Meet our amazing instructors!
Each teacher brings a unique perspective, diverse experience and varied training to their session. Some favorites return from the past, and fresh faces are here to inspire you.
Connect with our stellar team of yoga teachers; they will help you bloom!
Tiffany Thomas-Killam
ACROYOGA
Tiffany shares her students’ excitement as they follow her careful instructions and fly in her AcroYoga classes. She approaches her practice and teaching as she approaches life–playful, lively, hard working, and always kind to others. She uses all these wonderful qualities in nurturing three energetic boys, and as a health teacher for Waukee Schools. We’re happy she’s back at the Retreat!
Deb Jennings
SOUND BATH
Deb brings vast experience leading meditation, drum circles and healing groups to her first appearance at the Central Iowa Yoga Retreat. She is versatile in the instruments she plays, and the venues where she teaches, performs and facilitates. Deb has studied sound since she was five–in Tibet, China, India, and among indigenous tribes of North and South America. She continues to explore Christian, Buddhist, Sufi, and Hindu traditions.
Haley Niichel
ECSTATIC DANCE
Haley is so passionate about breathwork, meditation, ecstatic dance and Vedic astrology that she left her corporate gig and made a pilgrimage to India to go deeper into the study of yoga than she thought possible. Haley has specialized in meditation, breathwork and kundalini kriya techniques in her practice, and training. She uses these tools to illuminate pathways for curious spirit seekers to realize their potential and their true nature.
Brent Aronsen
MORNING PROGRAM–ACROYOGA
Brent’s life and practice are made up of dedicated training, and playful curiosity. Learning new approaches and facing new challenges are apparent in all his endeavors. He helps his students fly, but on a firm basis of the fundamentals. An avid practitioner of yoga since 2011, and acroyoga since 2014, Brent is excited to return to the Central Iowa Retreat for the fourth time.
Martha McCormick
ADVENTURE
Don’t make yoga your life; make your life Yoga. Garden. Make Art. Yoga. Repeat. After creating her own mindfulness practice over 20 years, Martha joined the community at Shakti Yoga Shop, and found a deeper practice that keeps her healthy physically, mentally, and spiritually. Martha is an experiential and adventure educator by profession, and weaves stories, poetry & philosophy into her classes.
Jenny Klein
RETREAT ORGANIZER
Excited to share her love for yoga on a number of platforms, Jenny opened Movement Yoga in the fall of 2019, and her son was born shortly after the pandemic began. Anyone with less courage might have been daunted by circumstances but not Jenny. She is making a success of both, and is taking leadership for the Central Iowa Yoga Retreat after this year of collaborating with the Next Step team.
Lindsay Bordwell
FLOW & RESTORE
Lindsay was drawn to Yoga as a way to focus on mental and physical health. She loves facilitating yoga and human connection, and works to inspire her students to find happiness. Lindsay’s goal is to help others know and get what they want from life. She continues to deepen her practice, and provides a safe space to come as you are, take what you need and spread positive energy.
Bridget Ryan
THAI YOGA MASSAGE
When Covid-19 hit the US, I scrambled to let Bridget know we had to cancel! She was in Thailand studying to become an even more extraordinary bodyworker. Bridget has studied yoga and massage across the world. She practices and teaches at Body Wisdom Massage Therapy School. She is inspired by subtle details, and uses that inspiration to hone her unique awareness of the human body.
Brandy Case Haub
FOREST BATHING
Brandy Case Haub is a conservationist, outdoor adventurer, educator, anthropologist, local food & beer lover, mother/friend/wife and certified forest therapy guide. She is the owner of intertwined: nature + forest therapy. Brandy’s passion is bringing nature into culture by supporting individuals in rediscovering the restorative and curative effects of time spent in the natural world.
Janet Casson
SOMA YOGA
Janet believes in each person’s ability to reinvent and recreate themselves. She has long used yoga & meditation to help each student thrive, and every body feel at ease. Janet uses her training as a Reiki practitioner to guide students on the path of self discovery—helping them see what they’re capable of doing, thinking and being. Connection and curiosity are Janet’s guiding principles.
Sheng Ly
YOGA STRENGTH
In 2003 Sheng came to yoga to become more flexible. He found the practice to be amazing, and continues to work at balancing strength, mobility, learning and self-discovery. We missed Sheng’s birth year in the Chinese Zodiac. 2020 was the Year of the Rat–skillful, successful, and content with a peaceful life. There’s no better description for Sheng, and we’re happy he’s back to inspire us with strength and optimism.
Joseph Schneider
RESTORATIVE YOGA
Joseph learned restorative yoga as a student of the Iyengar tradition, later fleshed out in Anusara teacher training. A retired sociology professor, he draws on his long teaching career to offer clear instruction, subtle humor, and strong commitment to alignment principles in asana classes at Shakti Yoga Shop in Des Moines. Joseph finds yoga to be a great “body supplement” to his studies and writing.
Stephie Clemens
YOGA NIDRA
Named “acharya,” a teacher of wisdom, Stephie wants “people to remember to stop and breathe. I want them to have a sense of self-awareness and connection with their bodies.” Stephie has completed more than 700 hours of training at Kripalu in Massachusetts, and recently added trauma-sensitive yoga to her tool kit. She currently teaches at studios in the Des Moines area, including Power Life Yoga.
