Today we’d like to introduce you to Orlee Klempner.
Orlee, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
Beginning with a stressful career in advertising, I was encouraged by my supervisor who is a good friend, and my family to switch careers to helping people. They saw something in me I did not yet see. And because I had such a lack of trust within, I trusted them. You see, we can’t judge qualities we might find as weak. This is what I needed for the push, for the seed planting and for the realization of trusting. Two years later, I quit and began a yoga teacher training in 2014 with Liz Arch. It wasn’t enough. I knew there was more to it and I wanted it. Why? Because I didn’t trust myself. So, I went on to educate myself more. A lovely lady, Natasha Snow Needles took me under her wing. She taught me more anatomy and the function of our body, she taught me to teach more modalities and challenged my way of teaching, laying out the groundwork for a well-rounded teacher. I began assisting her yoga teacher training, giving anatomy lectures until one day I got into a bad car accident. Passed out and sustained a few injuries.
Then came the hip reconstruction. Stuck to my couch for eight months, I began my meditation practice. With my time at home, I went down a rabbit hole of information about the history of yoga and what it is today. I signed up for Dan Sieglel’s Nuerobiology training. It was then I became fascinated with the science behind this work. Beginning with the science of how brain works with body and body works with brain to Nuer-plasticity and well-being. We have the capability to live the life we want to. By 2017, I was in a meditation training at The Den Meditation and worked closely with those teachers thereafter. Everything I found helping me, I wanted to know more of so I could teach it. I was getting a lot from some of the Hindu traditions and visited India and I got a lot from Mindfulness and Loving/Kindness.
So, I wanted to know this mindfulness thing for all ages. I signed up for Mindful School Training. I learned how to teach kids meditation and that opened a whole new door. A passion grew for meeting the needs of a child so they can fulfill the life they want to live and make this world better for themselves, the future. That’s when I began teaching an intelligent curriculum, Breathe & Learn by Joanie Plake. I help out Joanie with this in the South Bay and teach it on my own at The Den Meditation. I began finding a real benefit in my yoga nidra practice and decided to do a training with Hilary Jackendoff while taking some UCLA MAPS classes with Heather Prete to keep up with my mindfulness training. You can find me teaching yin + yoga nidra at Wanderlust, Hollywood. Yoga Nidra taught my body (the one I lacked trust for in keeping non-injurious for over a year) to let go and relax by way of trusting. And so, I finally learned the essence of trusting. By even sending my energy this way, I opened my eyes to the support I have around me that can show me ingredients of trust and confidence. With this and sticking to the mindfulness training more clarity around the truth of the matter grew. The place beneath the stories and the clouds that make our reality. The place beneath that which is here and now. A moment happening, moving in and out of awareness. Low and behold, I decided to take another training. Not because I didn’t trust my being adequate, but because I wanted to. I could let go of the strong hold around the meaning I gave certain things that led me to believe that if I am spending the money on a training, it is for a certification that will better my career.
While it is true that it looks great to have more training, it looks and feels even better when there isn’t a strong belief of attachment around it – I will be better after this training, i.e., I am not good enough until I do this training. So, because, and only because I wanted to dive in deeper to teaching mindfulness, I signed up for Jack Kornfield & Tara Brach’s Mindfulness Certification program through the Greater Good Science Center at Berkeley University. I am currently enrolled in this program. Most randomly, one of the greatest trainings of empathy I took was to volunteer at the Suicide Prevention Center this year, reinforcing my belief in acknowledgment being the real love we are all looking for. I am human and forget. But as much as I can remember, I stay in present moment awareness, the reality of right now and allow empathy to lead the way through it all.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Some say the universe knocks on your door asking you to pay attention by providing you with some major life event like a car accident, death or illness. The universe started knocking before I was out of the womb. I needed out. I was born a month early with severe complications, missing parts of my digestive system and having a rare heart condition. I was surrounded by chaos even before opening my eyes to the world for the first time. It was a great first impression. No, but really, it was.
From Holocaust survivor grandparents, to parents that didn’t really fit together but made it work, to a really tough birth myself with my older brother by my side as my rock, holding my hand in the incubator, to facing my stomach’s condition many times over, attempting suicide because life was that exhausting, being a victim of sexual abuse, watching mom survive breast and ovarian cancer with a will to live like NBD (no big deal), a major car accident and a reconstruction on a couple body parts – Within each of these events that I was old enough to respond to, there were glimpses of the bigger picture. I remember after one stomach surgery, coming back to the ad agency where I noticed for the first time the mundaneness of the first conversation I heard. As if, there is something bigger. Not that mundane is bad. I just noticed it. But yes, at the time, I judged it as bad. And fell right back into it, into being overpowered by the way I related to these moments and therefore the rest of my life. Talk about resistance to who you are in any given moment.
The first noble truth is that there is suffering. And when something is uncomfortable and we are not aware, we automatically run from it and towards comfort or familiarity. But, it was when I was recovering from a hip reconstruction that I got a glimpse big enough to really notice. This glimpse was into the suffering. I was suffering emotionally more than any other physical ailment caused. I felt isolated and depressed and was doped up on pain pills. I went into a dark place where I felt so alone even though I had so many people around me. All in the while, just beginning my meditation practice in place of a physical yoga practice. Ten minutes per day. I started this with one of my best friends who was sleeping over at the time to take care of me. He was having such a great experience, feeling the results in the day and I was feeling my anger more and more. This was very frustrating at first and honestly, depressing.
With more practice and teacher’s guidance, I began to forgive and grieve this person that has been so hurt and even through my genes. I stopped fighting her. And I began to love her. You see, in each of these events, there was evidence of a will to survive. The resistance to the suffering is what caused the emotional exhaustion, the painful suffering. Within each of these events, there was the one inside of me, the one inside of my mom and dad, the one inside of my grandparents protecting – The Protector. This one has done a great job of protecting and has also caused a great deal of suffering. Why? Because this one never got the acknowledgment and understanding it needed. With some loving/kindness practices, I developed the belief that we can find peace and freedom by simply acknowledging with empathy others and most importantly ourselves. This is what I am set out to teach. My life changed when I realized this. Am I human and get bitchy sometimes? Yes, 100%. Still, today I can say I love my mom and find her so cute, take life a lot less seriously by seeing the suffering of others and remembering the truth of the matter – it’s not happening to you, it is just happening.
Om With Orlee – what should we know? What do you do best? What sets you apart from others?
I teach public and one on ones in yoga and mindfulness to youth and adults. In yoga, I specialize in injury and in mindfulness I specialize in youth. What sets me apart? I have personal experience with physical ailments and trauma in my youth. I have personal experience with being with pain and learning to ease around the tension of it. My insights to this I love writing about and am as much proud as I am honored to be recognized for that through social media, my website’s blog and a gift of a platform on Giadzy.com. And I am honored to be working with our youth.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.omwithorlee.com
- Instagram: omwithorlee
Suggest a story: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
