Inspiring Conversations with Melissa Landrum-Hart of Moon Guidance Yoga Movement and Healing Collective

Today we’d like to introduce you to Melissa Landrum-Hart.

Melissa, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I started doing yoga as a way to stretch and prepare for a pole dance class I use to take weekly. As I learned more about yoga and its principles, I was even more intrigued. About 5 years ago I had a medical procedure done. Afterward, I noticed my anxiety was increasingly worse. As the year followed things started triggering in my body that I wasn’t aware of. I decided to start exploring more yoga, meditation, and mindfulness in a trauma-informed way. Which led me to take a trauma-informed 200-hour teacher training. It opened my eyes to the way yoga could connect us to our bodies. Afterward I continued my learning with a deeper dive into breathwork through different techniques and added Reiki energy work and additional prenatal, children’s yoga and mindfulness training.

I used my childhood and adult trauma as a way to deepen my relationship and learn within myself. These experiences and life events in my past have guided me on a compassionate and empathetic path of helping to ease some of the ACEs (adverse childhood experiences) in children. I have been working at a County Juvenile Correction Center once a week for a few months now. I also am bringing children yoga and mindfulness to an afterschool program that encompasses a school district. These are things that deepen my love for yoga.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It has not been an easy road by no means. But not awful. I feel blessed everyday to be able to make this journey and help others with theirs. The main problem I am finding with a pandemic, recession, and war; is that people’s lively hood start to dry up. When this happens one of the first thing they do is to stop spending money on their personal health and growth. People are passionate about change but putting themselves first for self-care may not be as important. When in actuality it is almost more important now.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Moon Guidance Yoga Movement and Healing Collective was started to help bring awareness and new ways of handling stress and anxiety through yoga. I wanted to teach and show others that through yoga, mindfulness, and breath we can help heal those prior traumas. We can make space for learning new ways for our brain to recognize how to handle anxiety and stress. We can hold space for children, traumatized individuals, BIPOC, and LGBTQ. We have an ever-changing world and environment. Learning to work together as collective energy, we can help everyone grow and learn inclusivity and diversity. We can help teach our future children alternative ways to work through our everyday stresses. These are things that make me passionate about my work and business.

Moon Guidance Yoga Movement and Healing Collective has developed into a well-rounded healing collective. I offer Breathwork classes and workshops to help move to heal and release through breath. I also have mindfulness and meditation classes, children’s and prenatal yoga, 1-on-1 yoga sessions and group classes, workshops for herbal remedies, and Reiki energy work.

Can you share something surprising about yourself?
Something surprising that a lot may not know about me is that I worked for almost 18 years as an account manager for a large beverage company and I have 2 adult children, a grandchild, and 3 fur babies.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: moon_guidance_yoga
• Facebook: @moonguidanceyogamovement
• Website: www.moonguidancegr.com