Lara Harsh

Lara Harsh, E-RYT 500, LMT, BA, is a lifelong practitioner of numerous contemplative and movement traditions. She is passionate about honoring and celebrating our human embodiment in all its diverse forms.

Lara has been teaching yoga since 2009 and has been a bodywork practitioner since 2011. She has studied and practiced Tibetan Buddhism since childhood. Her mother, Lama Wangmo, aka Carol Fitzpatrick, was on the original Board of Directors at Tara Mandala, and served as Executive Director for a number of years. During those early years, her mother initiated the family retreat, which Lara grew up attending with her family from the age of seven.

During college Lara embarked on a Tibetan Studies semester abroad with Emory University in McLeod Ganj, northern India, where His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama was one of her professors. She was also fortunate to receive an audience with His Holiness the 17th Karmapa and to learn from a large number of groundbreaking artists, educators, and social activists who stood for Tibetan freedom and autonomy. She spent her independent research time gathering diverse stories of female Tibetan resilience.

After receiving her BA in Critical Theory and Social Justice with honors from Occidental College in 2010, Lara returned to Santa Fe to attend massage school at the Scherer Institute of Natural Healing, where she graduated in 2011. Shortly thereafter, she was placed at the helm of a nonprofit yoga studio, serving as its Executive Director for over a decade and helping transform it into the thriving Santa Fe Community Yoga Center it is today. In addition to its beloved studio with a variety of affordable classes, SFCY is home to “Yoga in Schools” and “Yoga in Prisons.” Lara still teaches yoga at SFCY and privately, and she offers massage therapy through her private practice, both to the general public and to her specialty clients – prenatal/postpartum folks.

Lara and her husband, Jason, live in Santa Fe, NM with their four children, who range in age from infant to teen. The family loves to spend time in nature, to create music, and to find new ways to enjoy being alive.