Elissa Margolin

Elissa Margolin

I am an E-RYT500 registered yoga teacher, certified mindfulness meditation teacher, global health practitioner and professor, and mama to my two most important teachers.  I am happiest moving my body, outside, preferably in view of the ocean.

I have been practicing yoga and mindfulness meditation since 1996, and teaching since 2009.  I have studied, practiced, and taught throughout Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, and the US, and am honored to train with some of the world’s most respected and beloved teachers.

My yoga teaching is a soulful tapestry woven from these practices and cultures:  A synergy of the poetic fluidity of Prana Flow, the fire and flow of Ashtanga, the alignment precision of Iyengar, the personalized healing potential of Desikachar, the embodied presence of Yin, and the compassionate awareness of Insight Meditation.  Joyful, playful movement is paired with mindful, nourishing exploration of breath and stillness.  

I approach teaching as an alchemical exchange in the exploration of what it means to be… to be with, to belong to… ourselves, the natural world, each other.  I believe yoga can support healing and resilience, and I endeavor to inspire and sustain meaningful engagement in the world through my practice and teaching.

For nearly a decade, I lived and worked throughout the developing world, leading HIV programs for some of the world’s most impoverished.  As a professor of public health at American University in Washington, DC, I developed a global health focus within the Health Studies department, and established a Mindful Wellbeing Initiative, offering mindfulness to senior leadership, training hundreds of faculty members to integrate mindfulness into higher education, and ultimately reaching thousands of students with my 14-week mindful wellbeing curriculum.

I created a yoga therapy program for HIV-vulnerable, transgendered people, many of whom injected drugs, and I am becoming certified in children’s yoga and mindfulness.