spring Archives - VETOGA

VETOGA Newsletter March 2023

VEToga — Mon, 06 Mar 2023 20:10:43 +0000

Upcoming Events + Teacher Trainings + Retreats

VETOGA Spring Teacher Training

Scheduled for May 2023

We are only a couple months away from our Spring VETOGA teacher training in May and we need your help! We still need to raise $10,000 in order to make this teacher training happen.

Please consider donating to VETOGA and share our story to help us reach our teacher training goal to sponsor 20 veterans to attend the upcoming training.

Help sponsor a veteran to attend a VETOGA Teacher Training program.

DONATE HERE & SUPPORT TEACHERS

VETOGA teacher training group at Ojas

Sunday, March 26th

Free Yoga Class in Carlsbad, CA

If you live in Southern California, join us at Yoga on State in Carlsbad, CA for a special community yoga class led by VETOGA CEO, Justin Blazejewski and in partnership with LiboRisk.

FREE event to all service members, veterans, law enforcement, emergency responders, and their families. Suggested donation class for civilians who want to join and support VETOGA, active military, and veterans. All are welcome!!!

VETOGA’s mission is to provide yoga, meditation, and healing arts to military, veterans, their families, and communities. We seek to build a supportive community, of both veterans and non-veterans, and to provide an opportunity to experience a wide variety of the Healing Arts.

LiboRisk is a military colloquialism derived from the phrase “Liberty Risk” Used prevalently in the Marine Corps, troops who were coined as “LiboRisks” had to be watched more carefully and were punished more often for mishaps during liberty and leave. Because “LiboRisk” is used irreverently and is associated to a troops “free-time”, we believe this would be the best name for our community.

We will start with an all-levels yoga class available to everyone. We will stretch, breathe and cultivate our connection with body-heart-mind-spirit. The class concludes with Yoga Nidra, a deep relaxation that aims to release that which no longer serves us.

After the yoga class is complete, we will head over to Barrel Republic to get some food and drinks for some Community & Comradery.

Donations will go to VETOGA Incorporated, a healing arts program that services our veterans and their care providers. VETOGA is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and all donations are tax-exempt.

Yoga on State, 2697 State Street, Carlsbad, CA 92008
More info: info@yogaonstate.com

VETogi of the Month

DONATE TO VETOGA’S MISSION

Claudia Cavazza

VETOGA Instructor

Claudia Cavazza is a certified Yoga Teacher (E-RYT 200 + E-RYT 500), Advanced Yoga Nidra Facilitator, Prison Yoga Project Certified, Certified Trauma Professional, and Certified Compassion Fatigue Professional. Claudia’s passion is to deliver yoga, meditation, breathing techniques and Yoga Nidra to populations such as veterans, first-responders, college students, and at-risk youth affected by high stress and PTSD through a carefully designed trauma-informed and polyvagal-informed embodied practice.

Committed to share the benefits of a trauma-informed yoga practice, as Director of Education and Training for New Millenium Employee Assistance Services, Claudia has been developing resilience focused trainings and practices for first responders in the DC metro area. In addition, for the past 7 seven years Claudia has been serving the veteran-owned organization Vetoga to provide yoga and meditation to veterans, first responders and their families.

In 2018, Claudia founded the corporate wellness company WRKwell, LLC to deliver stress management programs to local corporations as well as public entities. WRKwell combines the benefits of embodied practices with leadership and corporate responsibility training to provide tools for both organizations and corporate employees to thrive in a safe work environment.

Question: What originally motivated you to do this work and what continues to motivate you?

“Both my grandfathers served during World War II in the Italian Army. While one of my “nonni” adapted very well upon returning to civilian life, the other came home from the Russian front deeply scarred and became severely addicted to alcohol to cope with his experience of war, unleashing violence and abuse on my grandmother, my mother and her baby brother. At the time, no one talked about the effects of trauma and PTSD. Veterans and their families were left to deal with their unbearable burden alone.

Many years later, after connecting with veterans in my local community, I realized that their stories weren’t so different from the stories of my grandfather and grandmother, and their suffering was the same kind of suffering that had impacted my family across generations. I felt a sense of personal responsibility to break the cycle of suffering in my own family, but also to pay it forward to other veterans and their families. As a civilian, I was very fortunate to be accepted into the Vetoga Teacher Training and immediately felt included in a wonderful community of veterans. That’s when I truly felt in my body the power of yoga not only to bring a sense of wholeness within myself, but also to unite human beings from all sorts of backgrounds and lived experiences. I remember as it was yesterday, a young man – a giant Marine who looked so strong that he could move mountains – getting up and crying unstoppably at the end of one of our yoga nidra practices, as years of deeply hidden traumatic experiences were coming to the surface and were released by his body. I just walked over, and we hugged. No words, no explanations, but we’ve become best friends ever since. THAT, to me, is the power of yoga. The practice of yoga can peel back the layers of what we think makes us different from each other and unite us in wholeness as connected human beings.”

VETOGA Wellness Retreats

Location: Ojas Retreat Center

See our programs in action! Watch the video

SPONSOR A VETERAN

VETOGA’S partner: Ojas Retreat Center

Support All Our Programs!

Donate to VETOGA’s Mission

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The post VETOGA Newsletter March 2023 appeared first on VETOGA.

VETOGA Newsletter February 2023

VEToga — Mon, 06 Feb 2023 15:00:35 +0000

Upcoming Events + Teacher Trainings + Retreats

VETOGA Spring Teacher Training

Coming Up: May 2023

We are only a couple months away from our Spring VETOGA teacher training in May and we need your help!

Please consider donating to VETOGA to help us reach our teacher training goal to sponsor 20 veterans to attend.

DONATE HERE & SUPPORT TEACHERS

VETOGA’S partner for Wellness Retreats: Ojas Retreat Center

Free Yoga in Southern California

Last Sunday of Every Month

If you live in Southern California, join us at Yoga on State for a special community yoga class led by Marine Corps veteran and VETOGA CEO, Justin Blazejewski.

Free event to all service members, veterans, law enforcement, emergency responders, and their families. Suggested donation class for civilians who want to join and support VETOGA, active military, and veterans. All are welcome!!! Register here to join us

Our mission is to provide yoga, meditation, and healing arts to military, veterans, their families, and communities. We seek to build a supportive community, of both veterans and non-veterans, and to provide an opportunity to experience a wide variety of the Healing Arts.

Donations will go to VETOGA Incorporated, a healing arts program that services our veterans and their care providers. VETOGA is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and all donations are tax-exempt.

Yoga on State, 2697 State Street, Carlsbad, CA 92008
More info: info@yogaonstate.com

VETogi of the Month

DONATE TO VETOGA’S MISSION

Haley Pope

US Navy Veteran

Haley is a graduate of the VETOGA 200. She currently is not actively teaching but does volunteer work with VETOGA weekly to help streamline incoming VETOGI’s and graduates as well. She does a self yoga practice at her home in Virginia Beach (tons of sunrise yoga) 😉 and currently is activated in the Navy Reserve in Virginia Beach. She enjoys baking, going to church, and spending time with friends and family (preferably at the beach).

“My journey with VETOGA started in 2019 before I left for deployment. I had been practicing yoga for 4 years by then and it had become part of my daily routine. I found VETOGA and reached out to Justin to see when the next training was. It was scheduled for May of 2020 and I was still going to be on deployment. Justin assured me that it “would all work itself out” and “to trust the process.” COVID happened-post poning that training until November of 2020. Yoga and my Faith saved my life on deployment, and at the end of deployment I was finishing my time up active duty and I knew that the first thing I wanted and needed to do was this training. I trusted the process, and was able to attend the November 2020 training where VETOGA changed my life in 5 days. I carry all the tools I learned from this training, daily in all aspects of my life.

VETOGA Teacher Training

Help sponsor a veteran to attend a VETOGA teacher training program with a targeted donation.

SPONSOR A VETERAN

Support All Our Programs!

Donate to VETOGA’s Mission

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The post VETOGA Newsletter February 2023 appeared first on VETOGA.

VETOGA Newsletter May 2022

VEToga — Mon, 02 May 2022 22:05:16 +0000

Mental Health Awareness Month

Upcoming Events + Trainings + Retreats

This May VETOGA has partnered with Amazon Global Military Affairs, Veteran CEO, Mala for Vets, and Mindful Memorial Day Foundation to bring awareness to Mental Health by hosting a 14-Day Wellness Challenge. This challenge will be led by the VETOGA instructors. Click the link bellow to sign-up and show your support.

Challenge runs from: May 16th – 31st

VETOGA Spring Teacher Training

Dates: May 26 – 31, 2022

Sponsor a Veteran

Help sponsor a veteran to attend a VETOGA Teacher Training program. Contribute here

DONATE HERE

VETogi of the Month

Bernadette Kilcer

US Navy Veteran

Bernadette is the senior mentor for the Western US and OCONUS (Asia, Australia). In addition, she is the lead for VETOGA Colorado (VETOGA CO) chapter. She is developing and co-leading VETOGA’s first SUP Yoga retreat this July in Colorado. Bernadette has been an active student, volunteer, and VETOGA teacher since 2018. Her goal for next year is to help bring VETOGA to the first responder ski patrol communities of Colorado and northern New Mexico.

“What makes VETOGA different is the shared experiences across the veteran and first responder community. No matter how or when you served you are welcomed into class. There is no judgement and definitely no expectation to touch your toes.”

Support All Our Programs!

Donate to VETOGA’s Mission

MAKE A DONATION

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The post VETOGA Newsletter May 2022 appeared first on VETOGA.

VETOGA Newsletter March 2022: Women’s History Month

VEToga — Tue, 01 Mar 2022 23:30:22 +0000

Celebrating Women’s History Month

Upcoming Events + Trainings + Retreats

This March VETOGA has partnered with Amazon Global Military Affairs to bring awareness to Women’s History Month by hosting a 14-Day Wellness Challenge. This challenge will be lead by the amazing women of VETOGA. Click the link bellow to sign-up and show your support.

Challenge runs from: March 14 – 28, 2022

We’d like to dedicate this challenge to all the amazing women who have served in the military, currently servicing and all the amazing women of the VETOGA family.

VETOGA is celebrating International Women’s History Day (March 8th) and recognizing all the amazing women who have served in the military, currently servicing and all the amazing women in the world! To further celebrate these amazing women, VETOGA is hosting a 14-day wellness challenge in partnership with Amazon Military. To support VETOGA and future women to attend VETOGA’s trainings, please considering joining the challenge and/or donating to VETOGA’s mission. Sign Up

VETOGA Spring Teacher Training

Dates: May 26 – 31, 2022

Sponsor a Veteran

Help sponsor a veteran to attend a VETOGA Teacher Training program. Contribute here

DONATE HERE

VETogi of the Month

Colonel Nahaku McFadden (Ret.)
US Air Force Veteran

Watch Nahaku’s Story

Nahaku leads VETOGA’s online corporate yoga challenge programs bringing healing to more than 4,000 veterans, providing community and belonging. She raised over $100,000 to help veterans, active military members and their family attend VETOGA teacher training and yoga retreats at no or low costs. Nahaku is deeply committed to our community and a valued member of the VETOGA family.

“VETOGA has changed my life because it has given me a lot of direction after I retired from the military. It has allowed me to be able to be focused on something of service and for me to continue post military service. It’s changed my life by allowing me to give back and continue to do something that I love.”

Support All Our Programs!

Donate to VETOGA’s Mission

MAKE A DONATION

Please share this newsletter with friends and family | Share link

The post VETOGA Newsletter March 2022: Women’s History Month appeared first on VETOGA.