Namasté Friend,
Welcome!
My name is Sandra Leigh.
I’m actively teaching yoga & wellness in Vancouver, BC
Here’s a link for
Spring 2026 yoga sessions.
UPDATE 2026 ::
Over the past few years, I’ve been taking a number of adult flexible learning courses through BCIT, working towards associate certificates in both Music Business and Radio Arts & Entertainment.
I’ve been learning to produce and record, both music and spoken word, at home, as well as how to gracefully maneuver music business and marketing in our current world. Since it’s a world of sound, I’m pleased to be learning skills and ways to reach more people through radio and recording arts, plus video production.
This year, I’m celebrating a 10 year anniversary for the release of the album I play in my classes: ‘Divine Play’ by Give Peace a Chant. I’m pleased to share all of my recorded music on many familiar digital platforms. Thanks for adding us to your collection.
If you’re looking for live in person music events, check my music website for more rhythm and mantra meditation events. I’m open to explore and exchange music and harmonic practices. Contact through email me at
sandraleigh108 @ gmail . com for more info.
I’ve been writing more and gradually posting articles here, too. This link is a recent article I wrote regarding subtle energy body anatomy and the effects meditation and sound healing practices can have on trauma, brain health and the body. Thanks for reading!
A short read of my own journey to wellness and why I took up yoga and meditation ::
It could be that my interest in yoga was inspired by the television shows of the day. I grew up in Calgary when TV programming included a CTV exercise program called ‘Kareen’s Yoga’, hosted by ever-fabulous Kareen Zebroff. I remember following along in the living room with my mom, and us both wearing one piece nylon bodysuits paired with thick, itchy leotards, just like D and E below.
In my teens, I had strong interests in music, dance, art, drama, with high energy activities all highlighting my school experiences. However, at only 17 years old, I developed an unexpected health issue that eventually became an inflammatory health condition that required multiple surgeries and hospital stays from the ages 18 – 24. I was would experience this condition as life altering, yet back in those days, we just got on with life.
After I recovered, I trained as an Aesthetician and went to work at a spa specializing in skin care, massage and European spa treatments. 3 years later I moved to Vancouver.
I was living and working in Vancouver for almost a year when the health condition returned and for nearly another year, I recovered from 2 emergency surgeries. By now, I was living on my own in Vancouver. I only tell this story because it was a devastating time for me, but I pulled through a little wiser and as part of my own health recovery program, I found exercise programs to attend at my local community centre. I returned to the gym and I registered in yoga, not expecting any kind of life changing experience beyond getting twisted up like a pretzel.
Instead, I met an exceptional teacher, Lilian Bianchi who guided me with her vast experience and honed awareness. I was intrigued by Lilian’s interpretations of meditation and yoga philosophy. She’s from Brazil and has been practicing yoga and meditation since she was only 14. When I attended her classes, I felt like a light went on in my body. I began attending sessions with her as often as possible and for many years, I had no idea that I would become a teacher, myself. All I knew was that I had landed on a mat and was in a process of growth and recovery. Yoga was interesting and fun and Lilian’s classes were very challenging!
Then, in 1995, my impulsive decision to marry my childhood sweetheart and pen pal backfired, ending fairly soon with a divorce. These dramatics showed me how I needed more space and time for my own recovery. At the time, I wanted to be married but now, I had survived a big illusion. My broken heart would mend as I sought a new direction and that summer, I visited Yasodhara Ashram, near Kootenay Bay, BC, and participated in a 10 day workshop that included ‘The Hidden Language of Hatha Yoga’ as taught by Swami Sivananda Radha, the original pioneer of the ‘Divine Light Invocation’ as well as Hidden Language. These practices went beyond prayers to prepare me for the next step on my journey.
I ended up staying on at the ashram work program for about a year after completing their yoga development certification course (YDC) and receiving a Hatha Yoga Teacher’s Certificate.
I returned to Vancouver and went back to work in the restaurants. I saved my tips and bought my first harmonium. I had started subbing for Lilian and I also started teaching at the YMCA, both downtown and in South Vancouver.
Lilian introduced me to her dear friend and local legend, BC teacher, Sandra Sammartino who offered a complete modular teacher certificate course at her Kairos Studio in White Rock, BC. I was intrigued by her approaching yoga as therapy. Her trainings worked with subtle armoring and letting go processes, and in varying degrees, layers of psychological traumas trapped within ourselves were given a safe place to process. Yoga teacher training with Sandra was a true sanctuary for deep learning and growth in recovery.
She was also the original pioneer and heart behind BC’s ‘Yoga Outreach’ programs.
My Outreach teaching experiences included many interesting placements, such as providing yoga sessions for home bound trauma survivors. I also taught adult women at a drug and alcohol treatment facility in South Vancouver. The Yoga Outreach program also sponsored an after school program called “The Avengers”, where I taught yoga and breath work for children and youth with intellectual disabilities.
Through Yoga Outreach, Sandra also mentored me to teach men’s yoga to young offenders who were being held at the Willingdon Youth Corrections Centre in Burnaby. Looking back, I’m sure these incarcerated young and vulnerable men were themselves bottling up the effects of unprocessed childhood trauma. They lapped up the yoga and deep relaxation.
I also led a women’s yoga program at St. Paul’s Eating Disorder Clinic. Although we didn’t call it “trauma-informed somatic yoga” at the time, we used breathing techniques along with a mindful tailored yoga practice to help restore the nervous system.
In 1999, I met a yoga group from the UK and I became interested in their unique, energy based style of yoga, called Dru Yoga. I would first complete a 3 year course of Dru Yoga Teacher Training modules in Vancouver BC, Canada. I would also travel to the Dru Yoga Centre in North Wales, UK, visiting London, Scotland, The Netherlands, and India, attending conferences and retreats. I later earned a Dru Sound Healing & Mantra Certificate and a Dru Meditation Teacher’s certificate. More recently, I’ve was certified as a Dru Breath Coach. Dru Yoga is popular in the UK, Europe, Australia and parts of India, and specializes in sound and mantra. Dru Yoga is sensitively incorporated into all of my classes.
In 2001, after an entire summer in North Wales, UK, I took a job at Banyen Books, a local independent “metaphysical” bookstore where I trained as a cashier & eventually became a part-time floor manager. It was an excellent job and I loved being there. In the early 2000’s, yoga (as an industry) began to really expand, too. In the bookstore we’d get a new yoga book, yoga video, or DVD arriving on a near daily basis. The section for yoga books eventually outgrew itself, from one small shelf of the classics, to into an entire room, dedicated to both traditional and western influenced yoga media. Banyen then moved locations to bigger, permanent premises. The yoga section expanded, yet again. I worked part-time, scheduling at the bookstore and then, I’d teach a few weekly yoga classes. The yoga industry (books, studios, and all) continued to grow full to capacity with no signs of slowing down.
Thanks for reading along, so far. To continue on with my story, it’s fair to say that my life long fascination and passion for music led me to begin producing my own music ~ now available for your listening pleasure!
(Part 2 of my story… coming soon)
We’re grateful to live and work on the unceded, ancestral territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil Waututh Nations.