Wild Yoga Tribe Podcast Episode #105 – Yoga Vision – Yoga in Liberia with Massa Mamey-Clarke

Welcome to Episode #105 of the Wild Yoga Tribe Podcast! My conversation with Massa Mamey-Clarke, a yoga teacher from Liberia, was so powerful as we talked about what it’s like to be the only Liberian yoga teacher in Liberia who is currently teaching! I hope that this conversation helped you to reflect on how yoga found you, and if it found you at precisely the time when you needed it the most.  If you’re looking to tune into a podcast episode that is all about yoga in Liberia then this is the conversation for you.

Tell me more about Massa Mamey-Clarke

Massa Mamey-Clarke, born and raised in Liberia, discovered yoga during her undergraduate years in the US in 2014. What started as a physical connection transformed into a mental haven, bringing her peace and joy. A self-taught yogi, she became a certified Ashtanga yoga instructor in India in 2019. Massa’s classes in Monrovia, including corporate yoga, feature dynamic transitions and a blend of breath, flexibility, strength, and mobility. Hosting annual retreats since 2019, Massa aspires to create spaces of inspiration and positivity, with dreams of an international yoga retreat. Teaching officially since 2016, she envisions a future studio, continuing to radiate light and tranquility in Liberia and beyond.

What to expect in the Yoga In Liberia episode of the Wild Yoga Tribe Podcast

Massa Mamey-Clarke shares her beautiful story with us on the Wild Yoga Tribe podcast, a story of self-discovery, resilience, and a deep-rooted passion for sharing the transformative power of yoga with her community in Libera. 

Massa’s journey with yoga began unexpectedly during her senior year of college in the United States. A chance encounter with the crow pose sparked her curiosity, leading her to explore this ancient practice. Despite being unfamiliar with yoga, Massa was captivated by the beauty and grace of the poses she discovered online. Thus, her journey as a self-taught yogi commenced, marking the beginning of a transformative path.

Driven by the profound impact yoga had on her life, Massa felt compelled to share this gift with others, especially in Liberia. Recognizing the need for mental wellness amidst the backdrop of Liberia’s tumultuous history, Massa saw yoga as a gateway to healing and resilience for her community. Thus, her vision to become a yoga teacher and establish a studio in Liberia was born.

As Massa’s teaching journey progressed, she learned valuable lessons about the importance of self-care and boundaries. Recognizing the toll of back-to-back teaching sessions, Massa embraced the need for balance and prioritized her well-being. Her journey serves as a reminder to aspiring yoga teachers to nurture themselves while serving others, finding harmony amidst the demands of teaching.

For Massa, yoga transcends mere physical practice; it embodies a holistic lifestyle encompassing physical, mental, and spiritual well-being. Rooted in self-acceptance and presence, yoga offers a path to healing, self-discovery, and connection.

Favorite Quote From Massa Mamey-Clarke

“Yoga is a form of medicine. Physically, mentally, and Yoga is not like a plan. It shouldn’t be a plan. It is a lifestyle.”

Connect with Massa Mamey-Clarke

https://instagram.com/yoga_withmassa

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https://wildyogatribe.com/thepodcast/

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Wild Yoga Tribe Podcast Episode #105 – Yoga in Liberia with Massa Mamey-Clarke Transcript

[00:00:00] Lily Allen-Duenas: Namaste family and welcome back to the Wild Yoga Tribe podcast. Today I am so excited to welcome Massa Mamey-Clarke onto the show today. She is a yoga teacher from Liberia and she is a self taught yogi who’s now a certified Ashtanga teacher. She officially began teaching in 2016. And I love that she has this beautiful vision of herself as a future studio owner in Liberia where she can continue to radiate light to Liberia and beyond. So thank you so much Massa for being with me on the show today.

[00:00:37] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Thank you so much, Lily. I’m really honored.

[00:00:40] Lily Allen-Duenas: So I’d love to start just at the top of the show. Let’s get to know you better. So how did you discover yoga and how did it become such a big part of your life?

How did yoga come into your life?

[00:00:50] Massa Mamey-Clarke: “It’s funny whenever I’m asked this question, there’s a long story behind this question. So I was born and raised in Liberia, and in 2010, I got a scholarship opportunity to continue my undergraduate study in the U.S. So, 2010, I’m in the U.S. I’m studying, trying to adjust to everything, and during my senior year, 2014, I went to the gym and I was working out and I did the crow pose. I had no idea what the crow pose was, and one of my friends asked me, she said, ‘Oh, do you practice yoga?’ So then I said, ‘What is yoga?’ She said, ‘You just did the pose. You just did a crow pose,’ and I went home, Googled yoga, and I was so fascinated. I saw so many great poses, just the way that people were able to manipulate a body to create beautiful shapes. I was captivated by that, and I went on YouTube and started researching, and that was my first exposure to yoga. I’ve never heard anybody talk about yoga, never taken a yoga class. The whole time I was in the U.S., I didn’t really know that this thing called yoga existed. So yeah, that’s my story.”

[00:02:11] Lily Allen-Duenas: Where in the U. S. were you? And you mentioned you were a senior, so you were a senior in college in 2014. Is that right?

[00:02:17] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Yes, that’s correct. I was in Macon, Georgia. I think it’s like an hour and a half away from Atlanta. And honestly, I wish I had found yoga before that year. I guess it was all meant to be. And one thing I would say though, when I found yoga, I was in a really dark place in my life. And that year, I was also, that’s when I was working out a lot, and when I just found it, it was as if to say it was meant to be at that point.

[00:02:48] Lily Allen-Duenas: Amazing. I agree that yoga usually finds us exactly when we really need it. So I love hearing that is what happened for you, and I’m sorry that you were dealing with a tough time in your life. I [00:03:00] know I’ve had difficulties and yoga has been such an incredible friend to me, and it’s just a gift in those times. Massa, what led you to want to pursue to become a yoga teacher or to share this knowledge back in Liberia.

What made you want to become a yoga teacher?

[00:03:16] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Yes, so okay, so after yoga found me, as I like to say, because I didn’t really find it, it just found its way to me. I was very excited to share this practice with people because of how it made me feel. So I had the instant connection I had with yoga. All I wanted to do was to teach and immediately with my first two, three weeks of discovering yoga. I wanted to teach my friends I wanted to teach my family members, but I was mostly focusing on the physical part. I would just tell them, “Oh, let’s do this pose to see if you can do this pose.” And with my desire to teach all of my friends and family members, I realized that I really wanted to teach this to Liberians.

Liberia, we’ve experienced 14 years of civil war. And on top of that, we’ve had Ebola in Liberia. Liberia has survived and Liberians are very resilient. But I think that mental health is something that really we need to incorporate into our lives. And yoga is the gateway to help people to take care of their mental health. And that was my entire vision of trying to wanting to teach yoga in Liberia. That was the reason behind it.

[00:04:42] Lily Allen-Duenas: hat is so powerful that you acknowledged your community, your country really needed it and it wasn’t offered at all. There was no yoga at that time or is there now even more yoga teachers there? 

What is yoga like in Liberia?

[00:04:54] Massa Mamey-Clarke: so when I came up so after my studies I moved back to Liberia and I moved back in 2015 and there was a I think one yoga instructor that I know, I knew of, and she had been teaching for a couple of years now. And I think there were just a couple of expat yoga instructors, but a Liberian yoga instructor that I knew of, it was just one person at that time.

[00:05:23] Lily Allen-Duenas: Wow. Oh, I’m so grateful that you decided it was time. It was time for you to become a yoga teacher and bring that back. And I know that you were self taught and then you decided to do an Ashtanga training. What led you to want to pursue Ashtanga?

Beginning to Teach in Liberia

[00:05:39] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Okay, so after I moved back to Liberia, I started giving free classes again. I moved back in 2015 and I was giving free lessons, but I was doing all of this just with what I knew and how I got to the point where I got [00:06:00]. I did a lot of YouTube, watched a lot of videos, and participated in a lot of Instagram challenges at that time. There was a big community of yoga instructors on Instagram doing a lot of challenges, and I followed a lot of them and participated in almost all of the challenges that were posted on Instagram. So with that knowledge, this is what I had, and when I came back, I researched some of the poses and the right way to get into them. When I came back to Liberia, this is the knowledge that I had, and I started teaching. I was a teacher at my high school, Rick’s Institute, and I started a yoga club and giving free lessons. Then I started teaching at a studio. 

The teaching I was doing was all based on my personal practice. Every time I’d take a yoga class online, I would be a student, but I would always listen with a teacher’s ears. The first time I taught my first official class outside of the lessons I gave to my students and people for free, it was great. People couldn’t stop coming to say, ‘Wow, that was great.’ In 2017, I started teaching somewhere else on my own. The interesting thing is I had a lot of expats coming to me when I gave free lessons, but I had a lot more Liberians coming. When I started charging, it was more like an offering: give what you want to give because I felt like I wasn’t fully certified. People would come and they would always ask me, ‘That was really great- where did you get your certification?’ I wasn’t certified. I started planning. It took me two years between 2017 to 2019. I found a school, saved some money, got on a flight, went to India for 24 days, and got my Ashtanga certification. And it’s just, it’s changed my life ever since.

[00:08:18] Lily Allen-Duenas: Ooh, yes. In India, were you studying in Rishikesh? 

[00:08:22] Massa Mamey-Clarke: I was in Goa. I went to a school called Upaya Yoga.

[00:08:26] Lily Allen-Duenas: beautiful. And so I would love to hear too about your vision for yoga in Liberia because I know that you have a hopes to be a future studio owner.

Vision for yoga in Liberia in the future

[00:08:37] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Yes. Oh my goodness. I have this image in my head. I’m always, I’m such a daydreamer. And when I’m, before I go to bed, I will spend my time just piecing the studio together mentally. And my vision is to have. Like a wellness space that has a yoga studio in it, [00:09:00] that whoever that enters this yoga studio would just feel relaxed, you would just feel like all of your worries and stressors of your day has just It’s just going to be melted away and I just want this space to be a space of healing where people would come and just feel like whatever issues that they’ve dealt with, that they’ve been able to face it in that space and being able to let go and just being able to bring people together just to have a community that it was be a place of a community for people in Liberia.

[00:09:34] Lily Allen-Duenas: Incredible. I love that idea of making sure everyone feels at ease and welcome because I’m also wondering what challenges did you face in bringing yoga to your community because I know that you mentioned that there was maybe just a couple expat teachers and one other Liberian teacher, so has there been any challenges for you just bringing yoga to Liberia? Has your community, your culture, has it? Been really supportive and excited to come, or has there been any resistance or pushback?

What challenges have occured bringing yoga to Liberia?

[00:10:06] Massa Mamey-Clarke: “I think initially when I started, I was just posting the poses, right? And people would call it Karate. People had their own names for it. It wasn’t yoga to them because even me as a yoga instructor now, I didn’t know what yoga was. A lot of people, especially Liberians, did not know [00:10:30] about yoga. And when people started understanding what it was, some people questioned it because in my culture, just sitting and meditating or singing a mantra is like witchcraft or something. 

So some people would say, ‘Okay, Liberia is a Christian nation, a lot of people are Christian, and there’s a conversation about whether practicing yoga is honoring God.’ So I’ve had conversations with people like that. But I think just overall, it’s been a challenge to really reach the Liberian community because when I discovered yoga, my desire was to get Liberians to be exposed to this. But it’s gotten to the point now where a lot more Liberians are getting exposed, and I think part of that is because of social media. We post a lot on social media, and I have two friends actually who became yoga instructors, but they recently just left Liberia, so I’m the only Liberian yoga instructor that is teaching right now in Liberia. 

But I think we’re getting there. I think that people understand now, people are slowly starting to understand the benefits. I think that one of my goals is just, I want to do a better job explaining more about the benefits of yoga. But [00:12:00] one day at a time.”

[00:12:01] Lily Allen-Duenas: Yes it can feel like a lot, especially if you’re the only teacher who’s Liberian in your community. It’s like that, it feels to me like that would be a lot of pressure.

Being the only yoga teacher in Liberia and all that entails

[00:12:11] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Yeah, I would love to, I wish we had more yoga instructors in Liberia because there’s so many different types of yoga and to be honest, I don’t want to be the only Yoga instructor in Liberia that’s teaching. I want people to experience different types of yoga.

 Somebody will come to my class because my practice is ashtanga, but I don’t really teach ashtanga because people don’t really connect with it. So I’m more on the vinyasa side. It’s like a combination of Vinyasa and just deep breathing exercises. So I would love for people to experience yin. So when I teach yin too, but I usually do that when I do my yoga retreats. There are so many types of yoga and I just don’t want to be the only yoga instructor who’s just. Having to teach all the time and even if I want to leave, for a vacation, the class is on pause, and that’s also my concern with establishing a yoga studio. I’m going to need teachers, so yeah,

[00:13:25] Lily Allen-Duenas: Oh, I loved how you painted that full picture for us because yes, [00:13:30] exactly what I was thinking it’s a lot of pressure. You get sick and then your classes, you have no subs. You have no one to step in and substitute and help. 

[00:13:38] Massa Mamey-Clarke: not at all. 

 The pressure to want all of your students to have the opportunity to explore different styles.

[00:13:44] Lily Allen-Duenas: It’s either you have to learn a lot of styles and teach all the time, or, I know that certain styles resonate, like with me as a teacher. it kind of ebbs and flows in our own life, what our own body and our own teaching style needs.

So to have that pressure to like, you like, you have to sequence and plan and learn all of the styles. Whew! That’s a lot.

Building clientele: Group clases and private classes 

[00:14:06] Massa Mamey-Clarke: It is. But when I started teaching one of the goals I had was to build my community to build my clientele. And I was teaching private lessons. I was teaching anywhere between five to six times a week. There were days I would teach private lessons before I go to work. And then after work, I teach a group session. My whole life for two years, it was just back-to-back until COVID hit. When COVID hit, that’s when I took a break. And I realized, wow, I was putting so much pressure and stress on my body and my mind. I didn’t realize it until COVID allowed me to take this break. And as a yoga instructor you get burnout because you’re using your body to teach. And it’s not just physically, it’s mentally, it’s your energy that you’re using. You’re giving out your energy and [00:15:00] it’s all positive energy and so up to now, I had to stop the private sessions just because I’m extremely busy with work and besides that. I Just needed the time and energy to save for my group sessions and I still have people, they’re constantly reaching out to me for private sessions, but I can’t anymore and it breaks my heart sometimes and, it is what it is.

Yoga is beyond the physical dimension

[00:15:28] Lily Allen-Duenas: Yeah, you can’t do everything and the back-to-back is so hard and I loved how you mentioned too that it is not just about the physical and the time, it’s also about the energy. It’s just to hold space. If my mind, if I’m teaching a yoga class and if I get distracted mentally with thinking about, oh, I forgot to get this at the grocery store.

That, that is very obvious to my students that there has been a beat that has been missed. Like either they’ve been in a pose too long or either my vocal cadence is messed up then or their cue is, it was a little off. It’s amazing that you have to be completely present and you have to hold space for your students to feel things or to need things. 

[00:16:13] Massa Mamey-Clarke: I think that I was so just attracted to the physical part initially and, I didn’t realize how much energy that is needed and how much space you needed to hold for people in order to teach and I mean it comes to practice [00:16:30] over time I realized well this is way beyond just the physical part.

[00:16:34] Lily Allen-Duenas: Yeah, it is. It’s way beyond. And I love though that it’s such a good thing for other yoga teachers who are tuning in kind of, I’m sure we’ll go, Oh yes, like we can relate. Or if it’s a new teacher and they’re like, Oh, I didn’t know that. If they’re just starting out, just finishing up their training.

So do you have any advice? For other yoga teachers who are just getting started out, what advice would you give them?

Advice for new yoga teachers 

[00:16:58] Massa Mamey-Clarke: I would say that Just remember to take care of yourself first. Try not to put so much pressure on yourself and just go as yourself and people are going to love you for you. And no, no matter who you are, or what you look like You’re going to find your community, so just stay true to yourself as you’re navigating or trying, to start your yoga teacher journey, just stay true to yourself.

[00:17:31] Lily Allen-Duenas: That’s beautiful. And Massa, I do ask this question as well to every single guest on the podcast. It’s like the through line, the touchstone. So what is your personal definition of yoga? 

What is your personal definition of yoga?

[00:17:43] Massa Mamey-Clarke: That’s such a great question I don’t know if, I feel like it changes. There are times where it changes for me, but right now, I think that for me, what yoga means to me is being able to find [00:18:00] space, hold space, time for yourself and being able to face whatever it is that you’re dealing with and being able to accept, let go, and just allow yourself to be. I think that’s what it is for me, for yoga. I would say that, yoga is a form of medicine. Physically, mentally, and Yoga is not like a plan. It shouldn’t be a plan. It is a lifestyle. 

[00:18:29] Lily Allen-Duenas: Aw, thank you. Let’s learn a little bit about Liberia. I know some of our listeners maybe don’t know too much, or maybe they’re experts, who knows? But either way, could you please tell us more about your country?

What is Liberia like?

[00:18:40] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Yes, Liberia is such a beautiful country. It’s a small country in West Africa. And it’s on the Atlantic coast and tons of nice beaches. And some of the beaches are nicely lined up with palm trees. And Liberia has two weathers, rainy season, dry season. So we have months of rain and we have months of dry.

And one thing I like about Liberia is the people. The people are very nice everywhere you go. Despite the fact that people have been through so much people are so resilient, people are always smiling. People are always willing to help. And people are always waiting to literally drop everything that you’re doing to assist and it’s a great place to be and the food is great What else can I say about [00:19:30] Liberia?

Yeah, beautiful landscape Lots of nice waterfalls. So yeah, that’s Liberia. I hope I’ve painted a picture.

How to get in touch with Massa and learn more about yoga in Liberia

[00:19:39] Lily Allen-Duenas: Beautiful. Massa, I have loved getting to know you and hear your story, and I’m so excited for our listeners to get to hear it too, so if you’re listening to it right now, I would love for you to know that if you want to get connected with Massa, if you have a question for her, want to learn more about her, or just support her by following her Instagram.

I’ll link it here in the show notes. So you can just pop open the show notes, scroll down, click a button, and you’ll be connected with Massa as well as I have a blog, a transcript, and everything that you’ll need to get connected with Massa on my website, wildyogatribe. com slash yoga in Liberia. But here on the podcast, Massa, do you want to say what your Instagram handle is?

[00:20:20] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Yes. It is yoga underscore with Massa.

[00:20:24] Lily Allen-Duenas: Perfect. Thank you so much, Massa. It has been a joy to be with you, and I am so excited to celebrate with you on the day you open your studio in Liberia.

[00:20:34] Massa Mamey-Clarke: Thank you so much

Wild Yoga Tribe Outro

[00:20:36] Lily Allen-Duenas: Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the Wild Yoga Tribe podcast. My conversation with Massa Mamey-Clarke, a yoga teacher from Liberia, was so powerful as we talked about what it’s like to be the only Liberian yoga teacher in Liberia who’s currently teaching. I hope that this conversation helped you to reflect on how yoga found you and if it found you at [00:21:00] precisely the time when you needed it the most. 

If you are a yoga teacher also and you are discovering some of the challenges and some of the exciting new steps or the pressures of even being a yoga teacher in your community, this is also a perfect episode for you to tune into and learn more from. So if you’re looking to tune into a podcast episode that is all about yoga in Liberia, then this is the conversation for you.

Thank you so much for listening to the Wild Yoga Tribe podcast. Be well.

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