Our teachers

Karren Perry

Karren has been a practitioner of Yoga since the late 90’s. She came to Yoga first to relieve the physical pain of sciatica and knew this was the path she must follow. Years of exploring various styles of Yoga led to her first training in Hatha Yoga in 2008, she began teaching in 2009.

In the following years her interest in the therapeutic aspects of Yoga grew, the ability to heal through the practice was something she was extremely curious about. After two years travelling overseas, Karren returned in 2014 to embark on a three year post graduate diploma in Yoga Therapy with one of the most accomplished teachers in this field, Dr. N. Chandrasekaran, in the tradition of T. Krishnamacharya. In recent years, Karren has completed hundreds of hours of training in Traditional Hatha Yoga, enjoying the immersion of study and the opportunity for personal growth and evolution. Humbled to always be a student, Karren continues to study Yoga Philosophy, Sanskrit and Vedic Chanting, with a particular interest in the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali, which is often the inspiration behind her class themes. Her dedication to her own daily practice and the choice to live life according to the principles of Yoga shine through in her life and her classes. It is her hope, as a teacher, to inspire and hold space for all to enjoy their own experience.

Sally Meredith

Sally is the founder of Elements Embodied retreats, facilitating yoga in studios, retreats, training and festivals within Australia and abroad. She is also the co-owner of the online yoga platform – Alive Yogi, along with her Mum, Rose.

Sally’s teachings are deeply inspired by nature’s cycles and our human potential, guiding you through awakening and balancing practices with your breath, body and heart. Sally’s classes poetically integrate timeless yogic concepts and the experiential anatomy of our inner landscapes in a way that is spacious, relatable and deeply beneficial. Being informed by the five element system of Taoist philosophy, Sally’s offerings will have you inquiring into your own relationship with the majesty of nature both around and within you.

Sally has always had a passion for exploring inner-space and really getting to know ourselves. As a child she remembers having a thirst for the profound peace and spirit she would discover through dance, yoga, meditation and being in nature. Since she could walk, Sally has been wholeheartedly invested in embodied expression, from dance to yoga, to circus and healing arts. As a teenager, she first began facilitating movement practices as a part-time dance teacher. While studying her Bachelor of Contemporary Dance at university Sally enrolled in her first Yoga Teacher Training, the Advanced Dip of Yoga Teaching with the Australian Yoga Academy. Upon graduating in 2009 Sally set her off on a trajectory of travels and inspired learning including delving into the arts of Ashtanga Yoga, Shadow Yoga, Yin Yoga, Power Yoga, Prenatal Yoga, Acro Yoga, Taoist Yoga, and Zenthai Shiatsu.

Apart from Yoga, Sally also works as a Zenthai Shiatsu therapist and lead facilitator, frequently running courses in Bali and Melbourne. And when she’s not traveling around facilitating courses and retreats, she is enjoying “mum life” with her family in one of their favourite parts of the world – the Sunny Coast!

Being informed by everything she has learned along the way, Sally’s yoga practice is a dance that invites fluidity, aliveness and totality to the body, mind and spirit. A dance that guides us back home to our authentic and natural state of being.

ABhi Joyti

Abhi (Alyce Musk) brings an unwavering presence to her yoga classes. With curiosity and a deep receptive quality of touch, she supports unfixating the bodies tensions and concerns, whilst listening to understand causes beneath the surface. Carrying a playful nature and a generous laugh, Abhi builds easeful relationships with all her clients and students to support their journey and questions. Abhi Jyoti was the name gifted by her teacher Yogirishi Vishvektu meaning Fearless Light.

Phoebe Boonkerd

Phoebe is a lifelong yoga practitioner, having started practicing yoga in her late teens. She began teaching in 2014, and takes an inclusive, welcoming approach in her classes. While acknowledging the contemporary nature of modern yoga, she is always looking back to the roots of yoga philosophy and wisdom as an anchor point for her teaching and practice. In addition to being a dedicated yogini, Phoebe is a registered naturopath and midwife, and has worked extensively in spa and wellness retreats in South East Asia. She has a podcast specialising in yoga nidra, which she updates roughly monthly. Expect slow, strong flows in her classes, peppered with gentle humor and a trauma-informed approach.

Mercia Cleote

A practitioner for 16 years, Mercia’s passion for teaching lies in facilitating connection and integration of the body and mind, deepening awareness, and supporting people in feeling comfortable and at home.

Mercia fell in love with yoga at a young age, when she was a competitive swimmer in New Zealand and yoga was used for rehabilitation and functional healing. From there began a long journey of diving into the intricacies of the human body. With a Degree in Zoology, Physiology and Nutrition, she is excited by the mechanics of the human body, as well as the incredible healing power of movement, meditation, and connection to community.

For the last 5 years she has been travelling overseas, with yoga as a powerful anchoring tool wherever she goes. Now settled in the Sunshine Coast, Mercia loves to support others in cultivating safety in their body to build resilience independent of external circumstances.

A huge advocate for taking Yoga beyond the physical asana, Mercia promotes yoga through mindfulness, ethics, discipline and developing intuition and connection to what our body is communicating with us. As well as a solid sense of humour and a reminder not to take ourselves too seriously! She loves the dynamic nature of yoga, from practices of strong, powerful Hatha and Vinyasa to a soft, gentle Yin and breath practices. Because life is all about duality!

David Hardy

David has been a student of yoga since 2009 when he discovered that a regular yoga practice relieved chronic back pain and sciatica. In 2019 he completed his 200hr Yoga Teacher Training and began teaching the same year. He has since completed a 110hr Meditation Teacher Training and an additional 300hr YTT. David is also a creative Visual Artist and Signmaker.

David believes our life experience is directly related to what we choose to practice each day. Using the tools that yoga provides, everyday becomes another opportunity to direct energy towards our greatest life. He enjoys creating a safe, grounded atmosphere for students to explore and deepen their own practice. His soothing voice and grounded energy makes each class a deep experience and connection to self, not to be missed.

Kelly Briese

Kelly is a certified meditation teacher, holistic counsellor + hatha & yin yoga teacher.

Although Kelly draws from all styles of yoga and meditation, she has developed a deep love of yin yoga in alignment with surrendering to the feminine and cultivating a slow and intentional practice on and off the matt.

Kelly has developed a transformational, yet deeply nurturing approach to yoga that centres your individual experience and integrates mindful healing modalities to achieve your unique goal.

She spent the past few years in the deep study of mindfulness, including extended time in India studying Hatha / Aruyvedic and Yin Yoga.

Since 2021, she has been a course facilitator and trainer for students in meditation + teaching holistic counselling for a mindfulness school,
which has now expanded internationally with online mindset workshops.

Kelly is passionate about creating a safe and sacred space for her students while integrating modalities of mindfulness for mental health care.

Sal Henderson

Sally came to yoga after suffering burn out from many years of working full time, studying as a mature aged student at university and raising a family and not applying self-care to her life. A friend invited her to a hot yoga class and she was intrigued and blown away at the intensity all at once. She did a 7-day challenge shortly after and continued this practice for many years as a daily practice.

Sally has also practiced other forms of yoga including flow, yin and anything else she could throw herself in the path of. Sally began to study yoga as a practice and uncover parts of herself that were previously hidden.

She wanted to learn more and booked a teacher training then another the following year and has not stopped learning and studying since and plans to continue. Sally is certified in hot yoga, Yin, traditional Tantric Hatha including philosophy and Ayurveda and flow styles.

In addition, Sally also has certification to teach trauma sensitive yoga. She has taught children, adolescents, veterans, groups and corporate events and yoga as therapy such as in private health retreats and one to one as part of her Counselling practice. Sally works as a drug and alcohol Clinician and specialises in addiction, PTSD and trauma.

Chontelle Myers

Chontelle is a young and vibrant teacher who deeply values poetry, authenticity and community. Her focus is to create spaces where people feel safe to both curiously explore the potential of the mind body spirit relationship, as well as receive the wisdom of yoga in ways that are nourishing and peaceful. Chontelle weaves the threads of Zen Thai Shiatsu and Chinese medicine 5 element the theory, through her classes to expand the possibilities of the practice. Inspired by her teacher Gwyn Williams, “The way you do one thing, is the way you do everything”. May we all learn to grow in unconditional love and compassion.

Jana Heiss

Sat Nam! My name is Jana, I’m a 500-hour certified Kundalini and Hatha Yoga teacher from Germany. During my years at Uni I began a regular meditation and Yoga practice which helped me so much in dealing with stress and anxiety. I was looking for meaning and purpose in life and got drawn to learn more about Yogic philosophy, meditation as well as shamanic practices.

After finishing my degree in Linguistics in 2018, I went to travel India, deepened my meditation practice and completed my first Yoga teacher training in Hatha Yoga. Instead of getting a job after my India trip, I left everything behind and went to South America on a one-way ticket and ended up staying in many Yoga hostels in different countries to teach daily classes. I have lived a more or less nomadic life for around 5 years, always with my Yoga mat strapped to my backpack! In 2019 I accidentally walked into my first Kundalini Yoga class, not knowing what it was. Honestly, at first I thought it was so weird, all these unfamiliar and fast movements, intense breathing exercises, high energy Mantras and different meditations to what I was used to. But this first class had left me feeling so clear, recharged and light (because I had a lot of emotions coming up during the practice) that it got me hooked immediately. I started to learn more about this type of Yoga and in late 2020 signed up for a 3-months intensive training for Kundalini Yoga. Today, both Kundalini and Hatha Yoga are a big part of my life, which I’m very grateful for. As a teacher, I am here to assist you in your Yoga Journey and healing process, guide you through beautiful, fun and challenging Kriyas and hold space for you in any way I can. I’m looking forward to connecting with you! Love, Jana

Mandy Dumas

Mandy is a self-confessed yoga nerd. The practices of yoga have transformed her life in more ways than she ever could have imagined. It’s for this reason that she holds the practice with so much love and reverence; delighting in any opportunity to share the teachings. Mandy recalls her first taste of yoga vividly, it was back in 2007 when she attended a Body Balance class at a local gym. It’s a class she will never forget, the profound ability for yoga to provide a ‘work in’ rather than a ‘work out’ was placed in front of her on that very first day.

In the years following she continued to use the practice as a tool to de-stress and to keep her body from breaking while competing in long distance triathlons. It was during 2013, that Mandy put aside her engineering career to answer her inner calling to immerse more deeply into the practice, study and teaching of yoga. Since then she’s continued to dive deep, completing more than 1200hrs of formal yoga training covering a wide range of different styles including Vinyasa, Hatha, Vini Yoga and Yin. Mandy has taught in various places across Asia and Australia, but now calls the Sunshine Coast in Australia home. She is a teacher of teachers, having led numerous Yoga teacher trainings on the Sunshine Coast. It would be fair to say that yoga is one of Mandy’s greatest passions, she believes that there is a yoga practice suitable for everyone on this planet. She views our yoga mats as the perfect training ground for life, always inviting the opportunity for self-enquiry, growth and transformation.

Rani Shah

Connection with oneself through movement has always been a pivotal interest for Rani. A dancer since young, she began teaching Belly Dance, Hip hop and Bachata classes in her early teens and was first drawn to yoga to improve her enduance and flexibility. The clarity and deep connection she experienced after each class was profound.

She moved to Singapore in 2018 and eventually began teaching yoga and movement classes full time. She believes a strong movement practice should heal and create more energy. Moving from the inside-out is a reminder you will hear often in her classes!She holds over 500 hours training collectively in pratices of Vinyasa, Hatha, Hot Yoga and Embodied Movement. She is currently inspired by the transformative art of Zenthai Shiatsu and Traditional Chinese Medicine. In class, Rani loves to combine functional, primal and somatic inspired movements with traditional yoga asana to create a conscious and intelligent practice.

OUR TEACHERS