The Phoenix Rising Project Council - Alanna Kaivalya, Ph.D.

THE COUNCIL

Jase Cannon

Director of Creative Development

Jase Cannon has worn and wears many hats. She is continually evolving in her role in the world and intersecting her work within diverse communities to build community in New York City and beyond. Jase divides her time between her West Village apartment, the yoga studio where she has a loving following throughout the week, the Ali Forney Center drop-in center in Harlem, and all over NYC in meetings and collaborations with the eclectic people who make up the circle of co-conspirators in the mission to spread loving-kindness. Through producing short documentaries about her work and speaking publicly at events, on television, and publishing multimedia accounts of her journey, Jase has cast a wide net in the worlds of wellness, philanthropy, gender studies, and entertainment to bring these elements together and create a powerful platform for ever greater self-expression for all.

Jase was born Jason and came out as a woman in the summer of 2015 during a karma yoga retreat at the Sivananda Ashram in the Bahamas. Prior to that, she was known as the ‘Bearded Yogi,’ often with a characteristic beard and the same bright smile. Now she feels overjoyed to have had the opportunity to discover her truest expression and continues to produce new work in line with her dedication to raising money and awareness for those in need, specifically with God’s Love We Deliver, an organization that prepares and delivers home-cooked meals to people suffering from long term debilitating diseases. ‘The Pilgrimage’ is an ongoing project weaving together the need for self-love and self-acceptance with selfless service, and finding authentic expression. For Jase, these are inseparable, and she hopes to take the project internationally to continue documenting the journey of an independent trans woman who speaks from her heart and touches those of everyone she meets.

Shawn Moore

Council Member

Residing at the intersection of leadership and mindfulness, Shawn creates sacred spaces for self-study and personal discovery.

Shawn currently serves as Director of Student Leadership at Morehouse College, helping students grow their leadership competencies and talent through training, workshops, and developmental opportunities. His tenure in student affairs has focused on the identity development and leadership growth of students of various backgrounds. Shawn has presented and facilitated workshops l on the topics of marketing/branding, leadership development, mindfulness, and identity development for various organizations institutions, including the Human Rights Campaign, Iota Phi Theta® Fraternity, Inc., MACUHO New Jersey Housing Conference, and the NASAP Student Leadership Institute, Kaiser Permanente Institute for Equitable Leadership, and Auburn Seminary.

While leadership resonates with him deeply, it is his personal and spiritual practices that allow him to continue to show up for himself and others. Mindfulness has been an integral part of Shawn’s life, exploring his own meditation practice rooted in Buddhism since high school, sparked by Herman Hesse’s Siddartha. Over the years, he has integrated meditation and mindfulness as a tool for his own creative resilience, personal power, and healing, with the privilege of sharing these nurturing tools with his community. He is a Registered Yoga Teacher (RYT-200), sound practitioner, meditation teacher, Yoga Nidra Teacher, reiki practitioner, and Gallup-Certified Strengths Coach, with additional trainings in Mindful Communication and Brand Identity. In addition to holding community space through classes, he provides training in leadership and strengths-based development, and workshops in mindfulness and meditation. Shawn hosts The Mindful Rebel Podcast. The podcast, established in 2017, highlights the intersection between Mindfulness and Leadership with interviews of entrepreneurs, healers, educators, creatives about their unique journey in their respective craft.

Melissa De Los Santos

Lead Mystics Mentor/TKYM Mentor

Melissa De Los Santos is a dream interpreter who helps sleep-deprived and stressed individuals uncover the root cause of their anxieties through dreamwork. She is a 500-hour TKYM graduate since 2017. Since then she has created and contributed to numerous online communities to provide support and holistic education for those on their own spiritual journeys. Through her work, she has been able to help people address suppressed emotions that come up in dreams while providing them with the tools needed to release these emotions in a process she calls Dream Healing. Melissa has also collaborated in local healing events throughout El Paso, TX to fundraise for the Navajo tribe in Black Mesa, Arizona which was in need of emergency resources. She can be found on Instagram @the_dreaming_yogi or her site www.thedreamingyogi.org

Justin Blazejewski

Council Member

Justin’s introduction to yoga began in 2007 while he was searching for different exercises that would help with a back injury he sustained while serving in the Marine Corps. Soon after his first-class, he dove into a daily yoga practice, quickly realizing the physical benefits of yoga when his back pain began to disappear after only a couple of weeks.

Justin was in his 4th year of monthly travel to Afghanistan and Iraq as a government contractor when he devoted himself to a daily yoga practice. Over the last 10 years, he served as a communication engineer with a total of 41 temporary duty assignments. After years of constant travel, Justin realized the effects of the war zone were taking their toll, but he also noticed how the benefits of yoga were offsetting these effects.

During the first year of his yoga practice, he observed how yoga helped heal the physical, mental, and emotional burdens he carried traveling in and out of war zones. In 2008 he attended his first yoga/kirtan retreat in Bali, Indonesia, which proved to be the turning point in his spiritual practice. Soon after, Justin began to find clarity, calmness, and intuition in his life. This led him to find his Guru, Sri Dharma Mittra at a small humble yoga studio in the heart of NYC. He immediately enrolled in the “DMY Life of a Yogi” teacher training to solely deepen his practice of yoga and self-healing. After graduating from the 200-hour teacher training program, Justin immediately realized he was given a gift. A gift he could share with those around him, especially those who were carrying similar burdens of war. Since 2008 he has completed his 200, 500, and 800 hour Dharma Mittra Yoga, Amrit Method of Yoga Nidra, and Acro Yoga teacher trainings.

His mission is to help others and share the powerful healing benefits of yoga and meditation. He strives to share yoga to those who need it most in life, especially his brothers and sisters of the armed services and veterans who still carry the encumbrance of war with them every day.

Shellie Crow

Council Member

Shellie Crow received her degree in Interdisciplinary Studies and certificate in Women and Gender Studies at Western Kentucky University. While in college, she volunteered at Hope Harbor Sexual Trauma Recovery Center in Bowling Green, KY. Upon graduation, she served as an AmeriCorps VISTA (Volunteer in Service to America) in Elizabethtown, KY matching vulnerable and at-risk youth with caring, supportive mentors.

As a yoga teacher, Shellie supported SpringHaven, Inc. Domestic Violence Program and Silverleaf Sexual Trauma Recovery Center through fundraising, collecting donations, and raising awareness of sexual and domestic violence in her community.

Shellie has been a long-time volunteer with Amnesty International. In 2018 Shellie was invited to attend A.I’s “Lobby Days”. She and her partner addressed Representatives Guthrie and Rogers and Senators Paul and McConnell’s staff on behalf of the Rohingya people who were being subjected to ethnic cleansing by the Myanmar military.

Through yoga, astrology, and her writing, Shellie works with female-identifying clients seeking to heal and empower the sacred feminine within them. She continues to advocate and raise awareness of sexual and domestic violence in her community.

THE COUNCIL

Jase Cannon

Shawn Moore

Melissa De Los Santos

Justin Blazejewski

Shellie Crow

alannakaivalya

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