Mellara

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Mellara I’m an embodied practice teacher and writer with over two decades of experience guiding yoga, meditation, and mindfulness.

Rooted in contemplative traditions and nervous system awareness, I live and teach on the South Shore of Massachusetts.

Some of us learned very early to pay attention.To the smallest changes in someone’s voice. A pause. A shift in the room....
20/10/2026

Some of us learned very early to pay attention.

To the smallest changes in someone’s voice. A pause. A shift in the room. The things that weren’t being said.

And sometimes that sensitivity becomes something beautiful. It helps us listen, connect, and notice what others might miss.

But I’ve been learning that noticing something doesn’t mean I need to keep searching for what it means.

Sometimes we already have enough information.

And we can let ourselves rest there. 🤍

Today I am 51, entering my 52nd year of life. ❤️I was born on a Sunday, beneath an almost full moon. And perhaps it is f...
19/10/2026

Today I am 51, entering my 52nd year of life. ❤️

I was born on a Sunday, beneath an almost full moon. And perhaps it is fitting that, as we move through Mercury’s retrograde shadow period, I find myself reflecting on the life I’ve lived, the woman I’ve become, and all the versions of myself I’ve met along the way.

Birthdays have always been a time of reflection for me. Not so much about what I’ve accomplished, but about how I’ve lived. How I’ve loved. How I’ve expressed myself. And how willing I’ve been to receive the love that life offers.

There is something about growing older that continues to soften my relationship with myself. Not because life becomes easier, or because I always get things right, but because I am learning to meet more of myself with understanding.

I think about the ways we each find our place in the world. The different ways we express ourselves, the things we give our attention to, and the relationships that teach us something about who we are.

And I wonder how often we extend to ourselves the same thoughtfulness, gratitude, and grace that we so readily offer others.

Perhaps that is something worth considering today, whether it’s your birthday or not.

Can we appreciate the life we are living, even while it is still unfolding?

Can we love the person we are becoming without withholding love from the person we are today?

As I begin another year, I feel grateful for the life that has carried me here. For the love I’ve given and received. For the lessons that took time to understand. And for the opportunity to keep learning, growing, and participating in this extraordinary experience of being alive.

May we remember to include ourselves in the love we so generously give.

With love and gratitude. ❤️

Mellara

Still learning that closeness doesn’t always mean closing the distance. Sometimes love asks us to leave a little room 🤍 ...
18/10/2026

Still learning that closeness doesn’t always mean closing the distance.

Sometimes love asks us to leave a little room 🤍

Today is World Menopause Day. ❤️A couple of years ago, I wrote an article for OM Yoga & Lifestyle about my own experienc...
18/10/2026

Today is World Menopause Day. ❤️

A couple of years ago, I wrote an article for OM Yoga & Lifestyle about my own experience of perimenopause and the ways yoga nidra has supported me through this changing season of life.

At the time, I was beginning to understand just how much our bodies ask of us during these years. Not only physically, but emotionally, too.

And here I am, a little further along in the journey, still learning, still listening, and still discovering that what supported me yesterday may need to look a little different today.

One of the things I appreciate most about yoga nidra is that it doesn’t ask us to accomplish anything. We can lie down, be supported, and allow ourselves a little space away from the constant demands of doing.

Of course, rest doesn’t resolve everything. And menopause is not something we should have to navigate without informed medical care, understanding, and support.

But I have found that having a practice that allows me to meet myself where I am, rather than where I think I should be, has been invaluable.

In 2024, I shared seven ways yoga nidra can support women through perimenopause and menopause in my article, *How Yoga Nidra Can Transform Your Menopause Journey*, published by OM Yoga & Lifestyle Magazine.

Today, I’m revisiting that work and sharing a few photographs from my former home yoga studio, where so many beautiful moments of rest and practice were shared over the years.

For every woman navigating this chapter in her own way, I’m sending you a little love, understanding, and perhaps permission to rest without feeling that you have to earn it. ❤️

Some things can be explained. Others just have to be lived.Over the years, I’ve come to appreciate how much of what we l...
15/10/2026

Some things can be explained. Others just have to be lived.

Over the years, I’ve come to appreciate how much of what we learn through practice cannot always be put into words.

We can read about awareness, listen to teachings, and understand something deeply in our minds. But there is another kind of understanding that develops through experience. Through the way we move, breathe, listen, and meet the moments of our lives.

And sometimes, what once needed so much explanation becomes something we simply recognize within ourselves.

Perhaps this is part of what it means to embody what we have learned.

Yoga has never been only about the postures.It is about the relationship we develop with ourselves while we’re practicin...
15/10/2026

Yoga has never been only about the postures.

It is about the relationship we develop with ourselves while we’re practicing.

How we respond when something feels difficult. Whether we listen when the body asks us to soften. Whether we can remain steady without becoming rigid, and rest without feeling we’ve earned it.
These small moments of awareness begin to reveal how we meet ourselves beyond the mat.

The way we breathe, the way we listen, the way we respond to discomfort, and the way we allow ourselves to simply be.

We don’t have to change anything to begin paying attention.

And sometimes, that attention changes everything. 🤍

We often think that meaningful change happens in the big moments of our lives.But so much of our relationship with ourse...
14/10/2026

We often think that meaningful change happens in the big moments of our lives.

But so much of our relationship with ourselves is revealed in the ordinary ones.

How we respond when something doesn’t go as planned. How we speak to ourselves when we’re tired. Whether we notice our own needs or continue moving past them.

These moments may seem small, but they are where our habits of attention become visible.

And when we begin to meet ourselves with a little more patience, honesty, and kindness, something gradually changes.

Not necessarily the circumstances of our lives, but the way we live within them.

❤️

I remember being at one of Channa’s early retreats, sitting with so much of what had happened in my life.The grief. The ...
14/10/2026

I remember being at one of Channa’s early retreats, sitting with so much of what had happened in my life.

The grief. The loss. And the strange emptiness that remained when so much of what I had known had fallen away.

I didn’t know what came next.

I remember looking at a lotus growing out of the muddy water. There was something about that flower that stayed with me. Its beauty hadn’t appeared in spite of the mud. Somehow, it had grown from within it.

And I began to wonder whether I, too, could rise.

Looking back at these photographs now, I feel such tenderness for the woman I was then.

She couldn’t have known that only a few years later, she would be smiling with a fullness she couldn’t yet imagine.

She couldn’t see what was coming.

And perhaps she didn’t need to.

There are times in our lives when we cannot see beyond what is falling apart. When the future feels so unfamiliar that we mistake the emptiness for an ending.

But life is still moving, even when we cannot feel it.

Today, I look at these photographs differently.

Not because everything that happened needed to happen. Not because suffering is necessary for growth.

But because I can see how much life was still waiting to be lived.

And how little I knew of the woman I was becoming.

❤️

Sometimes we offer something of ourselves without ever knowing where it will land.A few words, a moment of kindness, a c...
14/10/2026

Sometimes we offer something of ourselves without ever knowing where it will land.

A few words, a moment of kindness, a conversation, something created from our own experience.

And every so often, life gives us a little glimpse of how those offerings continue beyond us.

Perhaps we don’t need to know how far something reaches. Perhaps it’s enough to offer it with care and allow it to find its own way.

❤️

Over the years, I’ve led many retreats, and what continues to move me is what happens when we have the opportunity to pu...
11/10/2026

Over the years, I’ve led many retreats, and what continues to move me is what happens when we have the opportunity to put down our householder responsibilities for a little while.

The bills, the laundry, the schedules, the people who need us. All of it will still be there when we return. But something happens when we have a few days to rest, practice, and remember what it feels like to be with ourselves.

During our Costa Rica retreat this year, I brought George Harrison’s *Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth)* into one of our sessions.

I invited everyone to close their eyes and slow dance on their mats. Just themselves, the music, and whatever they were feeling. An opportunity to offer themselves some of the love and tenderness we so often look for outside ourselves.

Then we played the song again.

This time, we danced with one another, changing partners as the bell rang. There was laughter, tenderness, and the simple experience of being human together.

It was one of those moments that reminded me why I love this work so much.

We return home from retreat to the same lives we left. But perhaps with a little more awareness, a nervous system that has had time to settle, and a greater capacity to meet ourselves and the people we love.

And that matters. Because how we relate to ourselves inevitably finds its way into how we relate to everyone else, including the people on the periphery of our lives.

I’m so grateful for the people who continue to trust me to hold these spaces, and for the many years I’ve had the privilege of doing this work. ❤️

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Sunshine Coast, QLD

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