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Jennifer Harvey - Winner of Best of Boston 2001: Excersice Instructor

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Teachers

Jennifer Harvey

As studio owner and director, I welcome everyone to Laughing Dog. I hope the environment is such that people of all ages can benefit and experience the freedom and power of yoga and other healing arts. I am also committed to encouraging the creative growth of the Laughing Dog teachers so they can be the best at what they do.

I teach what I love. I love the integrity and grace of Anusara Yoga, the freedom and inspiration of Nia and the focus of pilates. I also draw on my many years as a licensed psychotherapist.

I gratefully thank all my mentors along the way and all the students and teachers at Laughing Dog for helping to create such a life affirming and supportive community.

Amy Skye Robinson

Amy Skye’s ballet and body conditioning work scans over four decades, incorporating time honored principles of classical ballet technique to create beautifully toned, lithe, graceful, intelligently strong, muscular bodies. She has studied ballet from childhood both in Boston and her hometown, New York. She is well acquainted with both cecchetti and vaganova syllabi, and her teaching is a classic american mixture of both. She performed in chamber companies in Boston and NYC but ended that part of her professional life after the birth of her children. She has taught ballet and floor barre conditioning to all ages, from pre-school to pre-professional. She additionally holds a graduate degree in special education with a specialty in dance therapy, which she practiced for four years in MA public schools. Alongside her love affair with dance, she is rather politically inclined and has done extensive lobbying and advocacy for both animal rights and disability issues. She says, “one of my major eureka moments was the discovery that tip top fitness can be achieved simply by doing housework on the full demi–pointe”.

Cynthia Gramer

Cynthia has been teaching yoga in and around Boston since 2002. Her first training was in Bikram yoga and after a few years of teaching solely Bikram she trained in Power Yoga with Baron Baptiste and Ashtanga with Michael Hamilton. In 2007 she completed a teacher training in Anusara yoga with Deb Neubauer and lived through Ana Forrest's Advanced Teacher Training. Cynthia has studied Yin yoga with Paul Grilley and Josh Summers and is heavily indebted to Jennifer Harvey, Aaron and Chandra Cantor, Arthur Kilmurray and David Vendetti for their wonderful influence on her practice and her teaching. Cynthia considers it a privilege to teach. She strives to create a space where students feel free to be where they are, yet challenged and inspired to find their deepest peace, highest truth and greatest joy.

Diana Cullum-Dugan RD LD RYT

Diana moved toward yoga to complement a strong physical activity practice resulting from years of teaching group exercise and strength training. Unexpected were the transformations that occurred at every level of her being. She explored all styles of yoga then was intensely drawn to John Friend’s Anusara style of teaching yoga from the inside out. She received her Hatha yoga teacher training in the Anusara style with Deb Neubauer, one of the first certified Anusara teachers, and is registered as an Anusara-inspired teacher. Diana offers a caring, dynamic, and passionate approach as a safe foundation for students to open their hearts to the present moment and live from that place, to explore a deeper experience in their practice, and join with their highest aspirations. Students will experience yoga as a celebration of the heart as they find optimal alignment through balanced energy.

Fez Aswat

Fez's earliest investigation into the nature of reality dates back to Pakistan at the age of three in a heated discussion with his grandfather about "Row Row Row Your Boat" and as to whether or not "Life is (in fact) but a dream." He has been teaching yoga and meditation in the Boston area since 2001 and his study continues today with his teachers Tom Alden, Patricia Walden, Barbara Benagh, Arthur Killmurray, and Jin Sung of Oakland Yoga Studio. Whether it be recovering from grief, working through illness, or just repairing his body from playing too much music, Fez has continually found the yoga practice to be an invaluable source for healing and learning to “Livestrong.” With joy and a sense of humor, his class style integrates the mindfulness, stillness and insight of a hatha yoga and meditation practice into the vinyasa format.

Jené Rossi

Jené has been teaching power yoga classes and workshops for several years in the Boston area. Her teaching has been inspired and influenced by her studies with many world renowned master teachers. Yoga opened the doors for her to continue the study of spirit through Shamanisn and Mediumship as well as being an attuned Reiki Master. Her style of teaching is playful and challenging and her class setting is safe and sacred. She encourages you to go to the edge and beyond, to take the journey within. Her own personal journey on the path of yoga led her to heal herself physically, emotionally and spiritually and her wish is to share this with everyone.

Julia Novina

Julia began practicing yoga as a complement to her dance and legal careers, and was transformed when she discovered Anusara Yoga. After completing Todd Norian's Anusara Yoga Teacher Training, she became a Yoga Alliance Registered Yoga Teacher and began teaching full-time. Her teaching is playful, thoughtful and supportive, as she encourages students to connect with their bodies and spirits to bring both into optimal alignment with joy.

Kathy Mongeau

Yoga led Kathy on a transformational journey from the moment she began practicing. The impact of that experience, more than a decade ago, gave her a new outlook on life and furthered self-realization. After having studied with numerous teachers, she found that the Anusara Yoga methodology resonated in her heart and was compatible with her knowledge of anatomy. She believes that by receiving tools that are physically healing and spiritually uplifting her students benefit in ways that can enhance their wellbeing and overall quality of life.

Kathy Ryan

Kathy began studying yoga while working for Disney Studios as a dancer and choreographer. She found that yoga made her stronger, more focused and less prone to injury. She has studied with internationally acclaimed teachers like Rod Stryker, Shiva Rea, Anna Forrest and Steve Ross.

Her warm energetic style of teaching creates a perfect balance of challenge and fun. Her popular classes are a blend of a skillfully sequenced Power Yoga flow and lots of great music. She hopes that through movement students will find a deep sense of stillness where therein lies their power. Along the way be prepared to laugh, have fun and enjoy.

Manjit Kaur Khalsa Ed.D.

As a Licensed Psychologist and long time Yoga teacher, Manjit brings a unique, entertaining and professional touch to her classes and workshops. She studied with Yogi Bhajan for many years and she is a co-author of a yoga manual called Radiance and Victory, A Woman's Way to Prosperity. She also wrote a chapter in The Psychospiritual Clinician's Handbook. She is currently writing a book and program focused on health, happiness and thinness called Whole Life Weight Loss.

Marissa Farrell

Marissa holds a BFA in dance. She trained professionally in New York and graduated from the Ohio State University’s dance program. While studying dance, she was introduced to yoga to assist in flexibility and strength building. She found the effects to be both positive for the body and uplifting for the mind. For two years after this initial introduction to Yoga, Marissa studied and practiced Iyengar and Sivananda Yoga and began to delve deeper into meditation and Yoga philosophy.

Since that time, Marissa has become certified to teach Ashtanga Yoga (primary series) by David Swenson. She has also studied Kripalu Yoga, Power Yoga, Anusara Yoga and various other forms of Hatha Yoga. She has been influenced by such teachers as: Shiva Rea, Patricia Walden, Baron Baptiste, Stephen Cope, Angela Farmer, Jennifer Harvey and Rodney Yee.

Marissa teaches Vinyasa style yoga combining many of the forms of yoga she has been introduced to over the years as well as dance, Tai Chi and Aikido. Her class is always original from week to week as she constantly takes new approaches to the postures as well as to the spiritual and philosophical essence of Yoga.

She also teaches children’s yoga and pre/post natal yoga. While pregnant with her son, Marissa began creating a practice for pregnant women who were looking to either maintain their present yoga practice with special modifications, or for women looking to yoga to assist in their physical, mental and spiritual well being during and after their pregnancy. She has since designed a complete program and has helped many women during this sacred time.

Mary Kaye Chryssicas

Mary Kaye teaches children and teen yoga and is the author of Breathe: Yoga for Teens and I Love Yoga, a book for children. She graduated from Vanderbilt University with a degree in human development. After leaving a career in Boston as an advertising director, Mary Kaye discovered the transforming effects of yoga and was quickly inspired. She decided to focus on a more family friendly career of writing books and teaching children yoga. She has studied ashtanga, kundalini, hatha, iyengar and anusara yoga and completed several levels of teacher training through the Radiant Child Yoga Program. Drawn to the creative, peaceful and heart opening aspects of yoga, Mary Kaye hopes that her passion for yoga is shared by the kids that she teaches. Her classes are playful, soothing, challenging, outrageous, energetic and soulful all at the same time. She has spent over 15 years teaching and coaching children in various sport and yoga programs. Mary Kaye is a registered yoga teacher with Yoga Alliance. A kid at heart, her entertaining sense of humor and innate understanding of yoga and children make her popular classes fill up quickly. To enroll in her classes, check out her website at www.buddhafulkids.com.

Renate Kerr

Renate has been studying Hatha yoga for several years, and is certified by the National Yoga Alliance. Renate believes that bringing strength, stability and flexibility into the body contributes to a larger sense of well-being and self-empowerment. She maintains that inactivity, rather than age that is the main cause for physical decay, and that it is never too late to begin making healthy lifestyle changes. To Renate, yoga is an abundant gift she would like to share with others, so they can enrich their own lives. Along with husband John, and children Janine and Patrick, Renate has lived in Dover, MA since 1983. Other interests include reading, gardening, and knitting.

Robin Maltz

Robyn has been a Nia teacher for 13 years. She began doing Nia as a way of befriending her body after years of over exercising and generally over doing everything! She has completed all of her belts, white, blue, brown and black as well as a 400 hour vinyasa yoga teacher training. She is also a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and has been in private practice for 28 years. She uses her Nia and yoga training in her work both individually and through offering workshops designed to help individuals heal themselves. She is very interested in how Nia affects body image and self-esteem.

“Nia has been the door for much transformation in my life. I am calmer and emotionally richer as a result of my practice. I also have so many wonderful friendships through this work and this may be the most valuable aspect of my Nia practice – being a member of the NIa community.”

She is married to Ira and has a wonderful dog whose name is Mae.