Melanie Haller – Global Perspectives during COVID-19

At the WCIA, we understand that the outbreak of COVID-19 has been difficult for so many people across the world. At the beginning of the pandemic, we reached out to people worldwide to share global perspectives on COVID-19, recognising the global nature of the issue, and some of the similarities and differences of experiences in different countries. We wanted to identify and share both the positive and negative stories emerging from the situation. Over a year on from the start of the pandemic, we’re reaching out again…


Originally from Madrid, Santi works in our WCIA Communications team. He has a background in Communications, Latin American Politics, and Spanish teaching. He reached out to Melanie Haller, a German national dedicated to the world of yoga, meditation and wellbeing. More information on her yoga workshops https://www.instagram.com/melaniesophiehaller/.

Here’s her story

Covid-19 has been an absolute journey. I have been a yoga teacher for over three years now, but it used to be a side work because I mostly dedicated myself professionally to marketing in Berlin. To be honest, I didn’t like that job at all. I was very unhappy and it was meaningless. So I started my own yoga business with insight gained from the marketing world. For a while I combined both the marketing and the yoga world until the pandemic made its appearance. In the beginning we struggled until it was obvious we could not keep organizing live events, so I got fired.

I couldn’t be happier! That was my chance to go for my dream, a full-on dedication to teaching yoga. This is what I love and where I feel most alive. Like many people during the pandemic, I started online. Which wasn’t seen very positively at first, but then as time went by, people started adapting to this new online yoga model and my clientele kept growing. People were opening up to new possibilities and ways of doing things. I transitioned from being fired to owning my e-business. Everything worked out for me. I suppose our larger community needed some cheering up during these difficult times.

“Waking up, focusing on positive thoughts and exercise gratitude is a powerful way of facing the day”

Waking up, focusing on positive thoughts and exercise gratitude is a powerful way of facing the day. The opposite would be embracing bad vibes that don’t let you keep on going. This attitude can even bring mental and physical sickness. So basically we all bonded over our community and shared will to feel good. Looking back, these challenging moments have been my chance to be myself and go for my dreams. The best time is now. I was actually surprised that the pandemic didn’t affect my personal life, because I am usually in the forest with my dog and my classes are mostly online. At the same time, I feel that it’s now a proper time to get back to face to face classes because I do yoga retreats and human contact is very important for the community engagement. I hope we will be reunited again soon!

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