When Carleen was nine, her mom decided to leave the corporate grind in suburban NJ to run a yogic retreat center in the Pocono Mountains. Overnight, her world stretched into 70 acres of forest and meadows. She made friends with tree families, tracked beavers at their work along the stream, picked bouquets of Queen Anne's Lace, and sank into secret mossy alcoves where sunlight filtered through towering pines like something holy. The land taught her how to hold space for all beings, and celebrate the beauty of nature's diversity. 

Carleen pulls that connective thread into her yoga classes, helping her students return to their true nature and seasonal rhythms through a mix of asana, breathwork, meditation and wisdom teachings. 

When she’s not on the mat, Carleen is teaching at Anne Arundel Community College in a course called Stress, Science, and Well-Being. It’s there that she helps her students understand not only what stress is but what it does to the body, and how they can hold it in their hands, soften it, let it go. Breath by breath, she gives them tools to make sense of the weight they carry.

When not teaching indoors, you can find Carleen outside. As a newly certified Mindful Outdoor Guide, she's developing her spring and summer schedule for women's camping weekends and yoga hikes. In her free time, she loves to surf and race with her outrigger canoe team, or snowboard down a mountain, where the whispers of the wild captivate her heart and soul.