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Hridaya Yoga Teachers
Senior Teachers
Sahajananda
Sahajananda, the main founder of Hridaya Yoga, is a meditation and Hatha Yoga teacher with over 40 years of experience. His message conveys the non-dual Tantric teachings. An engineer in electronics by education, Sahajananda started…
Antoaneta Gotea
Antoaneta Maria Gotea was born in July 1972, in Bucharest, Romania. The memories from her early age about her father practicing complicated physical exercises (known in yoga as uddiyana bandha) and unusual breathing (pranayama) synergistically connected with her mother’s…
Arnaud Philibert
Arnaud Philibert is a senior yoga and meditation teacher. As a child, he was passionate about history and spirituality. That led him to walk the Camino of Santiago in Spain and to explore ancient and…
Claudiu Vaduva
Since 2005, Claud has dedicated his life entirely to spiritual matters. This came as a culmination of many intersecting circumstances and tributary interests that he had cultivated since childhood. In 2007, he met Sahajananada, and…
Liviu Gheorghe
Liviu Gheorghe graduated from the Bucharest Polytechnic Institute, Department of Computers, in 1986. His first spiritual experiences related to the expansion of consciousness were at the age of 16 when he was studying Christian doctrine…
Sebastian Teodor
Sebastian started his yoga journey some thirty years ago at the age of 16 and grew up practicing. In 1996, he became a yoga instructor offering classes in Fagaras, Brașov, and Miercurea Ciuc, Romania and…
Simona Trandafir
Simona Trandafir has been a spiritual teacher since 1985. During this time she has inspired and coordinated large groups of yogis. She is an experienced yoga teacher, as acknowledged by Yoga Alliance (E-RYT 500). Even…
Center Teachers
Adrian Guillot
The thirst for Truth has been driving Adrian’s life since a very young age. After university, he began a relentless pursuit to understand reality through science, Buddhism, and a variety of mystical spiritual traditions. His…
Aimee Norton-Taylor
Aimee first came to Hridaya to discover how to live from the Heart and if it was really possible to have a quiet and peaceful state of mind. Hridaya’s 10-day silent meditation retreat and Module…
Alison Bond
When Alison first came to yoga for its health benefits in 2010, she had no idea that the profound spiritual path unfolding before her would become a deep calling. Upon finding Hridaya Yoga in 2012,…
Antoine Drouillard
Antoine was born in Bordeaux, France, in 1989. He always felt deeply concerned by the degradation of our planet and our materialistic way of life as a human family. Antoine’s longing to act for a…
Antonio Martín
Born in Spain in 1980, Antonio has always been curious about life and its different expressions. This led him to pursue various interests, including theater, music, engineering, social activism, massage therapy, and sound healing. Antonio’s…
Bérengère Cottavoz
When she was 20 years old, Bérengère discovered and became passionate about Hatha Yoga. During extensive travels, she later found Vipassana meditation and deepened her quest with the practice of selfless service in various Vipassana…
Blanca Amezcua
Blanca first discovered the Hridaya teachings in 2015, when she participated in a meditation retreat with Sahajananda. Ever since, she has been through a profound process of transformation that has awakened her longing for Truth…
David Coleman
David’s spiritual journey began at a young age, with a deep intuition and longing for a connection to Truth. It was only when he came to Mazunte and first experienced the Hridaya Silent Meditation Retreat…
Estelle Vincent
Estelle found her way into spirituality through movement and dance. In dancing, she reached meditative states, but only years later recognized them as such. In 2015 she traveled to Guatemala, where she came into contact…
Eva Rodenbusch-Mohr
Eva has always been called by a profound intuition that there is more to life than what we commonly believe. Thirsting for more depth and truth, she followed this inner calling and feels blessed that…
Gesine Leicht
Gesine found in the teachings of Hridaya a well of personal transformation and a fountain of freedom. Being a practitioner of Hridaya Meditation and Yoga since 2012, a deep love and appreciation developed for the…
Hadi Beyrouti
Hadi was born in Lebanon and grew up in Germany. He arrived at Hridaya Mexico in 2017 and, touched by the Heart and inspired by Claud and Sahajananda, the direction of his life was turned…
Heather McFarland
Heather’s life-long fascination with the mystery of existence and innate dissatisfaction with conventional life led her to seek truth from a young age. She traveled widely, eventually encountering Hridaya Yoga. She fell in love with…
Iris
My name is Iris. Everything I did in my life was to bring me closer to the truth, to love, to the perception of oneness. I am practicing Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy, Sound Healing, Pre-and Perinatal-Birth…
Jessica Bornhäuser
“Deepening on the path of Love and the Heart, waking up to presence, serving for the benefit of all”– Jessica describes her inspiration to serve at Hridaya. With a background in psychology and an education…
Kyle Brooks
Kyle’s spiritual seeking and aspiration to find a deeper Truth began when he was just a 15-year-old boy studying Buddhism in England. After traveling to Peru in 2013 to work with plant medicines, he met…
Louis Pasquer
Originally from the South of France, Louis worked for seven years as a scuba diving instructor and cave diving guide in the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico. During this period, he spent a large part of…
Luna Cabasés Corral
Originally from Spain, Luna has been sharing the Hridaya teachings informally since she first discovered them in 2012. A profound fascination with the non-dual teachings and a burning longing to directly experience their truth led her…
Marco Luethi
After growing up in Switzerland and finishing his degree in mechanics, for seven years, Marco traveled the world in search of meaning and happiness. When he arrived at Hridaya’s center in Mexico, he felt such…
Mehdi Dumondel
After studying theater, Mehdi began his spiritual journey in 2012 during a two-month retreat in Latin America. From then on, his thirst to know himself and to live in harmony with the world has never…
Paul Noel
Paul’s first contact with spirituality came informally during childhood, growing up in very different places, from Eastern Europe to tropical islands in the Indian Ocean, where the presence of nature and the diversity of cultures…
Phoebe Rose Douglas
It was only a matter of time before the Hridaya teachings beckoned Phoebe, a passionate lover of life, from Australia. She joined us in Mexico in 2014 and returned in 2015, when a 3-Day Hridaya…
Pieter Moonen
Born in Belgium in 1985, Pieter started to question the roots of the environmental and social crisis and the nature of the human condition during his studies and work as an environmental researcher and activist.…
Tasha Friedman
Tasha has been part of the Hridaya family since 2015, when she participated in her first retreat in Mazunte and fell in love with the path of the Heart. Born in Massachusetts, she was living…
Valentina Cannavò
At a young age, Valentina was fortunate enough to travel. It was during these travels that she first encountered meditation at a Vipassana retreat. She immediately felt an urge to explore this deeper dimension of…
Xavier Lequarré
Originally from Belgium, Xavier is a seasoned traveler who is passionate about exploring other cultures, lifestyles, and traditions. In 2006, he became almost blind, which was a turning point in his life, forcing him to…
Ximena Pérez Grovas Álvarez
From the first moment the teachings of the Heart touched Ximena’s life, she knew there was no way back. Born and raised in Mexico City, Ximena first came to Hridaya in 2016, where she found…
International Teachers
Adam Caplan
Adam Caplan began practicing yoga in high school as a means of improving flexibility to enhance athletic performance. What started out as an experiment with a supplemental stretching routine eventually evolved into a conscious quest…
Adam Thomas
Adam started practicing yoga in 2014. He found stability in the practice after completing a 10-Day Hridaya Silent Meditation Retreat in 2016. During this retreat, he connected to a deeper aspect of his being which…
Adina Riposan-Taylor (Saraswati Devi)
Adina is a Saraswati Devi, an introverted Leo who has dedicated her life to Self-realization, helping and guiding others and bringing the Truth into the world. Adina has studied meditation since 1992, and yoga since…
Allie Reece
Allie Reece first started practicing yoga as a way to clean up her mind and heal her heart. From the beginning, she intuitively knew that yoga would help but she never imagined that she had…
Andreas Daum
Andreas Daum is a meditation and hatha yoga teacher at Hridaya Yoga and currently serves as the Program Manager of the school. In 2014, he started to teach the Module 1 Intensive at the Hridaya…
Anneke Louise
Passionate about people, international connectivity, and what drives us to evolve, feel empowered, and inspire others, Anneke started her career supporting entrepreneurs to create sustainable solutions to health, clean energy, and food security issues. This…
Arjuna
Arjuna grew up behind the Berlin Wall and followed an academic career until taking his first Vipassana course in 1998, which made him realize what there really is to explore – the essence of who we…
Ava Irani
Ava Irani first came across spirituality through a Buddhist teacher by chance (as it usually happens) in Sydney, Australia when she was 22. Although she was always thirsty for something greater, more profound, her entire…
Beata Kucienska
While looking for meaning, I studied clouds, lightning, children’s stories and secrets in the eyes of cats. I came to Mexico City for one year to work as a volunteer and stayed ten years because…
Burkhard Langemann
Burkhard Langemann has a passion for the integration of spirituality and science. A unified understanding of Eastern and Western Philosophies is the focus of his personal practice and academic research. He holds a Master’s Degree…
Carmen Prema Mitroi
Carmen has taught yoga for over 30 years and is registered as E-RYT 500 by Yoga Alliance. Her teachers include Sahajananda, Simona Trandafir, Master Mantak Chia (Universal Healing Tao), Ma Laoshi (China), and Master Chris…
Chris Van Der Weide
Chris works as a movement and dance facilitator around the globe. She facilitates women’s groups as well as tantra and dance workshops. She also works as a freelance performance artist. Through the years, she has…
Craig White
Craig is originally from Northern England and has been practicing yoga and meditation since 2007. During his first 10-Day Silent Meditation Retreat with Sahajananda in 2010, Craig experienced a deep peak experience that changed his…
Cristina Espinosa
Cristina Espinosa has been practicing hatha yoga since the age of 15 but her interests include mountaineering, African dance and photography. She grew up in Mexico City and the need to connect to the natural…
Déborah Blin
Déborah discovered yoga in 2014 while living in San Francisco and working at a little theatre company. She started her practice exploring different schools from Vinyasa to Iyengar, and then Integral Yoga, slowly opening the…
Deidré Baatjes
My name is Deidré, and I am a fellow aspirant on the spiritual path. I was born and raised in Cape Town and lived abroad for 16 years, most recently serving and studying in heart-centered…
Diane O’Donovan
Diane is Irish and was raised as Roman Catholic. Her mother had cancer and left her body when Diane was only 18. This heartbreak has led Diane to question God, life, and death since 1998.…
Dominik R. Graef
Dominik, a Taurus, was born and raised in the beautiful countryside of Southeast Austria. After watching a documentary about Shaolin monks in elementary school, he became fascinated by the power of spiritual practice. At an…
Dominique Didinal
Dominique is a Hridaya Yoga and Mystical Dance teacher as well as the founder of WanderWomenClub, a virtual sangha (online tribe) for female spiritual seekers who love to travel. Dominique is incredibly grateful and indebted to…
Emma Carruthers
Emma trained as a Hridaya teacher in 2012 and now owns and runs The Hermitage Retreat Center with her partner Severin and baby Benzra on Lake Atitlan, Guatemala. She is a deep admirer of Ramana…
Esther Greter
Esther Greter grew up in a little village in the heart of Switzerland where she spent most of her time in the fields and forests of the area either on the back of a horse…
Georgian Cernat
Before finding yoga, Georgian earned a bachelor’s degree in Psychology, became a massage therapist, and trained in martial arts, kickboxing, swimming, basketball, and chess. Inspired to begin studying yoga by his uncle, he practiced for…
Grace Bryant
Grace Bryant (they/them) offers Hridaya and Hridaya-inspired courses, silent retreats, and coaching based in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, USA. They first met Sahajananda in 2011 in Thailand and immediately knew they was a future teacher.…
Hannah Naomi Ruebig
Originally from Germany, Hannah is a trained professional dancer, yoga and meditation teacher, and cacao ceremony leader, and offers healing sessions and ceremonies combining all of these skills. After working in politics in Berlin for…
Ian Marshall
Ian is British and completed the HTTC in 2014. He has taught Hridaya Hatha Yoga and Meditation in London on a regular basis at the Jamyang Buddhist Centre. In collaboration with other Hridaya teachers, he…
Ian Wilkes
Ian is a Hridaya teacher, yoga therapist, breathwork facilitator, musician, and Holistic Life Coach from Vermont, United States. After going to business school and living in New York City as a hotel manager for seven…
Ilaria Antonietti
Since childhood, Ilaria has felt a calling in her heart and a connection with the Divine Mother. While she was attending courses at ‘Association ASIA’ in Bologna in 2004, she came across yoga and meditation…
Ingrid Goudsmit
Ingrid Goudsmit held a strong interest in Buddhism and Shamanism as a young girl but it was not until 2002 that she started practicing Zen with Jeroen Witkam, a Zen master and Benedictine monk in…
Jasmin Clark
Jasmin’s spiritual path started at a very young age when she was sent to attend a Rudolf Steiner Waldorf school, where she cultivated an appreciation for the beauty of life, an innocent wonderment of this dream, creativity and an…
Juliane Bauer
“Accepting with Love ‘what is, as it is.’” Juliane grew up between the Austrian mountains and the beautiful German countryside of Munich. Since childhood she felt a natural deep connection with the divine consciousness. She studied Art, Fashion-…
Juliette Salas
Juliette’s first teacher (from age 2) was her father, Alexander, who led bedside prayers in the dark evoking Jesus, the Divine Mother and the Consciousness of Oneness. From a young age she has been sensitive…
Jürgen Reder
Jürgen felt a yearning early on in life for spiritual teachings and a pull for the East, which first started when he was 17 with reading Herman Hesse’s novel Siddhartha, prompting a journey to Asia.…
Kalki (Martin Neufeld)
Author of the award-winning book Hugging Life, meditation teacher, relationship counselor, and therapist, Kalki has been on the healing and spiritual path for over four decades. Canadian by birth, he has lived, studied, and taught…
Karin Nyberg
Karin practiced Vipassana meditation for many years before she began studying Hatha Yoga and Tantra Yoga in Sweden in 2011. When she found Hridaya in 2014 it felt like a beautiful combination of her previous…
Keith McGuinnes
Keith, a Leo, resides in Boulder, Colorado, in the United States. He grew up in upstate New York, graduating from Syracuse University with a Computer Science degree and subsequently beginning a career as an engineer…
Kilian Hübinger
Kilian Hübinger is a passionate and heartful teacher of yoga and meditation with over 10 years of practical experience. His classes and lectures are pervaded by his deep care for each and every student. He…
Kirsten Reiss
Kirsten studied Architecture and Art History in Berlin. She later founded a development aid organization and traveled extensively in Asia and Latin America. In 2001, she discovered yoga and began a dedicated practice in a…
Krista Novakowski
Krista began her studies of Yoga and Meditation in her homeland of Canada. She has always been fascinated with the potential of awakening to our Essential Nature. She began her studies with Agama in 2006 and…
Latifa (Alejandra Fonseca)
Latifa has aspiration for spiritual growth has inspired her to deepen in the yogic and tantric teachings. The need of Self-understanding and healing brought her to have her first approach to spirituality and non-dual teachings from a group…
Lindsay Samuels
After practicing yoga and meditation for several years, when Lindsay encountered the Hridaya practice of focusing on the Heart she discovered a deeper purpose in life. In 2013, Lindsay attended a hatha yoga teacher training…
Maeioum Martínez
Hello! My name is Maeioum Martínez, I was born this lifetime in Mexico, I speak Spanish and English. I was blessed to have a mother who was into metaphysics so the spiritual dimension of life…
Malgorzata Szostakiewicz
Teacher, Meditator, Explorer, Woman. Her Home is where her Heart is. In 2013, Gosia (short for Malgorzata) took a major turn to free herself from preconceived ideas of what life should look like. She took…
Marco Trabucco
Marco is an Aquarius born in 1978. He began the practice of yoga over two decades ago with the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda and Kriya Yoga, deepening his studies of Indian philosophy in many years…
Maribel González Tato
Maribel spent several years working for the most important Law firms in Spain as an International Tax Advisor after receiving a Master degree in business Law. Though she enjoyed this experience she felt something was…
Molly Nixon
Molly Nixon is a 2015 graduate of the Hridaya Teacher Training Course. She and her partner Kyle are dedicated to serving the Heart by supporting refugees in crisis. She has shared a post on our…
Naomi Carla White
When Naomi first discovered Hridaya Yoga through a 10-Day Hridaya Silent Meditation Retreat in 2011, she had the profound feeling that she had finally come home. At that time, she was about to embark on…
Niamh Kavanagh
The romantic surroundings of Celtic nature during Niamh’s childhood evoked reflections on the wonders of our existence. Though this echoed throughout her life, it wasn’t until 2000 Niamh became fully conscious of her spiritual path,…
Nicholas Currie
Born in Canada in an intentional community called L’Arche, Nicholas has always felt a deep calling towards community living and a life dedicated to service. In 2007, while traveling in India, he first stumbled upon…
Nirav
Nirav met Sahajananda in 2007 during a Hridaya Silent Meditation Retreat in Thailand. Hridaya was a practice that Nirav found to be very intimately close to his heart and soul. The practice awakened him to…
Om, Ricardo Cristovao
Om (Ricardo Cristovao) was born in Portugal, star sign Aquarius, in 1979. Youngest son of 10 children, he always had many influences and visions of what life is and what it should be, but was never satisfied…
Ori Dahan
Originally from Israel, Ori is a spiritual mentor and transformation facilitator. He is here to illuminate, empower, remind, and celebrate all that is Real. And, to decondition, point at, face, uncover, and drop all that…
Paige Munro
Australian born and raised in the Outback, Paige has always felt deeply connected to the earth. She has a background in psychology and counseling, and is a perseverant seeker of Truth. She first fell in…
Patrick Föllmer
Patrick’s spiritual development began in early childhood in a Christian family in the former East Germany. In 2014, out of curiosity, he participated in his first 10-day silent retreat at the Kamala Center in Brasov.…
Paulina Gostomski
Paulina’s curiosity towards yoga started as a physical exercise around 2003. However, everything shifted when she did her first 10-day silent retreat in 2011. Since then yoga, in all its facets, is at the very…
Radha Iveta
Radha is a Hridaya Yoga teacher and meditation practitioner who has spent many years living in our community in Mazunte, Mexico learning directly from Sahajananda. Inspired by the depth of the teachings, Radha has held…
Rosanna Osterlund
Rosanna Osterlund has been a seeker since childhood, but it wasn’t until she started traveling in 2011 that she began to find answers. A natural caretaker and giver of love, in 2013 her journey finally…
Sabina Macintyre
Sabina has been exploring different styles of meditation since first coming across buddhist teachings in 2004. Deeply inspired after completing a ten day Hridaya Yoga meditation retreat in 2017, she halted her legal career and…
Sean Goldberg
Sean first came to yoga in 2006, though he has spent much of his life in Self Enquiry. His search started at a young age due to an intense yearning to understand what happens when…
Severin Geser
Severin is a passionate meditator, astrologer and practitioner of Advaita Vedanta, and continues to study these subjects from his home in Guatemala. In 2013 he completed the Hridaya teachers training and in 2014 he built…
Sophie Weiser
Sophie Weiser is a 2015 Hridaya Teacher Training Course graduate from Berlin, Germany. Her struggle with the disconnection and perceived emptiness of the art world brought her to Hridaya. It was in Mazunte that she…
Tamara Coughlan
Tamara’s thirst for depth, questioning, and inquiry has taken her around the world many times, through retreats, communities, and deep inner work and she continuously finds herself back teaching and facilitating from her Heart. From…
Tara (Giselle) Trimmer
It was death that finally brought Tara Trimmer into the path of service. One day, she found herself at a point in her life where she was continuously daydreaming about all the things she would…
Tiffany Nicholson-Smith
Tiffany Nicholson-Smith, a radiant yogini, lover of life and devotee to service, brings her clarity, abundant energy and aspiration for truth into everything she commits herself to. Her interests span the globe and all aspects of…
Turiya Ma
Turiya is a devoted explorer of Truth. Following the calling of the Self, Turiya continues to reveal ever more subtle layers of the being. There was a deep churning of recollection when Turiya crossed paths…
Uma Esmeralda Ritstier
Since stepping on the path of Hridaya in 2013, the Heart has been Uma Esmeralda’s guide. It taught her to trust and open more and more to what is here right now. It has been…
Veronica Cernat
Veronica Cernat, born under the sign of Leo, graduated in Forestry from the University of Brasov, Romania. She has been practicing yoga since 1991 and teaching yoga since 2004. Veronica worked as a translator and editor…
Vira Maria
“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” –Rumi Vira is dedicated to the great healing and expansion of the sacred human heart, with all its deep scars, sensitivity, and unbounded power. Vira…
Weston Wood
From childhood, Weston felt a yearning to explore and challenge the world he lived in. At age 18, driven by a dissatisfaction for materialistic society, he began exploring the earth, observing culture and lifestyle on…
