Community as Sanctuary: Reflections on 20 years of Queer & Trans Yoga

Queer people have honed the skill of critique, seeing the gaps, commenting on what is missing and who is left out. We can be harsh, sharp, judgmental and petty with this skill. At the same time, there is a brilliance to this: by seeing what is missing, we are compelled to fill the gaps. We did this during the AIDS crisis, caring for our sick and dying siblings when hospitals and government would not. We do this now, being creative across state lines with differences in healthcare, and offering shelter to community members who have to travel to receive that care.

Queer community can be a sanctuary, a refuge, a haven where we can be our full selves. In 2006, when I began teaching Queer & Trans Yoga, I strove to create a space where we could be present in our bodies and hearts together, outside of political work and cruising one another. 20 years later, I am still teaching Queer & Trans Yoga as a weekly class and regular retreat, because we need each other. Because when we show up attempting to be embodied, and present to our sore, tender, loving hearts, magic happens.

"I have seen students sustain a practice across decades, through chemo treatments, job changes, shifts in partnership and community."

People form friendships in my classes, fall in and out of love between the mats, claim custody over my class in small queer communities where sharing space after a breakup is painful. I have seen students dedicate themselves to yoga practice through this affinity space, experiencing how it makes their lives more vibrant. I have held classes where someone is fresh off of some trauma-homophobic harassment on the subway, witnessing a suicide, mourning the loss of a queer elder, a shooting at a queer nightclub. Some students have come to class to prepare for and heal from top surgery and bottom surgery. For some students, Queer & Trans Yoga is the only queer space they frequent. I have seen students sustain a practice across decades, through chemo treatments, job changes, shifts in partnership and community. Queer and trans yoga classes inherently hold all of what we as community holds, and thus so does a retreat.

I see students in Queer & Trans Yoga connect more readily than those in my general population classes-we know that just by showing up in that class, we have something in common. What I have learned as a teacher of Queer & Trans Yoga and yoga more generally is that students actually all have something in common: the experience of suffering and the desire to end their suffering. We come to yoga, to spirit, because we want to feel better, we yearn for something more.

The joy in Queer & Trans Yoga is palpable; often I have to quiet students down in order to teach. There is a bubbling over, an excitement, a vibrance, an inevitable resilience: this is who we are, intimate with the 10,000 joys and the 10,000 sorrows. They talk back in postures, throwing sass, “oh no you didn’t! Again, Jacoby?!”. They yelp when they do a headstand for the first time-uncontained and unabashed, often.

"The teachings are timeless: timelessly relevant, instructive, and a profound guiding force through the times."

As with all yoga classes, Queer & Trans Yoga has an arc through the chakras, and thus a tuning of student’s energy fields and lifeforce. The philosophical teachings that I offer every class and retreat have a particular resonance, as well. I hear often, “how did you know? Did you read my journal?” The teachings are timeless: timelessly relevant, instructive, and a profound guiding force through the times. I hone the yoga teachings to the moment, considering what is relevant in my community (this also means that I need to keep abreast of what is happening in community): as we head toward a presidential election, integrity or non-stealing may be relevant; after the loss of a community member, we work with grief rituals and compassion practices.

The connections and community that are cultivated on retreat withstand time and pressure, because we are doing change and transformation work from the inside out. Students keep in touch with each other, across the country, across town, across employment sectors; a bridge is forged through the go-around at the beginning of class, sharing what is relevant about the particular philosophy that we are working with, and a banter often occurs as students leave the studio, sweaty and grounded.

"The practice is a river that holds us, guides us toward freedom and vastness, within ourselves and with each other... sanctuary is what queer people need right now."

Queer & Trans Yoga has become a sanctuary. Witnessing this fosters and grows my faith in yoga teachings, again and again. The practice is a river that holds us, guides us toward freedom and vastness, within ourselves and with each other. And sanctuary is what queer people need right now, with over 1,000 anti-trans laws being proposed in 2025 as well as many of us being targeted by immigrant surveillance by ICE, economic policies that increase poverty, and US-supported wars across the world and in our own neighborhoods. 

We need to be with each other, and we need to be held by something greater than ourselves. A practice that humans have passed down over 5,000 years is a blessing and an honor.

On Campus

Weekend Format

Sanctuary

Spiritual grounding for queer and trans folks

January 9–11, 2026