the Land of Medicine Buddha.
I am a lifelong dancer and lover of all things dance, theater, and music. I am an avid participant and certified facilitator of a popular system of expressive arts improvisation called InterPlay. I live with my husband, Stu, in Aptos, California and am delighted to be able to walk to the beach almost every day, work in our garden, and to enjoy good music, friends and family, healthy delicious food, and lots of laughter.
You can find more details about my history and training on my website.
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If you feel moved to make a donation after participating in any of my offerings, know that I will appreciate your generosity. I accept donations on Venmo: @Julianne-Rice, Zelle: Bank of the West and PayPal: julirice@yahoo.com.
I began practicing yoga 15 years ago at Yoga is Youthfulness in Mountain View, California mostly to stretch and move my body as a strategy to offset some of the work stresses associated with a career in corporate finance. As I got started, I did become a bit more flexible, but I had no idea of the transformative yoga journey that was to come.
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Now living in San Francisco, as the pandemic took hold, I reconnected with Julianne Rice, one of my first yoga teachers at YiY. As I was seeking comfort during the early COVID days, her classes left me feeling amazing, physically and emotionally. It was just what was needed and I became a regular in her Zoom classes. Over time, I began to demonstrate postures for Julianne on Zoom which sparked my passion for teaching. In the Spring of 2021, I completed my yoga teacher training with Noah Mazé and Yoga International and began teaching yoga in June 2021. I love to teach. I can only hope my students enjoy receiving my classes as much as I enjoy giving them.
We are all interconnected. My goal as a teacher is to share this thing that has benefitted me so profoundly with others. I intend to share directly with my students in my role as a teacher and indirectly through donations to organizations that are making yoga more accessible to broader groups of the population, those most in need of what yoga has to offer.
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I accept donations on Venmo @C-Darling. These donations go to the Yoga based charity Give Back Yoga Foundation, with a company match.
Calvin Darling
Creating space to attend to our individual and collective health and well-being is my devotion. Coming together in community through yoga – in breath, body, mind, and spirit – is a deep calling within me.
My personal yoga journey began in 1997 with physical asana practice while I was in graduate school and needing a way to find a way to increase both strength and relaxation in my body. In 2010 a radical shift in my life uprooted me in a profound emotional and spiritual way, and my yoga practice deepened to include meditation and inward, energetic exploration.
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In 2021 and 2022, my yoga practice sustained me through profound grief following the unexpected deaths of three immediate family members. This inspired me to attend Mount Madonna Institute School of Yoga to become a 200 hour certified yoga instructor in 2021.
Further inspired by the deep connection I felt with students and our shared practice as I began to teach in person, online, and in retreat sessions, I chose to deepen my studies and became a 500 hour certified instructor in 2023. I also am a teaching apprentice at Mount Madonna Institute for students enrolled in the 200 hour yoga teacher training program.
I teach breathwork, meditation, and postures drawing on both the traditional and the modern, weaving together traditional practices (Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, Samkhya philosophy, subtle body theory, and Ayurveda) with modern studies (neuroscience, anatomy, and physiology).
I am honored to share the practices of yoga with others on their individual paths of transformation, as I continue on mine. May we walk together a while in our journeys. Namasté.
If you feel moved to contribute a donation after experiencing a class with me, please know I will appreciate your generosity. I accept donations on Venmo @Cathy-Hutton-1.
Cathy Hutton
Kent has an MFA in Fine Art. He is an artist, a teacher and a yoga studio owner. With three decades of experience instructing practitioners and teachers in Hatha Yoga, Kent and his studio Willow Glen Yoga, remain to this day a significant resource of insightful knowledge in the practice of yoga. Kent holds certifications from several schools and lineages of yoga and has studied with many contemporary masters. He strongly believes in the health benefits of breath-based movement methods and the yogic arts. A debilitating back injury led him to the therapeutic aspects of Hatha Yoga many years ago. For Kent it has been and continues to be a life long quest to unify the body and the mind.
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Kent also believes that just as you practice an instrument, the repetition of yoga postures becomes another form of magic, another way to access the heart of who you truly are. Over time yoga becomes a type of slow surgery, helping to reshape, restore and bring harmony into the whole body. Kent revels in the interface of movement, breath and creating art … a moving meditation in its purest form. He and his wife, Mary Ellen Hannon, currently live in Bend, Oregon and are enjoying a moving and magical life filled with art, family, fun and yoga.
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Like Kent on Instagram: kentbond1 to see his artwork and more
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Kent and Mary Ellen accept donations via Venmo @Kent-Bond-8, via Zelle and/or PayPal with kentbond@me.com
Kent Bond
Mary Ellen Hannon
Mary Ellen Hannon has a BA in Health Science, and majored in Somatics. She is a Certified Somatic Movement Teacher and Health Coach. She has enjoyed a Yoga practice for over 25 years. At one point, she developed chronic neck pain due to modern lifestyles and habitual patterns and became very interested in studying Complementary Alternative Medicine to help heal herself. In particular, she studied the theories, movements and philosophies of Thomas Hanna, the man who coined the word Somatics (sensing from within oneself). Through the work of Hanna, she found a way to ease her pain. She rediscovered herself - her body, mind and spirit in all its wholeness. This trustworthy healing method is the basis of what she now shares with others. It is at once delightful, meditative and rich in context.
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Mary Ellen was certified by Peter Appel of Finland and practices with other cutting edge, dynamic somatic movement teachers and is the author of Complementary Alternative Medicine: Yoga, Qigong, Somatics (2019).
Donations
Julianne, Calvin, Kent and Mary Ellen offer their online classes on a donation basis. Thank you for your ongoing and generous weekly and monthly class donations. They support our continued offerings and the future outreach of yoga as a whole. They are greatly appreciated.
Note: Preferred payment methods are always Venmo or Zelle. Their IDs are below:
Juliannne
Venmo
@Julianne-Rice
PayPal
julirice@yahoo.com
Calvin
Venmo @C-Darling
Donations to Calvin go to the yoga based charity Give Back Yoga Foundation, with a company match
Kent and Mary Ellen
Venmo @Kent-Bond-8
Zelle and/or PayPal
kentbond@me.com