Community Yoga Myanmar is a new initiative launched by The Abundance Project to enable international teachers to come to Burma/Myanmar and offer teacher trainings to members of the local community.

Kundalini Yoga teacher Tonie Nooyens has devoted many years to spreading the healing practices of yoga around the world, especially in Cambodia, where he founded Kundalini Yoga Cambodia, a program that is now run entirely by local teachers. KYC has changed the lives of many Cambodians emerging and healing from a recent history of genocide, war and trauma.

In April 2012, with the help of The Abundance Project, Tonie visited Myanmar for the first time and taught yoga and meditation to several different community organizations to see how yoga could also help bring healing to Myanmar as it has to Cambodia. These youth-led organizations are socially oriented programs comprised of young Myanmar people of various faiths and ethnic groups who work tirelessly to bring healing to their communities. Anyone who has practiced yoga understands its powerful ability as a healing modality.

In May 2012, Tonie will be returning to Myanmar along with fellow teacher Ann Sorita to offer the first in a series of basic teacher trainings for community workers. After the training, the new yoga teachers will be equipped to spread yoga in Myanmar as one small step toward creating a culture of reconciliation, peace-building, personal wellness and trauma recovery as Myanmar moves forward.

The Abundance Project is launching Community Yoga Myanmar to help raise funds for Tonie and Sorita's visit. We are aiming to get 100 people to donate just $10 each. That's easy! We can do that, no problem! Namaste, people...

Special thanks to our fiscal sponsor, Cloud Forest Institute, who makes online fund raising possible for this project!
 

More about Kundalini Yoga:

Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan is a Raj Yoga. It is also called a Yoga of Awareness. It is a holistic yoga working on all aspects of the body, mind and soul continuum. Combining different techniques and practices from the ancient yoga and meditation traditions Kundalini Yoga and Meditation strengthens the awareness of our outer and inner self, and helps us to reach into our creative potential. A Kundalini Yoga session comprises of pranayama (breathing), asana (body postures and movements), relaxation and meditation. These can be combined withmudras (hand gestures), bandhas (body locks) and mantra (chanting and music).

Tonie Nooyens is a long time practitioner in different traditions of meditation, meditational yoga and healing. He is a certified Kundalini Yoga teacher and one of the lead trainers on the KRI Asia Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training Program. He travels extensively and teaches throughout Asia. Since January 2007 he lives and teaches in Cambodia facilitating a Community Yoga and Meditation teacher training program for Cambodians. The program includes activities for local communities and vulnerable groups in which yoga and meditation techniques are used for relief of stress and trauma, as well as for communication and personal capacity training.

Ann Sorita is a certified Kundalini Yoga teacher and one of the lead teachers on the Community Yoga and Meditation teacher training in Cambodia. She has been working with young adults living with HIV/Aids, victims of trafficking and domestic violence, and with children with physical and mental disabilities. She also works with individual clients suffering from stress and depression, and from degeneration problems. Sorita also teaches on the KRI Asia Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training Program. She completed a course on creative art therapy and is currently studying for a Master degree in Psychology.