Our Team

“A wise man is the one who is happy by himself and because of himself.“

– Swami Dayananda Saraswati –
Sonia Novaes
Founder of Ātma Vidyā
Sonia Novaes is a teacher and director of Ātma Vidyā, her love for the Vedic tradition started early, seeking to find a deeper understanding of oneself, the world and God. She started her Vedānta studies in 2000 with Swami Vagishananda. She graduated in Philosophy from PUC-Campinas and decided to deepen her study of Vedānta.
In 2003, she went to Rishikesh to attend a 3½ year residential course on Vedānta, Sanskrit and Mantras with Pujya Swami Dayananda and Swami Brahmavidyananda. Since then, she has made India her home, where she has lived for 17 years.
Today Sonia lives in Auroville, Tamil Nadu, India, with her husband and two children. She dedicates her life to her family and to the studies and teachings of Vedānta, Sanskrit, Mantras and Indian culture in India, Brazil and around the world.

Maline Ribeiro
Teacher at Ātma Vidyā

Maline is a student of Vedānta, a yoga teacher, architect and Brazilian. During her graduation in architecture and urbanism which happened in the city of São Paulo, while going through long hours of traffic and public transportation, an enquiry about the purpose of life as well as the human dilemma regarding the feeling of inadequacy and dissatisfaction started to arise. By luck or grace the answer didn’t take long to come – Maline had her first contact with Vedānta in the world of yoga, during her yoga teacher training program on Hatha yoga by the ‘Humaniversidade Holística’, having its conclusion in 2017. Afterwards she continued her Vedānta studies with recorded and online classes, until the opportunity to come to India took place.
Noticing that what presented itself as the solution for her questions was the vision revealed by Vedānta, in February 2018 she attended the Vedānta camps in ‘Arsha Vidya Pitham’ in Rishkesh.
In September of the same year she attended a course of 108 days on Tattva Bodhaḥ and Bhagavad Gītā texts. Sequentially, in 2019, she continued to take part in the 3-years residential course on Vedānta, Sanskrit and chanting of Mantras at ‘Arsha Vidya Gurukulam’, Anaikatti, conducted by Swami Sadatmananda Saraswati, the acharya-in-charge of the Gurukulam.
Miriam Barros
Translation & Revision
Miriam Regina Xavier de Barros is a practitioner of Yoga since 2003, she graduated as an instructor at the ‘Isvara Institute’ in Campinas, and at the ‘IEPY’ (Institute for Research and Studies in Yoga), in São Paulo. She performed the training in ‘Yoga Hormonal Therapy’ with Profa. Dinah Rodrigues and specialization in Yogatherapy by the ‘Institute of Yogatherapy’ of Campinas.
She has studied Sanskrit, Vedānta and Mantra chanting since 2008, having taken classes with Sonia Novaes, Paula Ornellas, Cecilia Muzetti and Gloria Arieira. She has been dedicated to studying the therapeutic effects of Mudras since 2001, which she learned through the practice of Jin Shin Jyutsu.
She currently teaches Hatha Yoga, Hormonal Yoga Therapy, Therapeutic Mudras, Meditation Techniques and Natural Methods to Improve Vision in ‘Padma Yoga and Therapies’, in Sousas, Campinas.
Miriam has a degree in Physics from USP, with a Doctorate in Optics from UNICAMP. She worked with research in the field of optics for 25 years and with project management for 7 years.