For years, yoga helped our New Yorker of the Week find calm in the chaos. Today, she's making sure the practice is within reach of our City's most underserved communities. NY1's John Schiumo introduces us.

For Dawn Rizzo, yoga is a journey of self-discovery. It helps the Brooklyn native find inner-peace and strength.

"I know yoga can give people the opportunity to see their own power within themselves and then transform it into something bigger," Dawn said.

Dawn's personal transformation started when she was 18 years old, living without a home.

"The only thing I saw in those moments was darkness," Dawn recalled. "And it wasn't until someone reached out for me and said, 'Hey I want to help you,' or 'Come take a shower at my house,' or 'Stay on my couch,' that I realized there's people out there that really care."

Today, Dawn is the one reaching out.

In 2013, she founded the New York City Yoga Project. The non-profit travels the five boroughs, teaching yoga to hundreds of New Yorkers living in under-served communities — all for free.

Dawn works with kids from low-income neighborhoods; former drug addicts; and those living in shelters, like women that receive help from WIN, a social service agency.

"It's more of a getaway, more of a stress reliever, a relaxer, some time for yourself," Jasmin Alemany, a shelter resident, said. "It's teaching me a lot about myself. It's helping me out with my body a lot. I found energy I didn't know I had in me."

"I keep coming back because I like it and I also feel a difference in my body," said Denise Gutierrez, another shelter resident. "It makes me feel more relaxed, mentally and physically and emotionally."

For these women, staying present isn't done individually; Dawn builds a community.

"She actually pinpoints things in me that, you know, I need to tap into, like letting go of certain angers and certain traumas that I might have gone through," Gutierrez said. "It's not easy being here, struggling. The least you can have is some type of, you know, togetherness and know that you're not alone and there's people willing out there to show you different parts."

And so, for connecting New Yorkers in need on and off the yoga mat, Dawn Rizzo is our New Yorker of the Week.