Like WD-40 for Life
Skillful Meanz promotes real world, real time tools for supporting physical and mental health in a stressful world.
The results you can expect might include more energy, better sleep, yelling at your kids less, hating your job less, more clarity and purpose and calm, less running around like a chicken with your head cut off. Doesn’t that sound good?
Meditation and mindfulness are the primary tools we cultivate to get results. There is nothing fancy, complicated, or difficult in anything we do. In all of its services, Skillful Meanz uses the mind-body connection to positively effect our experiences of life.
About the name Skillful Meanz: The correct spelling of this term is “skillful means” and it comes from a direction on how to teach meditation. Basically, the term says that every student needs what they need to get better and decrease discomfort- one size does not fit all.
Skillfulmeanz is about cultivating the specific tools we as individuals need to effectively meet life’s demands in ways that bring ease and well-being for ourselves and for those around us.
KRISTIN VAUGHN
“These practices are life altering, from the inside out. Over time, you will get way more out of them than you expect or maybe even dream is possible.”
In 2002 Kristin bought a book about Buddhism for reasons she cannot recall. As a result, she started meditating with no knowledge and no experience and an unwillingness to ask for help. Nevertheless, she has been sitting ever since and in 2014 earned a teaching certification through the Mindfulness Institute in the UK. In addition to group classes and private clients, she teaches in the Massachusetts and Connecticut prison systems to men and women through the Prison Mindfulness Institute and through Recovery Yoga.
Kristin started yoga a bazillion years ago and went to like two classes a year until she found Baptiste Yoga. Having played Hooker for the Radcliffe Rugby team, and having been a member of the Harvard Boxing Club, Baptiste Yoga was right up her alley; “I clearly needed to get my ass kicked before I would listen, and Baptiste Yoga did that for me,” she has been known to say. That being said, her classes fit the needs of all the students in the room and are accessible to all. She is a certified 1500 hr Baptiste Yoga Influencer and a 500RYT with Yoga Alliance; she has taught all over New England and in California.
Kristin is a qualified MBSR teacher, having trained at the University of Massachusetts Medical School Center for Mindfulness. She is currently in professional training with the Somatic Experiencing Trauma Institute. She is also a Reiki II practitioner.
When not attending to her day job as an architect and entrepreneur, Kristin spends an inordinate amount of time deepening her practice on a variety of fronts. In addition to teaching yoga and meditation, she is an avid Bhakti Yoga practitioner and is constantly leaving town to chant with Krishna Das wherever he is.
ABOUT OUR SERVICES
INTRO TO MINDFULNESS
All Introduction to Mindfulness classes are based on the S.I.T. Mindfulness (Six week Introductory Training in Mindfulness) curriculum from The Mindfulness Institute. Each class will have some sitting meditation, some discussion and introduction of specific topics, and some exercises in mindfulness.
The topics covered include the historical roots of mindfulness, working with breath and body, how to work with thoughts and emotions, some common difficulties and how to work with them, and how to bring the practice home into regular life at the end of the session. After this series of classes you will have all the tools you need to start and maintain a practice of mindfulness which will increase your ability to focus, increase your capacity to respond to challenges, and enable you to more fully enjoy your day to day life.
MBSR
Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) is a structured 8 week program. Developed in 1979 by Jon Kabat-Zinn at the Medical School of the University of Massachusetts, MBSR is highly respected in the medical community and is widely taught throughout the US and internationally. It does not replace traditional medical or psychological treatment, but is offered as a complement and has been shown to help with many conditions, such as: anxiety, high blood pressure, stress due to finances or work or family issues, headaches, chronic illness, chronic pain, sleep problems, and others.
Classes include meditation, discussion, introduction of mindfulness concepts and their effects on the body, and mindfulness exercises.
There is a required orientation meeting, eight class sessions, one silent retreat day, and assignments between the class sessions. It is a rigorous program and requires commitment. However, it is the gold standard of modern mindfulness training and well worth the effort.
Dates TBD
SOMATIC EXPERIENCING
Somatic Experiencing (SE) is a potent psychobiological method for resolving trauma symptoms and relieving chronic stress. It is the life’s work of Dr Peter Levine resulting from his multidisciplinary study of stress physiology, psychology, ethology, biology, neuroscience, indigenous healing practices, and medical biophysics, together with over 45 years of successful clinical application. The SE approach releases traumatic shock, which is key to transforming all kinds of trauma, including accidents and medical procedures, among others.
SE offers a framework to assess where a person is “stuck” in the fight, flight, freeze, or collapse responses and provides clinical tools to resolve these fixated physiological states.
One on one sessions, by appointment.
Email KRISTIN@SKILLFULMEANZ.COM for information.
YOGA
First and foremost, Kristin is a Tier 3, 1500 hour Certified Baptiste Influencer, and her teacher is Baron Baptiste. A short description from the Baptiste Institute’s website states the following:
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The Baptiste Institute exists to make a difference and empower people to realize and manifest what is of interest and of most importance to them.
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Baptiste Institute is an organization changing lives by bringing yoga to the world as a leadership skill.
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We inspire people to fulfill their purpose of making a difference for themselves and others. Our tools and practices enable people to develop themselves and others as leaders in their own lives.
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We are committed to causing leaders who cause leaders first with themselves and then with others.
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Through the practices of asana (poses), meditation, and inquiry, transformation occurs that is the delight of a consistent yoga practice. Come along for the ride– you’ll love it.
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Additionally, Kristin is certified through Yoga Alliance, E-RYT200/RYT500
Kristin teaches at the amazing and brand new Baptiste Affiliate studio in Groton!! See
WWW.BAPTISTEPOWERYOGAGROTON.COM for details!
For individual sessions, email me! KRISTIN@SKILLFULMEANZ.COM
