Instructors
Tanaya Larsen, Owner
Tanaya truly believes that anyone can benefit from yoga regardless of flexibility, experience, age, or injury. Her love for yoga developed once seeing the progress it made on her stiff body and the complimentary nature it brought to her running routine and life. She completed her Registered Yoga Teacher training in 2010 in Boulder, Colorado, where she taught for five years before making Rome (and SpringStone) her home. Using her background in Exercise Science, Tanaya's classes use science-based approaches to inspire students to be curious about their experience and adapt each movement for a personal transformative experience. Students can expect to connect with breath, strengthen the body and calm the mind. In addition to yoga, Tanaya loves running, reading, baking, hiking, and having adventures with her husband and crazy kids!
Gayle Monk
First introduced to yoga eighteen years ago, Gayle has been a practitioner under the tutelage of first Sue Hopkins and later Lynne Jacobs. In 2012 she obtained her 200-hour teaching certification with Yoga Alliance, and then her 300-hour certification in 2015. Perhaps owing to her 36-year career as an elementary school teacher, most recently with Darlington School, Gayle enjoys sharing her love for yoga with students of all levels. When not on the mat, Gayle enjoys reading, hiking, line dancing and playing hand bells with her church choir. She also enjoys spending time with her family and her dog, Charlie.
Kelly Sanker
Kelly started yoga just after graduating college when a friend started teaching kundalini. She loved the way her body felt both physically and mentally after practicing. Kelly received her RYT 200 certificate from her original kundalini teacher in Atlanta in 2020. The training focused on vinyasa, ashtanga, and kundalini, and it ended up taking 6 months due to Covid. She also has a trauma yoga certificate and experience teaching teenagers and those struggling with addiction. Ashtanga is Kelly's passion, which she practiced at SpringStone with Shannon for 9 years. She also loves to mix kundalini with ashtanga styles of yoga. Kelly's classes focus on alignment with emphasis on the bandhas and breath. Besides yoga, Kelly loves being outdoors, especially hiking and biking with her family. She also loves to run, garden and spend time with her dogs.
Chris Slicker
Chris is a 200 hour E-RYT, who began her yoga journey in 2001 as a freshman in college, and soon saw all the benefits yoga brought to her life, both on and off the mat. In 2012 Chris completed her 200-hour yoga teacher training at Living Yoga Program in Austin, TX. She began teaching at a small dance studio in Temple, TX, and later co-founded Temple Yoga, the town’s first dedicated yoga studio. Chris enjoys teaching students of all ages and abilities, and meeting people where they are physically, mentally and emotionally.
Kam Malone
Kam teaches yoga and sound therapy at Springstone Yoga in Rome, GA, and he works as a music, yoga, and sound therapy group facilitator at Red Top Wellness Center in Cartersville, GA. He holds a 200RYS yoga teacher certification with add-on certificates in Trauma-Informed Yoga, Yoga Nidra, and Sound Therapy I/II. Kam came to yoga in 2011 after a cardiac event and a lifestyle change. He is a
retired music teacher and church choir director that enjoys bridging the gap between traditional music and innovative sound therapy.
Kyra Buchanan
Kyra believes yoga can help anyone learn to carve out a safe space for themselves in this often unsafe feeling world. Her purpose in teaching is to make space for each student to begin a new conversation with his or her body, to breath and move together as a community, and ultimately, to heal from injuries, both physical and emotional that our bodies are holding onto. Scientifically speaking, her purpose is to help your nervous system step out of survival mode—fight/flight/freeze response— to a state of calm.
Frank Kenney
Twenty years ago my doctor recommended that I see a neurologist to help understand my perplexing symptoms. My balance was "off", I had numbness in my right hand, and my right foot was "dropping" when I lifted my leg to take a step. The diagnosis? Primary Progressive Multiple Sclerosis. I was scared and angry and felt for the first time that my future had become unpredictable. Years of medications, mostly injections, failed to change my slow and continued disability. Then I discovered Tai Chi. Tai Chi did not cure me of anything but it did help me to address my balance issue, it created in me a sense that I was taking charge of my health, it relieved stress, it connected me to a community of like-minded people, it renewed my self-confidence, it challenged me, it taught me patience. Harvard Medical School lists Tai Chi as the #2 "best exercise you can do" (swimming took 1st place). Become a student of Tai Chi. Become a student in MY class. You may see me enter the studio walking with a cane, but I'll set it down and we'll all do our Tai Chi together.
Melissa Lerner
Melissa Lerner has been a practicing yogi for more than 15 years and is a 330-hour/26x2 OHYA certified instructor. Her practice and her classes are designed to be intentional moving meditations that allow mind, body, and spirit to move, rest, and breathe together as one. Her fellow students and instructors have all been inspirations in her desire to pass on a practice that allows and encourages body awareness and self-discovery of contentment, equanimity, and love.
Lynne Jacobs, Founder
Lynne is gifted in her ability to meet students where they are and make yoga accessible to everyone. She works with a wide range of students from all ages and abilities in a thriving private yoga therapy practice and group classes. Knowing that students come to yoga in different phases of life, Lynne encourages students to listen to their own body, adapt the postures to their unique body, play with their limits without exceeding them, and have compassionate self-observation. Her teachings integrate mindfulness, meditation, and sensory awareness enabling students to find a greater understanding and awareness of themselves both on and off the mat. Lynne began her yoga practice in 2000 and is a certified Yoga Therapist with the International Association of Yoga Therapists and is also a E-RYT- 500hr instructor with Yoga Alliance. Along with her formal yoga training, Lynne is a student and practitioner of mindfulness meditation. She currently only offers limited private sessions.
