Serenity Tedesco is a writer, social justice activist, yoga therapist, and scholar-practitioner of the yoga traditions. She specializes in practical wisdom that engages with society, embodied practices, and emotion as a compass for self-study. She is a graduate of the Yoga Studies M.A. program at Loyola Marymount University where she completed her thesis titled, “The Art of Suffering: Liberation through Anger & Radical Honesty.” Her research focuses on the intersection of race, philosophy, psychology, and its effects on modern transnational yoga culture. She has written on topics of identity, spiritual bypass, capitalism, colonialism, and racial inclusion/equity. She is also the co-host of the inaugural LMU Graduate Yoga Studies Podcast and Creative Director for “Good Death, Auspicious Rebirth” film project with True Dharma International Buddhist Mission.In her free time, she plays violin and volunteers for Prison Yoga + Meditation, a non-profit dedicated to providing meditation and yoga to inmates in Los Angeles county.Serenity was introduced to yoga as a young child on the foothills of the Korean mountains. From a young age, she questioned the nature of reality, death, and the human experience. Eastern spirituality was the backdrop of her life; she grew up in a family of natural healers, philosophers, and religious scholars. She lived in India from 2010-2011, where she immersed herself in Yoga, Jain, Hindu, Sindhi, and Tibetan Buddhist cultures and practices. 

Three months before 9/11, she immigrated to the United States with her family and quickly discovered issues of racism and discrimination as a multi-ethnic Buddhist girl in the South. She lived just minutes away from the Trayvon Martin murder and mass shooting of LGBTQ+ Pulse Nightclub in Florida. Her personal life experiences ignited passion for research focused on social justice, diversity, inclusion, taboo emotions like anger and guilt, concept of self/identity, yoga philosophy, and intersectional feminism.As a yoga and meditation teacher, Serenity guides students in a warm, creative space to meaningfully connect to themselves, their bodies, and the world. She integrates self-healing practices, movement therapeutics, modern health science, and HeartMath Coherence techniques. She lectures at universities, yoga studios, transformation festivals, and educational events, and workshops, and works as a consultant for fellow yoga teachers, scholars, and conscious entrepreneurs. Additionally, she is the host of two podcasts - LMU Graduate Yoga Studies Podcast and Yoga in the Margins.

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