Melissa Myozen Blacker Roshi is a Dharma successor to and received Inka Shomei from James Myoun Ford Roshi. She is a co-founder of the Boundless Way Zen Sangha, where she currently serves as a senior guiding teacher. She is also the Associate Director of the Stress Reduction Clinic and a Director of Professional Training at the Center for Mindfulness (CFM), University of Massachusetts Medical School. Melissa is the resident priest at Mugendo-ji, Boundless Way Temple, in Worcester, Massachusetts, and a member of the American Zen Teachers Association and the Soto Zen Buddhist Association.
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Linda Blake (516-766-0008 or lindab333@gmail.com) has been circle dancing for over twenty years throughout New England. She discovered circle dancing at Touchstone Farm & Yoga Center in the '80s while a graduate student at UMass and has loved it ever since. Linda brought circle dancing to New York City and Long Island, and now that she has settled in Greenfield, wants to have a circle here to complement other dance circles in the Pioneer Valley. Linda is a certified Core Energetics practitioner and brings her work with energy and movement from Core Energetics as well as many years of meditation practice to the dance, creating a healing and enlivening experience.
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Jenn Bond (413-695-3006 or stubby110@netzero.net). As a healthy, athletic adolescent, Jenn was struck ill with rheumatoid arthritis in 1984. The prognosis was grim. While following directions of medical professionals in Boston, she also followed a regime of yoga, macrobiotics and acupuncture which brought about a 13 year remission with no meds! Committed to sharing what she learned over those years, Jenn has led fitness classes at the YMCA in Greenfield; Greenfield Community College, where she was also the director of Faculty & Staff Finess and Wellness; and at The Body Shoppe, where she worked with both elite athletes and others recovering from injury or surgery. Certified to teach yoga through the YMCA of the USA and FiTOUR®, she has worked with kids as young as six, and the young at heart as young as 96. The goal of her classes is healing: each pose opens, cleanses, relaxes, and balances every aspect of the body as well as the subtle energy of the chakras.
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Frances Darling (413-527-3517 or fmcgd1@verizon.net) is a certified Hatha yoga instructor at the 200-hour level registered with Yoga Alliance. She has been teaching adult yoga classes in the Valley since 2006. At times her students indicated they may miss a class due to child care issues or visiting grandchildren, so Frances invited her students to bring their children to the class. This experience led to an interest in bringing yoga to children, and in 2010 Frances, became a certified Pretzel Kids® Yoga instructor. She hopes to share the joy of this child focused yoga with children of all ages.
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Rosie Fanale (413-652-2519 or rfanale08@yahoo.com) is a musician, a music therapist and a psychotherapist. In addition, she is also certified as a focusing trainer and a focusing oriented psychotherapist with a specialty in healing trauma work. In 1979, Rosie obtained her masters degree in music therapy from Lesley College, and later she received her masters in psychiatric nursing from Yale, holding certifications and licenses APRN and RNCS. Rosie went on to work with psychiatric individuals both in private and group music therapy. Since 1995, her teachers have included Arthur Hull, Chloe Goodchild, various sound healing teachers, and the grammy winning cellist David Darling. For thirteen years Rosie has been involved with the Music For People (MFP) organization, a world wide music improvisation program whose purpose is to help individuals of all musical levels to access their true unique centers of musical strength. Now, after having moved to the area two years ago, she brings the techniques from MFP to Greenfield in a monthly music improvisational gathering. This fall, Rosie is excited to bring the combination of focusing and expressive arts, especially music, to the families of the Pioneer Valley.
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Katherine Golub (413-325-7407 or katherinegolub@gmail.com) is a graduate of the 200-hour Forrest Yoga Foundation Teacher Training with Ana Forrest, Prenatal Yoga Teacher Training for Conscious Birthing with Janice Clarfield, and both the Tot and Tyke Itsy Bitsy Yoga® trainings. She has completed the Birthing From Within® Art of Childbirth Mentorship training as well as doula training with local midwife Michelle L’Esperance and with midwives in Oaxaca, Mexico. She is currently engaged in the year-long Forrest Yoga Mentorship Program. Since the birth of her son Kai, Katherine has dedicated herself to accompanying women and men in their transition to parenthood. She believes that only by truly nurturing themselves can parents effectively nurture their children, and that the birth of a baby offers parents a profound opportunity for healing, empowerment, and transformation. For more information, visit Katherine’s website www.wholefamilybirth.com.
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Jessie Groneman C.P.M., Community Herbalist (617-529-7621 or greenwoman19@yahoo.com) was raised in the Rocky Mountains and the deserts of Eastern Oregon, whose majestic landscapes inspired an early interest in plant medicine and natural healing. At 19, she enrolled in a yearlong Clinical Herbalism program at the California School of Herbal Studies which was followed by extensive study of healing plants with a number of mentors over an eleven-year period. During this time, Jessie also trained in massage and bodywork, studying at The Institute of Conscious Bodywork and Heartwood Institute in Northern California. Combining her knowledge of plant medicine and bodywork, she developed a private practice in the San Francisco Bay Area, and taught classes on herbal medicine. To pursue a growing interest in birth and midwifery, Jessie became a DONA-certified Doula in 1999, and she began attending births. Shortly thereafter, she began a 15-month apprenticeship with Cindy Haag, a homebirth midwife in the Bay Area, after which she moved to New Mexico to pursue a two-year training program at the Northern New Mexico Midwifery Center from which she received an Associate's of Science in Midwifery through the National College of Midwifery. In February of 2006, Jessie sat for her exam and received the title of Certified Professional Midwife (C.P.M.) from the North American Registry of Midwives. Since moving to Massachusetts with her partner in the Spring of 2006, Jessie has attended births both as a doula and a midwife. She helped found an annual herbal conference, the Grassroots Community Herbal Convergence, and she has served as both Vice-President and President of the Massachusetts Midwives Alliance. As a mother herself, Jessie knows how special the time surrounding pregnancy and birth is, and as a birth professional, she sees her role as promoting and protecting the health and wholeness of the birthing family. Jessie's priority is to help her clients connect with the people who are right for them, drawing on birth professionals and other caregivers as well as family, friends, and community to support the ultimate goal where her clients can give birth with confidence and trust in their bodies.
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Lindel Hart (413-768-9291 or info@hartyoga.com) is a certified yoga teacher working in the Iyengar style, as well as founder and owner of Hart Yoga in Shelburne Falls. He infuses his teaching with knowledge, compassion, joy, enthusiasm, and humor, emphasizing anatomical integrity and a constant dialogue between mind and body to instill confidence, trust, and self-respect. He encourages students through the practice of yoga to explore and deepen their connection to themselves and whatever they regard as divine. His primary teachers include Marilyn Hart of Green River Yoga & Movement Arts, Carrie Owerko of the Iyengar Institute of New York, and Eileen Muir of Karuna Center for Yoga & Healing Arts, Northampton, MA. For more information about Lindel, visit www.hartyoga.comoga.com.
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Annie Hassett (413-774-5622) has been practicing T'ai Chi Ch'uan for 23 years and teaching for 10 years in the Pioneer Valley.  She has taught classes at the YMCA in Greenfield and at many local senior centers. She enjoys working with students of all ages and abilities and hopes to share the benefits of this practice as widely as she can.
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Zayne Marston (413-624-9605 or zayne@transformationaltimes.com) has taught Qigong classes sponsored by Green Fields Market for many years.  He is a seeker of vibrant health and vitality who knows that we each have the power to transform our mind-bodies if only we only commit ourselves.  "It is never too late."  Inspired by the transformative results he has received from practicing qigong since 1991, Zayne has studied with a variety of Qigong masters, teachers and instructors and delights in sharing his discoveries with fellow seekers, offering individual and group instruction. Since 1999 he has directed the Energy Cultivation Program for the School of the Golden Discs in Shelburne Falls.  For more information, visit Zayne's website at www.transformationaltimes.com/qigong.htm or join him for Introduction to Qigong for Health & Happiness on Saturday, January 9, 10 am - 12 pm.
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Sam Masich (www.sammasich.com) Sam Masich is one of the most accomplished mid-generation practitioners of Chinese internal martial arts in the world today. Having trained and taught for over 30 years, Sam has studied with several of the great masters of his era from both North America and China including Liang Shouyu, Dr. Yang Jwing Ming, Jou Tsung Hwa, Yang Zhenduo and Chen Xiaowang. Sam began his martial arts studies at age 18 with Yang Style Taijiquan and Judo. He has also studied to varying extents Chen, Fu, Wu and Sun styles of Taijiquan, as well as Baguazhang, Xingyiquan, Luihebafa, Shuaijou, Shaolinquan, Modern Wushu, Kendo and Western Fencing. Sam distinguished himself in competition as a quadruple and septuple gold medalist in national competitions and was a member of the Canadian National Chinese Martial Arts Team competing in China at The World Wushu Invitationals in 1985. Now formally retired from competition, Sam's teaching has taken him to over 100 cities in Canada, the United States, Mexico and throughout Europe. Yang Style Taijiquan has commanded his greatest interest over the years, and Sam is one of few Tai Chi practitioners today that trains and teaches the entire traditional syllabus including bare hand and weapons sparring. He is possibly best known for his approach to classical and freestyle Push Hands. A passionate and gifted teacher, Sam continually finds new ways to integrate traditional principles with classical and contemporary form, always striving to find further application for the work in areas beyond the immediate art. Sam is the creator of the 5 Section Taijiquan Program, a recreational and preliminary training program which includes simplified Tai Chi bare hand and weapons solo and sparring routines. Sam has served as a martial arts action consultant, trainer and choreographer on various TV programs and stage productions, and is himself the subject of two documentaries on Taijiquan and the internal arts. Sam has made some 20 films on Tai Chi and Neijia related subjects and is the subject of two internationally airing documentaries. Local T'ai Chi instructor Dorian Gregory of Sunderland (www.taichidorian.com) is Sam's student and is hosting his visit to the Pioneer Valley. For more information about Sam, visit his website www.SamMasich.com.
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Tracy Penfield (802-685-3138 or tpenfield@safeart.org) Founder and Director of SafeArt based in Chelsea, Vermont, Tracy has been coming monthly to GRY&MA to lead the free SafeArt Movement Program which is offered in individual and group sessions to women survivors of traumatic abuse.  Tracy has been dancing all her life, though she did not know it until she was 20. Ever since then (over 30 years now!), she been sharing dance with people of all ages, with a focus on personal empowerment through expressive motion. For more information, visit Tracy's website, www.SafeArt.org.
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Rick Roberts(413-367-9777 or Rick@PioneerValleyYoga.com) started meditating and chanting in 1979 while in residence at Muktananda's Ashram in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he discovered that chanting helps to quiet the mind and provides a way back to center. Like the quiet space between the in–breath and the out–breath, the stillness that arises out of chanting leads one easily and naturally into meditation. For over three years, Rick has been leading Kirtans throughout the Pioneer Valley, and he always says that no vocal or musical experience is necessary to experience the Joy of singing with others. Rick is an RYT-500 certified Yoga teacher, and a student of Sanskrit. You can sign up for his monthly email announcements at www.PioneerValleyYoga.com.
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Kelly Savitri (kelly@injoywellness.net) creates her life, her practice, and her teaching as a synthesis of science and spirit. Her classes combine breath-centered joyful movement with an invitation for deepening individual awareness. Often conveying anatomical knowledge as well yogic philosophy, she teaches precise alignment principles from a whole-body perspective to help students find a deeper sense of integration, connection, and personal strength. Kelly’s yogic path led her all the way to India, and then brought her back again to the Pioneer Valley, where she has studied with Patty Townsend of Yoga Center Amherst since 2005. She obtained her 200- and 500-hour certifications through YogaCenterAmherst's embodyoga™ Teacher Training programs, and continues to assist Patty in those trainings. Her fascination with health and her thirst for knowledge led her to the COMTA-accredited Stillpoint Massage Therapy Program at Greenfield Community College, after which she obtained her license as a massage therapist and went on to earn an additional certification in Pre- and Perinatal massage. The joy of supporting mothers and their babies through pregnancy and childbirth inspired Kelly to also become a birth doula, where all of her skills combine to support new life entering the world as peacefully as possible. In addition to her group yoga classes, massage therapy practice, and doula services, Kelly also offers private yoga instruction. For more information, visit her website www.injoywellness.net.
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Jo Schneiderman E-RYT (802-258-2093 or jolovesyoga@comcast.net) Jo has studied the Iyengar method with Patricia Walden, Geeta Iyengar, and Felicity Green. Building on over 30 years of teaching experience, Jo offers classes that are spiritual and gentle, yet challenging. In all of her classes, including her Monday night class Wise Yoga for Every Body!, she incorporates knowledge of yoga therapeutics to assist students with physical challenges and those recovering from injuries by offering modifications of poses to ensure all students have a joyful, relaxing and invigorating experience.
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