Our Mission
The Humaya app was designed for cultivating authentic self-love, a deep sense of self-connection, and sustained wellbeing. It includes powerful practices for deep healing and transformation: Yoga Nidra meditation (NSDR), Transformational Breathwork, Yoga, and more.
Humaya helps us access the subconscious wounds that reinforce our negative self-beliefs — so that we may release them at their root. It guides people to connect with themselves so that they can learn how to give themselves what they truly need.
Each practice on the app is carefully designed to deeply soothe the nervous system, which is required for improving health and wellbeing. Our primary healing practice, Yoga Nidra meditation (a.k.a. non-sleep deep rest or NSDR), is actually used at the U.S. Department of Defense to heal veterans with PTSD. It has been proven to reprogram negative thought patterns, reduce emotional reactivity, improve self-confidence, and significantly decrease anxiety, depression, and stress.
Humaya is designed to provide real transformation in sustainable little bits. Our goal is to help people step into their self-connection — their true power — so that they can pursue the lives they really want.
The Humaya Team
MARINA HARMON, CEO & FOUNDER
The idea for the Humaya mobile app came to Marina after doing healing retreats with her roommate in their little bungalow in Venice, CA. They both had full-time jobs at the time, but wanted to share the healing practices that had helped them so much.
After struggling with depression and an eating disorder throughout high school and college, Marina found Yoga Nidra meditation in 2009. The practice saved her life and led her to develop an almost-daily meditation practice for the past 15 years. The transformation and deep healing she experienced through that time has given her the passion to share these tools with others.
Marina took her 200-hour registered yoga teacher training in 2012 and has since taken several Yoga Nidra, meditation, and breathwork trainings in Los Angeles. She also became a certified Transformational Coach and Psychedelic Preparation & Integration Coach. It’s her deepest desire to share the education she’s learned and the practices she believes in with people in need, along with elevating the voices of the teachers that have touched her heart along the way. To build Humaya, Marina quit an eleven-year career working in growth marketing and management for tech companies of varying sizes. She is also a self-taught programmer; she designed and built the first versions of the Humaya app.
ALEXIS GROSS, FOUNDING TEACHER
In 2014, Alexis left her career in international development finance consulting to teach yoga full time. She has since studied various lineages and techniques — a quest that she’s sure will be lifelong. Her training includes Dharma Yoga 500-hour and 1000-hour certifications, Vinyasa Flow 200-hour training, and certifications in Yoga Nidra, Yin Yoga, and Hatha Yoga. She is also a certified Holistic Health Coach by the Institute for Integrative Nutrition (IIN) and a Certified Life Coach by IGC, Washington, DC.
Alexis is now the founder and owner of Studio Ohana yoga studio in Nassau, Bahamas. She has 2,500+ yoga teaching hours (group and private classes), and experience leading Yoga Alliance certified teacher trainings, as well as regular workshops and retreats.
Alexis previously struggled with anorexia, depression, and anxiety, which were healed through her dedication to the spiritual path. She believes that as much as we sometimes struggle, that the world is full of love and good — we just have to open ourselves up to it. She believes that as human beings, we have an incredible ability to learn, grow and rewire our brains in order to become who we are capable of being. And she believes that yoga — in its entirety and all of its forms — is a beautiful place for so many of us to begin.
ERIN ROSE WARD, FOUNDING TEACHER
Erin lives and serves as a 750-hour RYT yoga, ecstatic dance, meditation, breathwork, and spiritual fitness teacher with a mission to be a conduit of big love. She is trained as a spiritual psychology counselor and pursuing her Masters in Psychology.
Erin teaches public, private, and online classes, as well as domestic and international wellness retreats. Conscious movement, breath, and meditation have evolved as her primary offerings and access points to personal freedom. As a teacher and a writer, Erin looks for the weaving together of philosophy and practicality to foster a safe space for people to come as they are, move and breathe through whatever they’re going through, and tap into something bigger than their personal stories. She strives to find out what it means to thrive and how to help others do the same.
KAT VILLAIN, FOUNDING TEACHER
Kat lives off grid in the central coast of California. She has chickens, grows aromatics, and creates her own distillations. She does a lot of work with flowers and learns through observing nature in her elemental changes.
Her dream is to create a sustainable community of humans that come together to ritualize their day while stewarding the land. She envisions many of these communities being created so that we learn to rely on one another and insource our talents and work so that we become resilient in the face of earth's changes.
She teaches yoga, pranayama, and works with others to help them find their soul work on this planet. She has written three books and continues to write to soothe her soul. She loves helping others find their passion and unique calling on this Earth. She believes that when we deeply feed our souls we feed the soils of right relationship for generations to come.