ABOUT US
ABOUT US
ADELE
Adele's dream is to live in a world where dance is medicine, everyone exudes aliveness, and emancipation from systems of oppression and violence has long been the reality for all.
Adele's dream is to live in a world where dance is medicine, everyone exudes aliveness, and emancipation from systems of oppression and violence has long been the reality for all.
Adele has a deep love of research, exploration and experimentation. Her life to date has seen this passion directed toward the tradition, styles, tools and methods of yoga, and related areas such as restoring wellbeing, healing justice through the body, working skilfully with the mind, and finding her own true meaning and purpose.
As well as being the founder and lead facilitator of RISE Yoga, Adele is one of the co-founders of the She Oak Collective, a trustee of the Yoga Education in Prisons Trust, is initiated in Nelakantha meditation (in the Trika non-dual Shaiva Tantra lineage), is a certified Embodied Flow teacher, and is a mind-body medicine practitioner.
Adele's passion for movement comes from her very first love – dance. She studied everything from ballet to hip hop, and was a dance teacher for many years. And then, at the sweet age of 25, the universe threw her a sudden spiritual grenade in the form of advanced stage bowel cancer. Literally overnight the world as she knew it was no more...
Faced with a 1 in 5 chance of survival, Adele embraced all the support she could, especially yoga – mostly simple breathing techniques and meditation – first as a way to manage the pain and the chemotherapy, then to heal and regain strength, and ultimately to help with all the doubt and worry she'd been carrying around.
That was 15 years ago and through the wins and the losses, yoga has been her anchor. She found the same challenge and fun she had in dance, and so much more. She supported and healed her body, overcame fears around her illness and found a way to live fully, with grace, gratitude and an open heart.
Adele has learned so much along the way, particularly in regards to trauma and healing, and her passion for feeling alive, strong and expressive is why her classes and programmes are like no other.
She translates her passion for aliveness and expression into compassionate trauma-informed and intersectional frameworks in her offerings, that also honours the Tantrik lineage of those who came before her. In this way she is sought after for her breadth of knowledge, her non-dogmatic empowering approach, and her unrelenting commitment to awakening and liberation.
She fervently believes that no one is free until everyone is free, and is always striving to create safer spaces for folx who experience marginalisation, oppression and systemic violence, so everyone has an opportunity for self liberation in this lifetime. Her view when working with others isn’t to help or fix, but acknowledges that her liberation is bound up in their liberation, and it’s a reciprocal meeting of desire for freedom.
She works to combat gentrification and misappropriation in yoga by striving to keep practices accessible and grounded in both Te Ao Maori and classical Tantra. She loves her work teaching in prisons and dedicates her embodied activism work towards decarceration and decolonisation.
“Put the warmest heart and graceful action with shockingly razor sharp intellect and wit, package it in a beautiful embodiment of a human being and you get Adele Kinghan. I have had the pleasure of knowing Adele for six years, and consider her to be the full package of a master facilitator. Adele has the rare capacity to make anyone feel joyous to be alive. She somehow makes the most complicated things seem easily achievable, and approaches each day and task with untroubled competence evocative of all the world’s greatest leaders. Her depth and breadth of yogic knowledge is paralleled by few. I would highly recommend any training with Adele as a rich tapestry of deep learning, and an elegant dive into being, with a great great teacher.”
Tara Judelle – Embodied Flow™
RISE Yoga Immersions and Trainings are facilitated by Sarah Hon, Mari Halina Colbert, and Adele Kinghan, RISE Yoga’s founder and creator.
The Immersions and Trainings also often include a faculty of Guest Teachers from New Zealand and around the world.
We also usually have one or two assistants on board to help out during the Immersions and Trainings - members of our passionate and fabulous RISE Yoga Alumni Tribe.
SARAH
Sarah’s dream is of a global Tribe of awakening beings - living, loving and flowing radiantly through this human experience. She loves to See and Be Seen, live deeply, fully and lightly, and dance ecstatically.
Sarah is a curious, loving, dedicated, compassionate yogini warrior, with a sharp, discerning mind and an idealistic, spiritual heart. She is passionate about Being, and loves to dive deep into the ways in which we show up for ourselves, in our relational spaces, and in the world. Studying, practising, refining and teaching on Being has been her passion and her dharma for the last twenty years. Sarah’s teacher, Hareesh (Christopher) Wallis, gave her the spiritual name Sāra, which means essence. This reflects her deep desire and commitment to truly live and Be from the essence of who she is, and to help and support others to experience this too.
Sarah is mama to two incredible humans, Finn and Raine, who are indeed her greatest friends and teachers. They live in Beach Haven on Auckland’s North Shore, where Sarah also teaches an epic weekly community yoga class. As well as leading yoga classes, retreats and teacher trainings, Sarah is also a sought-after Somatic Stress Release practitioner and Somatic Therapy Mentor.
Sarah has studied and practiced yoga and across a vast range of traditions and lineages, and with many luminous yoga teachers. She has trained formally with a number of international yoga schools. Her daily meditation sadhana has been the cornerstone of her life for over 20 years.
Sarah's Embodied Flow yoga offerings include movement, deep presencing, meditation, breath work, yoga asana, dance, self enquiry and energy body work. The sessions are energetically balanced and use the teachings of Classical Tantra to invite softening and attunement with our own inner truth and power.
“Working with Sarah has completely changed my life. I had the pleasure of meeting Sarah during a RISE Yoga Immersion in 2020 and was immediately drawn to her energy. She radiates love, peace and playfulness while having this profound wisdom that is almost hard to put into words. We have been working together for the past couple of months now, peeling back layers that I have built up over my lifetime. Her ability to hold space and guide you on your inner journey is truly incredible. Sarah speaks from the heart and a place of deep knowing. We have done some extremely deep emotional work together and it hasn’t always been easy, but I have always felt held and supported by her. I am now able to clearly recognize an emotion, hold space for it and honor the way it feels without judgement or letting it consume me. Her insight and guidance have allowed me to grow and connect in ways I never thought was possible. I truly owe so much to Sarah and am so incredibly thankful our lives crossed paths.”
Cassie
MARI
Mari longs to live amongst a world of hearts that have come alive to their passions, their connectivity, and infinite creativity. Where we surrender, with every breath, to the soft animal of our body loving what it loves. And where we compassionately hold space and take up space, celebrate and are celebrated, where the dancer in each of us flows forth radiantly and unapologetically, for the benefit of all beings.
Mari longs to live amongst a world of hearts that have come alive to their passions, their connectivity, and infinite creativity. Where we surrender, with every breath, to the soft animal of our body loving what it loves. And where we compassionately hold space and take up space, celebrate and are celebrated, where the dancer in each of us flows forth radiantly and unapologetically, for the benefit of all beings.
Weaving together 15 years of experience with movement as medicine for mental, emotional, physical and spiritual harmony, Mari began yoga in the midst of dance school in London and immediately recognised the gold in the practice, which became a place of refuge in the demanding environment of professional dance.
She has since immersed in the philosophy and study of yoga, completing the Embodied Flow™ training herself with Adele over 5 years ago, which was a soul-stirring recalibration and honey-warm homecoming. Her passion and curiosity have led her to many other immersions and study programs in Classical Tantra, embodiment, somatics, biomechanics, humanistic psychology, Body Mind Centering®, and trauma-sensitive yoga, facilitating Mari’s desire to bring these enriching and illuminating teachings to others in an accessible and inspiring way. She is immensely grateful to her teachers who have been beacons and transmitters of these paradigm-shifting practices and teachings, including Christopher (Hareesh) Wallis, Kavitha M. Chinnaiyan, Adele Kinghan, Sarah Hon, Bonnie Bainbridge-Cohen, Tara Judelle and Scott Lyons.
Mari brings a holistic, inclusive, and trauma-informed approach to all of her offerings that warmly welcome the individual however they are, whilst skillfully encouraging the revelation that what they long for is already right here with them, as them.
She now enjoys wearing many hats as a seasoned yoga facilitator, including mentor, yoga teacher trainer, and registered ACC provider for group Trauma-Sensitive Yoga where she works together with psychologist and yoga teacher, Sandra Palmer. Mari is also currently in training to become a Hakomi Somatic Psychotherapist.
Forever a student, these experiences and teachings have been, and continue to be, a huge part of Mari’s own healing journey and she is committed to providing up-to-date, authentic, embodied, and compassionate guidance to support others on their unique journey back home to themselves too.
“I met Mari for the first time when she offered free community yoga back in 2019. I was immediately inspired by her teaching style and quickly became a student at the studios she was teaching at, so I could practice with her weekly.
For me, Mari‘s classes are a deep dive immersion into the depths of soul. In my eyes, she fully embodies the teachings of yoga, which is so clearly and deeply felt throughout her offerings. Mari teaches from her heart, which in turn brings me closer to mine, and that allows me to drop in ever more fully. She weaves the yogic philosophy through her classes in a unique and poetic way that guides me to places I have never been before - an experience with so much depth and layers that leaves me fully nourished and nurtured every time I get to practice with her in a group or one or one session.
In Mari's presence, I feel held and supported in the most gentle and thoughtful way.
Thank you Mari for being you and sharing your passion for yoga. It’s because of you I pursued being a Yoga Teacher and I’ll be forever grateful to you."
Anjali
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