Meet your HYTT 200 Trainers
Students of the Holistic Yoga Teacher Training 200 hour program get the benefit of having two teachers who care deeply for each student.
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Lead Instructor
Shelley is a teacher at heart. She has been learning, living and sharing holistic ways for 30 years. Her passion for practicing and teaching yoga with intentions of personal integration are rooted in Child Psychology and love of people. Shelley created Yoga Sanctuary, a holistic, nonprofit studio, after completing her 200hr Teacher Training in California at White Lotus in 2011. The Yoga Sutra defines yoga as “unbinding the bonds of sorrow.” In passionate pursuit of this “unbinding” Shelley has completed her 300hr Yoga Psychology Training with Ashley Turner and has certifications in Trauma-Informed Yoga, Breath Coaching as well as Yoga for Depression & Anxiety. Shelley believes that yoga is a potent tool that, when practiced and shared, can help to rebalance some of the injustices inherent in our collective history. When we are connected to ourselves, our history, our pain, our joy… we can more wholly connect with others. Shelley is passionate about teaching teachers to teach yoga in ways that bring wholeness to self, to others and to the world.
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Lead Instructor
Tracy experienced the nurturing energy of Shelley and Yoga Sanctuary first as a student. Her 20 years of experience teaching movement to all ages and types of bodies infuses her teaching with a desire to understand the physical body through healthy alignment and energy flow. During a 5 year run as a professor at St Cloud State University, she co-directed the Dance program and taught anatomy-centered ballet classes. During the birth of her daughter in 2010, she had her first encounter with Healing Touch, a therapy which works directly with the energetic body. Since then she has earned certification as a Healing Touch Practitioner through Healing Beyond Borders, which feeds and informs her teaching greatly. Tracy undertook an amazing week-long anatomy intensive with Judith Lasater in 2019, and also completed David Keil’s 30 hour online Yoga Anatomy course. She earned both her 200 and 500 RYT from Devanadi, so her teaching style is very influenced by Tanya Bogenzhein’s unique blending of ancient yogic wisdom, energy healing and Ayurvedic therapy. She has been happy to learn yoga under Ben Vincent’s guidance for many years as well.
Together
Shelley and Tracy began to work on plans to create Holistic Yoga Teacher Training & Personal Transformation after completing a 9-month long program of intensive Yoga Studies with Ben Vincent in 2016. The name was carefully chosen to capture what they wanted to offer — Holistic because they believed that the full experience of yoga interweaves the physical, energetic, emotional, mental, and spiritual layers of life in such a way that to study a single layer of the self quickly leads you to see the rest tangled up with it. The Personal Transformation component seems inevitable, that as you study yourself, experience the deep teachings of powerful asana, pranayama and meditation, you are bound to change into someone you recognize as more truly “you”. Shelley and Tracy believe strongly that the only way to become a yoga teacher is to practice yoga, and then to begin to love the beautiful teachings of yoga to such a degree that you feel passionate about sharing it with others.
As partners, Shelley and Tracy complement each other well. Shelley is transparent and vulnerable, seeking to create a community where each person feels welcome. She considers program details and curriculum content to support inquiry into parts of our stories that can be tricky to navigate. Tracy is practical and goal-oriented—helping to shape the schedules and certification details that keep everyone moving towards the finish line. Throughout their lives in various ways, Tracy and Shelley have both always felt compelled to teach and share. They are both teachers more than they are anything else, and so students of the Holistic Yoga program get the benefit of having two teachers who care deeply for each student. Thus, HYTT & PT puts a strong emphasis on teaching what you are learning, from our very first session together, to help you find your teaching voice to guide yourself and others into deeper practices.
Guest Teachers
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Ben Vincent is a yoga teacher, yoga therapist and coach based in Minneapolis. His teachings are rooted in Tantra, Classical and Hatha Yoga traditions, Para Yoga, The Himalayan Tradition and the Krishnamacarya Lineages. Ben aspires to share yoga that is authentic, transformative and accessible, supporting students to realize freedom and fulfillment in life. He also enjoys time with his family, playing music, and being in nature. He views sharing yoga as a great honor and responsibility - as there is no greater service than work of love. Learn more.
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Jessa Walters has completed the 300-hour Trauma Center Trauma-Sensitive Yoga (TCTSY) certification with David Emerson through the Trauma Center at the Justice Resource Institute in Boston. Jessa began teaching TCTSY in 2013 as part of a study through the University of Minnesota and the Domestic Abuse Project researching TCTSY as a viable clinical treatment for trauma. Learn more
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Marjorie has been practicing yoga for well over 40 years and earned her first yoga teaching credentials in 2012, after living and working as a volunteer at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, the largest yoga center in North America. Since then she has earned certifications in Yin Yoga, Restorative Yoga and various forms of trauma informed yoga including training from the Black Yoga Teachers Alliance. She recently completed her 500 hour yoga teacher training with world renowned yoga teacher, Dianne Bondy focusing on equity and accessibility in the wellness field. Marjorie is a former social worker, youth worker and crisis worker with expertise in program development and implementation. After graduating seminary in 2018 she integrated her yoga teaching, social service experience, and spiritual education to help clients access the power, peace and healing at the core of their own being. She is the founder of Temple Within where she offers spiritual wellness consultation, yoga, and coaching services.
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Courtney believes yoga is a deeper understanding of life. It is the integration, the yoking, of our inner and outer world. Yoga offers a safe space to heal our wounds – physical, mental, and emotional.
She felt a pull towards deeper study in yoga during her years as a dedicated student at Yoga Sanctuary, especially as a regular in Chantelle Ebben’s unique Saturday morning classes interweaving Ayurveda, philosophy and psychology. She stepped forward eagerly to join the first year of the Holistic Yoga Teacher Training at Yoga Sanctuary, and stepped forward again to begin teaching that same Saturday morning class that had helped ignite my interests. Courtney says she is excited and grateful for the opportunity to teach at the studio that has been so significant to me as a student.
She sees Ayurveda as a practical and relevant way to balance our bodies and minds in the midst of our changing world. And thinks of Ayurveda as a map that I use to navigate, to connect, and to find my way by living according to the rhythm of nature, listening intuitively to my body and inner voice, and having the grace to change course when she finds herself out of balance. Courtney has studied with Claire Ragozzino, Andrea Russell, and Dr. Claudia Welch.
She welcomes you to be yourself and show up without judgments, doubts, fears, or expectations. Yoga is peace, love and self-acceptance.
