Meet SomaYoga Teacher, Cindy Rolli
Finding Common Ground After a Lifetime of Motion
I've spent my life saying yes. Yes to adventures around the world. Yes to pushing my body further. Yes to one more summit, one more mile, one more challenge. This restlessness led me to extraordinary experiences—and also to injury, exhaustion, and a body that was begging me to listen.
I knew something had to change. My mind and body were asking me to slow down, to find my breath, to reconnect. But I didn't know how to listen to what they were telling me.
The Path to Soma Yoga
For someone who expected overnight results and pushed relentlessly toward goals, SomaYoga offered something radically different: the practice of microshifts instead of major overhauls. Rather than forcing transformation, I learned to make small daily adaptations that, over time, created the change my body had been asking for all along.
Soma Yoga taught me to:
Slow down instead of speeding up
Explore patterns instead of pushing through them
Unwind tension instead of ignoring warning signals
Flow freely between mind, body, and breath instead of compartmentalizing them
This wasn't just about becoming more flexible or mastering poses. It was about learning to move with my body's wisdom, not against it—finding common ground with myself after decades of treating my body as something to command rather than befriend.
From Personal Practice to Shared Purpose
For 28 years, I've worked across communities supporting holistic approaches to hazard risk reduction, resilience planning, and climate adaptation solutions. I understand systems under stress. I know what it means to help communities adapt to constantly changing conditions. I recognize the need for sustainable, long-term approaches rather than quick fixes.
This work taught me that resilience isn't about resisting change—it's about learning to adapt, to flow, to find stability within transformation. The same principles that apply to communities facing climate change apply to bodies navigating the stresses of modern life.
Why Common Ground Soma Yoga
Through Common Ground Soma Yoga, I want to offer what I've discovered: that healing, restoration, and adaptation are possible in our ever-changing world. That your body already knows how to find balance if you learn to listen. That nature—the literal ground beneath your feet and the living world around you—is the wisest teacher you'll ever find.
Whether you're an adventurer who's pushed too hard, a person carrying stress in your shoulders, someone healing from injury, or anyone who simply wants to feel at home in their body—I understand. I've been there. I'm still learning, still adapting, still discovering what my body has to teach me.
Common Ground isn't just the name of this practice. It's what we're all searching for: the place where we reconnect with our bodies, with nature, and with ourselves. The shared earth that grounds us. The wisdom we've been overlooking while we were busy pushing forward.
I invite you to find your common ground here.
Credentials:
500-hour Registered Yoga Teacher (RYT), Yoga North International SomaYoga Institute
Currently in training to become a Yoga Therapist through Yoga North
28 years of experience in community resilience and climate adaptation work
Personal Note: When I'm not teaching, you'll find me exploring Kansas trails, learning from nature, and continuing my own practice of slowing down enough to hear what my body—and the earth—are teaching me.
