Cooper Seay

Cooper Seay (born Elizabeth Cooper Seay, December 7, 1965) was a member of the rock bands Ellen James Society and Viva la Diva. She recently released a solo album, Fin de Siecle, on Moksha Records, as "E. Cooper Seay". She also works as a Bikram and Sivananda yoga instructor in Austin, Texas.^[1] E. Cooper Seay has studied with Darren Rhodes, Donna Farhi, Ana Forrest, Christina Sell, Doug Swenson, Ed Marks, Mary Obendorfer, George Purvis, Bikram Chodury, Kofi Busia, and Amy DeFilippi.

Cooper began practicing yoga in 1997, blessed by two Integral yoga teachers who were both doctors of chiropractic; her first instruction was both spiritual and profoundly informed by the instructors' knowledge of the body. A lifelong athlete, Cooper became diverted by more physically challenging forms of hatha, going on to become a Bikram instructor. After four years of teaching an average of fourteen classes a week, running studios and eventually opening her own studio, she came full circle.

Following her integral lineage she traveled to kerala India to obtain her Sivananda teaching certificate. It was in the sivananda ashram that she was able to connect her earlier career as a musician with her yoga through both bhajan and kirtan.

After completing a teacher training in Bhava yoga with Peter Rizzo, Cooper began her current path and passion, teaching vinyasa in the Krishnamacharya lineage.

Cooper's personal practice is defined by her love of vinyasa and her love of Iyengar yoga. As counterpoint to her hatha yoga, Cooper practices vippasana meditation as taught by SN Goenka. As a teacher, Cooper strives to integrate the tapas of a strong practice with the santosha of a quiet mind. She is sensitive to the perils of strong physical work in a culture that is body obsessed, and believes that only through the eight-limbed path can we become free from internal friction.

"The yoga shala is a laboratory, it is where we begin to observe our patterning. It is an amazing journey to become aware enough to observe, and in control enough to create more options for our behavior."

"...Each of us is here to discover our true Self, to find out on our own that our true Self is spiritual, that essentially we are spiritual beings that have taken manifestation in physical form. We're not human beings that have occasional spiritual experiences - it's the other way around: we're spiritual beings that have occasional human experiences."~ Deepak Chopra ^[2]

Cooper is a Certified Clinical Hypnotherapist through the American Council of Hypnotist Examiners #308-286 through the Hypnotherapy Academy of America.

She studied music composition at Georgia Perimeter College. She has owned and managed yoga studios, and is a registered yoga instructor with the Yoga Alliance.

Cooper attended the Hypnotherapy Academy of America in Santa Fe, NM and she has had the honor of studying with one of the fathers of modern hypnotherapy, Gil Boyne.^[3]

One of her most recent performances was in Atlanta, Georgia, as Riff Raff in The Rocky Horror Show.^[4]

Discography

• Fin de Siecle

References

1. ^ "Cooper Seay, Senior Yoga Instructor", Breath & Body Yoga, http://www.breathandbodyyoga.com/about_the_teachers.asp, retrieved 2007-09-04 .
2. ^ http://www.antahsara.org/Biography.cfm
3. ^ http://www.ecooperseay.com/Index.html
4. ^ Farmer, Jim (2005-09-09), "Jump to the left", Southern Voice, http://www.sovo.com/2005/9-9/locallife/theater/theater.cfm, retrieved 2007-09-04 .

External links

• Home page at Daemon Records
• Cooper Seay at the Internet Movie Database
• http://www.ecooperseay.com/Index.html

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Name	Seay, Cooper
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Date of birth	1966
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