Danielle Bois
Born and raised on Cape Cod, MA, Dani moved to Vermont to attend UVM, where she received a degree in Dietetics. Through the nutrition courses, working at the UVM Women’s Health Clinic, and her membership with the UVM Gymnastics Club, Dani’s interest in health and wellness developed. Dani helped to plan and implement VIHW in 2010, and is excited to have the opportunity to be a full time teacher this year and in upcoming years. She currently works at a holistic health office in Williston, and enjoys reading, travel, and conversation, preferably over coffee.
Sim Darwick
I am focused on living joyfully and heartfully in a way that grounds and connects me to the earth, as well as inspires me to care-take others and this planet. My dreams include implementing laughter yoga in all hospitals across the country, teaching yoga to those who want to learn, and being joyful.
At the Vermont Institute on Health and Wellness, I teach Kundalini and Laughter Yoga, raw foods, and fitness. I work as a Health Coach and Transformation Facilitator for the amazing teenagers who attend this summer camp.
Leif Gaston
Leif is an intuitive learner and healer who has studied many forms of the healing arts. He was born under a full moon during the summer solstice and grew up in Maine with mountains, rivers, woods, and the sea. Leif has a passion for movement therapies, meditation and the healing arts. He is a body worker trained in Shiatsu and massage therapy at the Downeast School of Massage in Waldoboro, Maine, and is a Ushui Reiki Master. He has been studying tai chi and qi gong for 8 years and will be teaching this at VIHW. Leif, received his BS in environmental science from Lesley University. The focus of his degree was holistic sustainability and gardening. He did ecological field based research with the Auduban Expedition Institute. Having learned to lucid dream as a young man, he eventually started helping others to gain this ability and will be sharing this with VIHW students.
Dr. Neal Klein
Dr. Neal Klein began his search into the nature of consciousness and human potential while an undergraduate in the late 1960s. He continued this work as he earned both his master’s and doctoral degrees. For the past twenty-five years, he has taught at Lesley University in Cambridge, MA, where he focuses in the areas of counseling, holistic health, and cross-cultural psychology. He is also a member of the Steering Committee at Lesley’s Institute of Body, Mind and Spirituality. One of his life quests is to help expand the current prevailing paradigm that we as human beings and as psychologists use to formulate our beliefs regarding what is humanly possible — this is reflected in his book, A New Operating Manual for Being Human: a Humanistic/Holistic Perspective on Counseling Psychology and Personal Growth.
Coby Kozlowski MS
Coby is a dynamic workshop facilitator and speaker. She is a Professional Life Coach and owner of Simple Rhythm Coaching, Certified Ayurvedic Health Educator, Registered Yoga Teacher Trainer and works at the world renowned Kripalu: Center for Yoga & Health.
She believes happiness and wellness are created by listening and following to your inner guiding voice (who it is you really are) and making life-affirming choices that bring you closer to living the life you were meant to experience. Discovering your true self allows you to leave anxiety, doubting questions and disease behind you and ultimately connecting you with endless possibilities. With wellness you find an inner calmness, spiritual bliss and physical health that are inherently yours.
Guido Masé
Guido RH(AHG) is a clinical herbalist, herbal educator, and garden steward specializing in holistic Western herbalism, though his approach is eclectic and draws upon many influences. He spent his childhood in Italy, in the central Alps and in a Renaissance town called Ferrara. After traveling the United States, he settled into central Vermont where he has been living since 1996.
He works clinically and teaches as a professional member of the American Herbalists Guild, and is a part of United Plant Savers and the American Botanical Council.
Gabe McConkey
Nature, being in the great outdoors, rushing water, trees, plants, flying, eating, walking in the dark, storytelling, kayaking, smelling flowers, and eating mango’s are among my favorite pastimes. I also enjoy, being around as many inspired individuals as possible, using every moment as a possibility for education, and flying.
I graduated from Johnson State College with a degree in Wellness and Alternative Medicine in 2009. In this program I learned about health care in our country, and places around the world investigating the sociological considerations of medicine, and a variety of alternative therapies and practices available to help the individual take command of their health and wellness, and share their success with others. I believe that there are an infinite number of activities, practices, perspectives, and experiences that can bring wellness to everyone and I am here to share the enjoyment of life with friends and fellow human beings.
David Onne
David was born and raised in Central Vermont and moved to Colorado in 2005 after graduating from WPI with a degree in technical writing. Before enrolling at the Boulder College of Massage Therapy (BCMT), he was a technical writer and computer technician. While in school at BCMT, David interned as a sports massage therapist at Denver University and the Colorado University of Boulder. He also had the opportunity to volunteer community service massage for the Ronald McDonald House, as well as the Center for Resource Conservation.
David comes from a massage background; his father Bob has been a Certified Massage Therapist and Somatic Healer for almost 30 years. Having been exposed to massage since childhood, his primary form of health care is self-care massage. Having practiced massage for two years, David has a well rounded and balanced style that can be modified to fit the needs of many different people.
David enjoys Ultimate Frisbee, Table Tennis, Foosball, chess and occasionally pretending to be a ninja.
Bob Onne MS
Bob is the founder of The Universal Institute of the Healing Arts, and has been practicing bodywork, counseling, and teaching professionaly since 1970.
Bob has received training in the following places: Barbara Brennan School of Healing (Graduate); Certified Reiki Master Healer; Core Engergetics Institute; American Oriental Bodywork Therapy Association (Certified Practitioner/Certified Instructor); Vermont Massage Guild Body Oriented Practioners (Member); Nippon Shiatsu Daigaku (Certified Teacher/Certified Practioner); Springfield College (M.Ed.); Springfield Human Development Center (Leader); Johnson State College (B.S.).
Dana Regan
500 hr RYT & Life Coach, is passionate about yoga and holistic creative expression. She completed her 200 hour certification from the Yoga Alliance through Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health. Dana received her BA from Naropa, a Buddhist Inspired University in Boulder, Colorado. She completed her degree in Somatic Psychology and Performance Art. She is a certified Souluna Life Coach by Coby Kozlowski. Dana will be receiving her 500 hour yoga teacher certification in India at the Sacred Lasya Teacher Training.
Dana has taught yoga and creative expression workshops in the US and Costa Rica. She is a dynamic and inspiring teacher; passionate about empowering teenagers to create a life they will love! She draws upon her vast knowledge in the arts and cultivates a safe space for all people to experience what it means to be fully human, fully alive!
Matt Schifferle
Matt, known as the Fit Rebel, loves fitness and exercise methods that are inexpensive and don’t take up much space. His basement is a testament to the fact that you can build a complete home gym for just a few hundred dollars. By using the simplest methods, he produces results that are often above and beyond what is possible with the most complicated equipment.
His web site, www.RedDeltaProject.com, is a showcase to how anyone else can use these simple methods to break free from expensive gym memberships and complicated fitness programs.
Teal Scott
I left my home to train at a Japanese Buddhist monastery when I was 19. As a child, I saw people create deep suffering in the world and I felt unable to accept it. I wanted to face the problem directly, and upon learning that monasteries are built for that purpose, I immediately began to search. After visiting teachers for some time, I found a true Zen Master, Shodo Harada Roshi, with whom I was fortunate to train for four years, and under whom I was ordained. I also trained, and served as head monk, at Sariputta Boudh Vihar, an Ambedkar Buddhist monastery in southern India, where I worked for the rights of those born into the lower castes and helped to raise thirty boys with the understanding that we are all inconceivably valuable, regardless of family circumstances. I led peaceful protests and organized community efforts to overcome the injustice of the caste system. I further trained at Hemis Gompa, a Kagyud Tibetan monastery in the far north of India where I maintained an extremely rigorous meditation practice, and Xue Feng Si, an ancient Ch’an monastery in eastern China. Since returning to the United States, I have had the honor of participating in several Native American ceremonies, including the Sun Dance and a four-year cycle of Vision Quests.
I teach meditation techniques at residential retreats around the US and internationally, one-on-one in Vermont, over the phone and the Internet and through text messages, and in local schools and at King Street Center with youth. I wander around Chittenden County for the warmer half the year in the traditional Buddhist mendicant style, sleeping when offered shelter and eating when offered food, speaking with anyone I meet and accepting invitations to stay at homes, schools, churches and other locations. It is a blessing for me to have the chance to provide meditation guidance as a full-time job.
Katie Sereika
Katie is a singer, actor and certified Kripalu yoga instructor who currently resides in NYC. She graduated from SUNY Fredonia with a BFA in Musical Theatre and professionally she has performed in New Hampshire with The Summer Theatre in Meredith and nationally toured with Missoula Children’s Theatre and American Family Theatre. While in college she started her own company called P.U.R.E Creativity which hosted theatre camps and workshops in the Rochester,NY area to provide an artistic outlet for children and young adults. Her passion for yoga, consciousness and healthy living blossomed when she participated in the Semester Intensive at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health. Her goal is to bring consciousness to the world of performing arts. She is very excited and grateful to be a part of the VIHW team this coming summer!
Lauren Swanekamp HC, RYT, AADP
Lauren is a certified Health Coach and Kripalu Yoga Teacher. She holds a B.S. in Counseling Psychology from Lesley University and has also studied at the Kripalu Center’s Institute for Integrated Leadership as well as the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in New York City.
Lauren’s passion for food, cooking and nutrition stems from her own path of weight loss and healing from a painful digestive disorder. After years of working unsuccessfully with doctors, it was learning to prepare her own food, cultivate self-awareness, and manage stress that truly liberated her from feeling unwell. She now offers nutrition and wellness workshops in addition to teaching group and private cooking classes.
Lauren believes that the true secret to lasting health is not to create fool proof diet plans and spend hours discussing the importance of working out, but to examine the reasons behind each individual’s choice of what they eat. Our relationships, career, pleasure, confidence, history and connection with our bodies all create our relationship with food. By examining the whole picture we are able to transform our lives from simply surviving to thriving!
Jennifer Taylor MS
Jennifer holds a BS in Wellness and Alternative Medicine from Johnson State College, and she is currently using this degree in her work with the Healing Herb Shoppe in Charlottesville, Virginia, where she fills herbal prescriptions for a Chinese medicine practitioner and a nutritional consultant. Jennifer is currently teach at UVM will completing her graduate studies in nutrition at UVM. She likes to spend her free time gardening, raising quails and chickens, bicycling, playing ultimate frisbee and preparing delicious meals with students in an afterschool cooking club. Jennifer was a counselor for VIHW in 2008 and looks forward to teaching at this summer’s program, sharing how to live well through body movement, cooking, and natural medicine.
Jan Wall
Jan Wall teaches courses in Holistic Approaches to Healing, Transpersonal Psychology, and Intuition at Lesley University. Jan Wall has facilitated national workshops focusing on wellness, leadership training, personal growth and life transitions for over twenty years. She received her coach certification through Coach Training Alliance supplementing it with other training which includes workshop participation in the Coaching From Within program. Her graduate degrees in Nutrition and Transpersonal Psychology along with her training/certification in Feng Shui blend to create a holistic perspective and approach to her work. Jan’s focus is on the pursuit of personal transformation, joy, wellness and success for herself and her clients.
