Hi, I'm Śri (Shree),

Within each one of us lies the power to create. We are using it all the time, every day with each choice we make. Often, we get caught up in the flow of what’s going on around us and forget that we have any choices at all. We go on auto pilot. We make the same choices again and again by default because we’ve lost the ability to hear the one voice that can truly guide us. Only by slowing down and getting really quiet can we reconnect and hear what the voice of our inner wisdom is saying.

For the past decade, I've held space in many ways to help cultivate that connection: 1:1 Integrated Healing Sessions w/ Reiki & Sound, global collective healing meditations and chanting circles, silent retreats for woman, and online 40-day practice containers with Sanskrit mantra, which have now become the Sacred Sound Sangha.

I feel blessed to have had (and continue to have) so many amazing teachers guiding me, and I'm dedicated and passionate about passing on these practices that have been life-changing, and in many ways life-saving, for me.

Discovering Yoga

I have been drawn to the nature of reality for as long as I can remember. Losing my best friend to a car accident when I was 13 was a formative experience that began an intense path of inquiry into the meaning of life and death. In my early 20’s, I became fascinated by the union of mind and body in the present moment and the healing that can take place there. Coming from a background in theater and dance, I began sharing this as an important life skill with children of all ages through those mediums.

Finding yoga while in recovery from surgery, I realized that the essence of what I was teaching in my theatre classes, I could share even more deeply through yoga. I was committed to finding a yoga teacher training that was based in traditional teachings. I found ShivaShakti School of Yoga in 2015 and studied intensively with Krishna Perry and Aiyana Athenien along with many other fabulous teachers there until completing my 500HR YTT in 2018. Over the years I have done specialty training in Yoga Nidra, pranayama (yogic breathwork), meditation, children’s yoga, Restorative Yoga, Ayurvedic yoga, and Thai yoga bodywork.

A Passion for Sanskrit

Shortly after beginning yoga teacher training, I was increasingly drawn towards chanting practices. I was consistently hearing mantras in my head and sometimes, I would see Sanskrit letters flash across my inner screen as I was waking up.

In 2016, I began intensive studies in Sanskrit and yogic philosophy with Prem Sadasivananda from whom I was blessed to recieve my spiritual name Śri Devi in 2017. Through Prem’s guidance I was lead to Sri Vidya Ramananthan and Samskrita Bharata, where I continued my Sanskrit studies until 2023.

Striving for Authenticity

The more I studied Sanskrit, the more I wanted to incorporate it into my classes and events. For two years during COVID, I led a free online community chanting circle, mostly for friends in my yoga school, but slowly other people started joining. I wasn't really "teaching", but guiding a string of mantras I had learned from the Sivanada Yoga tradition. The longer I did this the more responsibility I felt to be doing the mantras accurately and was frustrated by the lack of definitive information I could find. As it became more clear that chanting was something I wanted to teach, Prem suggested I begin studying with someone who could guide me in a more direct way. In 2022, I began my studies with Shantala Sriramaiah, and since then, I've been training in alignment with a living lineage of Veda chanting from South India through Veda Studies

Although I do still incorporate Sanskrit chants that I learned before becoming a Veda Studies teacher, I'm so grateful to know the difference between chanting traditions, and honored to be a part of a lineage striving to maintain the integrity of Veda mantras as they were originally presented by the ancient seers.