Dana Tarasavage is an Authorized Level 2 Ashtanga Yoga Instructor with over thirteen years of teaching experience. She is currently a Master’s Degree candidate in Yoga Studies at Loyola Marymount University with a focus on Yoga Philosophy and Sanskrit, and has also studied postural yoga, chanting and Sanskrit in Mysore, India.
Dana was initially drawn to yoga in 2004 while living at home in Florida, but eventually moved to New York City where she attended NYU and FIT and cultivated a devoted Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga practice. In 2009, while also pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Communications, she completed a Registered Yoga Teacher Training at Urban Ashtanga Yoga Shala in Orlando, Florida. She has since completed additional training in Restorative and Vinyasa Yoga. Beginning in 2011, she made five annual month-long trips to Mysore, India, to study Ashtanga Yoga at the KPJAYI and to further her connection to the roots of the practice. Since 2013, she has taught Mysore Ashtanga classes, and is also a Classical Pilates instructor with 600 hours of training from New York City’s Power Pilates, has served as co-director of New York Yoga’s 200-Hour Teacher Training, and is a published poet featured in the Poetry of Yoga.
Today, Dana teaches traditionally-rooted classes, workshops, and trainings in person at Humming Puppy and online through a Virtual Mysore Membership, offers private sessions, and mentors emerging yoga instructors. Her classes are supportive and precise, with a focus on helping students build and sustain a holistic practice that integrates physicality with philosophy.
“India holds such a dear place in my heart, it has become almost like a second home after several years of traveling and studying yoga there. It always strikes me as a country of contrasts – beauty, devotion and peace mingle seamlessly with poverty and suffering. I’m honored to join YGB as an ambassador to do my small part to give back and bring more peace and opportunity to those who might be suffering in India. I immediately loved the concept of YGB – that for the price of a single yoga class we can made a difference, especially in the life of a woman or child in India.”