Heather Snyder is an Alexander Technique, pilates and yoga teacher as well as a birth doula and conscious activist.

After earning her BA in psychology and dance, Heather began studying Pilates as a way to strengthen her body for dance. She completed her Pilates certification at the Pilates Studio of NY in 2000, under the guidance of master teacher, Romana Kryzanowzka.  Over the next four years she taught both private sessions and classes in NYC at re:AB, Drago’s Gym and Center for Movement.

After a knee injury left her unable to dance or even walk without pain, she began to question much of what she thought she knew and understood about movement. It was a humbling and difficult time as she realized she could not heal herself and traditional physical therapy was not the answer. It was then that she tried The Alexander Technique for the first time. Her first lesson was a profound experience for her and led her to study faithfully for a year. The Alexander Technique opened her eyes to a deeper and more comprehensive way of looking at her own habitual patterns of movement and helped her to discover the real source of her knee injury. The root of the problem was the way she was using her body every day. Her physical alignment was off in subtle ways that she was not in tune with at that time. Amazed by her teacher’s knowledge and the huge transformations she saw in her own body, she decided to train to become a teacher of The Alexander Technique.

Heather completed a three-year training program at the Manhattan Center for the Alexander Technique in 2006, under master teacher Caren Bayer. During this period she continued teaching Pilates and ultimately created The Graceful Body in order to share with others her deepened understanding of  body alignment and awareness. Heather saw great transformations in her Pilates students after introducing them to The Alexander Technique. Heather has been teaching The Alexander Technique as well as Pilates to students privately in her studio space downtown for the past several years. She has worked with a wide range of people and greatly enjoys the challenge that each new student brings – whether it is an office worker with chronic back/neck pain, an athlete or artist who wants to break harmful habits and improve his/her performance, or someone dealing with neurological disorders.

As her own personal movement practice deepened, Heather found that yoga, which she had been practicing for years, was a great complement to her Alexander Technique practice and her growing spirituality. She  completed her 500 hour certification at Yogaworks, under mentor Jodie Rufty and quickly got involved with Off the Mat, Into the World,  an organization with the mission of using the power of yoga to inspire conscious, sustainable activism. Off the Mat gave Heather what she was always looking for; a community of like minded people wanting to make a difference in the world. She traveled with them to Uganda in 2009 and has since become the NYC Regional Leader for Off the Mat. Her time in Uganda led her to her next career twist, as she found herself supporting a 17 year old Ugandan girl through labor at a birth clinic she was visiting there.  This inspired a new passion inside of her and she decided she wanted to pursue birth doula work once she was back home. She has been working as a doula since June 2010 and loves supporting her clients and their partners through their labor and birth. She is always honored to be a part of the process, with whatever kind of birth experience it ends up being. She enjoys bringing her knowledge of movement, breath, and awareness to a laboring woman to greater help the new mom find her own way through the journey and discover her own inner strength and faith in the birthing process.

Heather is committed to a life of service, whether that be through her teaching, her doula work, or her volunteer work abroad. She is constantly growing and learning and can’t wait to see what comes next.