We take pleasure in presenting to you our carefully selected team of trained professionals who will assist on this workshop. They have all been apprenticed to Ya’Acov and Susannah for many years and are all deeply skilled in their own right. Each of them brings their own unique medicine to this online workshop and their role is to help you to do exactly the same.
Grandmother to Gaia, mother, daughter, partner and dancer; in the past I’ve worked all over the world in the organic food and other conscious business organizations as a marketing and creative director; prior to that I was a fashion and beauty photographer based in London. Today I am delighted to be a Movement Medicine teacher-in-training and absolutely over the moon to be part of the 21 Gratitudes team supporting Ya’Acov. I am looking forward to dancing with you soon. Blessings for healing and shining in this New Year!
Kristin has been dancing with Ya’Acov & Susannah Darling Khan since 2001 and began intensive training with them in 2010. She is a fully qualified Movement Medicine teacher holding spaces to dance and pray for 7 years in Basel and elsewhere. She is a physiotherapist, mother and yoga teacher. Her understanding of the body supports her guidance in the dance. Her long training of the mind and heart in Buddhist meditation practice deepens her ability to hold space with compassion. Kristin works as a coach and mentor and holds rituals for individuals and groups. She produced her first album with guided Movement Medicine journeys in the German language in 2020.
Ben is wholeheartedly committed to showing up and playing his part in these pivotal times we are living in. He’s passionate about inspiring and facilitating deep connection to nature, and his work brings together breathwork and embodiment practices to support people in their journeys of reconnection. Working with the elements internally and externally is a central part of his work, reweaving our place in the web of life. His personal relationship with nature is a big part of what informs and supports his work. He lives in Devon (UK) near Dartmoor National Park, which is a place of wild beauty and ancient wisdom.
If my living room transformed into a rainforest, my shoes evaporated to reveal dancing feet, and avocados started falling from the sky, that would be a good day.
The natural world tells some of my favourite stories, and I am passionate about the magnificent secrets held in plants, crystals, mountains and forests. The ocean is my neighbour and the beach my daily therapy.
In the quiet moments I listen — to dreams, doubts, desires, both yours and mine. My heart lies in healing and my feet love the dance floor, in ceremony, using the innate intelligence of the body to manage life’s trials and tribulations. The music is playing…join me in the choreography.
I am a graduated Movement Medicine teacher who has been working with this body of work since 2009 and have trained to an advanced level. I am a Ceremonial leader deeply committed to the sacred landscapes of the wild unbroken spirit of life, and to the transformational healing power of dance to reclaim our power that may have been lost within the wounds of the past and turn that into medicine to reconnect to our wild self and true heart.
I'm an apprentice teacher of Movement Medicine, intending to graduate next May. I have been dancing all my life, and I began with ecstatic and trance dance in 2000. I love to DJ, dance, sing, play, swim in rivers and the sea, to walk and run barefoot, and to live as naturally as possible. I'm daring and devoted to bringing my dream into form, step by step, of creating a venue and oasis in the Spanish desert.
I am a poet, shamanic dancer, master of ceremonies, event organiser and an awestruck devotee of the magnificence of life on Planet Earth. I am a 'Son of the Sun' apprentice of XamAM Alba Maria (Terra Mirim, Bahia, Brazil). I am a first generation MOVEMENT MEDICINE Teacher and Yoga Teacher. I am a co-founder of Bridging Worlds, a platform for contemporary shamanism.
I hold space with integrity, passion and humour - grounded in 25 years of personal growth, shamanism, yoga, men's work, Movement Medicine, community facilitation and ceremonial leadership. My soul song comes through Visionary Poetry and Prose.
My name is Tamara, I’m from Italy and deeply inside I feel a citizen of the world. I'm a Movement Medicine Teacher and I've been teaching Movement Medicine for 4 years, mainly in Italy. I'm a passionate of life and of the human being, with a strong sense of social justice, which includes everyone and everything. And I love creating connections and bridges between different worlds and people.
I trust in human development, on a personal and on a collective level ,both as a process and as a creative life's project, done by small steps. Breathing, dancing and being together, creating a safe space for each other, to blossom and celebrate differences.
I've been working with a humanitarian organization since 2006, at the beginning in the field, in Ethiopia and Brazil (with another NGO) and Kenya, Sri Lanka, Mozabique and with migrants in Sicily.
My role is now Career Manager and I am based in Rome. This has widened my perspective and my ability to put into practice the values of diversity and inclusion.
I have worked in this field of dance and embodiment work, Movement Medicine teaching and Movement Psychotherapy and for many years: originally as a primary school and Special Needs teacher in London and since then in Newcastle as a freelance artist, therapist and teacher. I’ve also co parented 3 children.
This fulfilling, challenging work took a turn for the richer and the deeper when I started my apprenticeship with the School of Movement Medicine.
My Movement Medicine teaching includes work in nature, ceremony, SEER and ritual, open classes and workshops and work with children and families. I also weave Movement Medicine into my groups and 1:1 work with pregnant women and new mothers.
Eliza is a medicine singer and a facilitator of transformational voicework and embodiment practices. She supports those she works with to bring their full, free selves into relationship with the world, and walks with a fierce commitment to the powers of gentleness, truth, and the emergent intelligence of the field.
She is a trained voice coach, a qualified yoga teacher, and a teacher of the contemporary shamanic practice, Movement Medicine. She is carried forward by a dedication to the edge of what’s possible, and a real love for our humanity and for this dear earth.
My name, Silvana, means “of the Forest”. I am a Movement Medicine teacher, the Community Weaver of Conscious Dance Italy and the Community Dreamweaver of the School of Movement Medicine Study Hub. I also trained at the Red School. Since 2012 I have been facilitating groups in Italy and abroad on individual and collective change processes through body awareness, particularly on female leadership. Passionate about social innovation, my work is influenced by Manish Jain’s Unlearning pedagogy. I am a TEDx speaker and the co-founder of Ulab Hub Pordenone. I am Italian, a citizen of the world and nomad at heart.
I am 56 years old. Born on the Cape Verde Islands and raised in the Netherlands. I feel the richness of both cultures. I was trained in social work and have been working as a freelancer since 2018. I am also a coach and empowerment trainer. I've been dancing since I can walk but move freely since 1999, when I was introduced to the 5 rhythms. But really started to deepening since the start of Movement Medicine.
Mira Khanya is a UK based Movement Medicine teacher. Growing up in South Africa, she brings with her a deep connection to the aliveness of nature and the beat of the drum. From an early age creativity was central in Mira’s life. Today the rich tapestry of her experience as a dancer, therapist and artist is woven into her work. Her love of ceremony, the depth of meditation and shamanic practices, and the inspiration of her drama, physical theatre, butoh and coaching trainings - are all rooted in her offering. For her it's a great honour and joy to create spaces where we can unite in dance, gather resources, deepen connection and experience the power of embodied transformation - individually and collectively.
Building Bridges to the world our hearts long for
My story bridges Europe and Africa in an arc that travels from Copenhagen, where I studied international business, to Zimbabwe, where I co-founded the learning centre, Kufunda. Core to Kufunda’s work is enabling rural communities to become strong, empowered agents of their own destiny, using people’s own imagination, collaboration and resources, including biodynamic farming. My work in offering Movement Medicine, mindfulness, time in nature and creative process supports individuals in waking to who they are and what they can be within their communities - moving towards a more just and beautiful world.
Born in Munich and living in Munich, Bavaria. The first part of my professional life I worked in journalism: As an editor and writer for women’s magazines the area of my responsibility had been Beauty, Fitness, Health and emotional Wellbeing. After ten very busy years I got ill and the subject of Chinese Medicine caught me: I started to study Chinese Medicine (TCM) and became a health practitioner. Working with Qi Gong, Acupuncture and Herbal Medicine. Chinese Medicine is working on an energetic level. So many patients were suffering from low energy and stuck energy. It was very fulfilling when I could help my clients with health issues, but the longer I practiced, the more I could see: So many diseases are deeply connected with unresolved emotional problems and trauma. So I started longing to work WITH people not ON people. Instead of sticking needles into clients, I’d like to teach them a way to bring movement into their stuckness and problems - so they could learn to bring healing to themselves.
Then when I met Movement Medicine and Ya’Acov and Susannah Darling Khan in 2007, there was no doubt: I deeply wanted to study this and become a Movement Medicine Teacher myself. I apprenticed with them and – believe me – worked hard on a lot of my own unresolved emotional stuff. I started teaching 2014 and then 2016 got my approval as a “Fully Qualified Movement Medicine Teacher” by Susannah, Ya’Acov and the School of Movement Medicine.
In addition to my Apprenticeship with the Darling Kahns I trained also with Anna and Daria Halprin as a Tamalpa Graduate, did a Professional Training in Neuroplasticity with Rick Hanson and finished in 2019 a two-year education in Systemic Constellations in Germany. I am very much looking forward to assist Ya’Acov in “Encounter” as a support for you!
Kaya works as an integrative body-oriented psychotherapist and Movement Medicine teacher in Croatia and abroad. She is one of the four founders of Center Meleta, center for integrative body oriented psychotherapy and well-being. Kaya has been working individually and in groups with adults and adolescents for many years and has been practicing body-oriented psychotherapy for over a decade.As this type of therapy is based on the process work and presence of the soul in the body, training in Movement Medicine was another step of learning to support the embodiment of the soul. These two practices are continuously enriching both her and her offering and create a safe, rich and creative field for her students. She is continuously amazed with how the Spirit manifests through the wiring of our personalities. Kaya also teaches Movement Medicine regularly- monthly classes, weekend workshops and ceremonies.
