Facilitators

Kerry Brady, MA, SEP, mentors others in awakening to their essential nature and to following its natural movement and inherent wisdom. She has over 20 years of experience in transformational modalities including psychotherapy, Somatic Experiencing, Jin Shin Jyutsu, bodywork, authentic movement, nature based practices and vision quests. Her deepest informant, however, is the wisdom gleaned through the unfolding of her own spiritual path. Through gentle yet fierce attunement, she facilitates others in shedding limiting stories, identities, and patterns and opening to what naturally wants to bloom.

Kerry has served as faculty at Animas Valley Institute and the California Institute of Integral Studies where she and Brian Swimme co-teach Nature and Eros – an exploration into what it is to live in participatory engagement within a living universe and in more authentic alignment with the cultural and ecological shift of our time. Her nature based retreats invite a more intimate engagement with all of life, seamlessly weaving the personal, ecological and cosmological aspects of our being into one fluid whole. Her long-standing love affair with the Earth and other cultures has led her to year-long travels in Africa, India and Nepal and, most recently, to obtaining a certificate in permaculture design

Brian Swimme received his Ph.D. (1978) from the Department of Mathematics at the University of Oregon for work in gravitational dynamics. In his books and courses he explores a meaningful interpretation of the human within an evolutionary universe. He was a faculty member in the Department of Mathematics and Physics at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington from 1978-1981 and at Holy Names University in Oakland, California from 1983-1990. He is a graduate faculty at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco.

His publications include The Universe Is a Green Dragon (1984), The Universe Story (1992), a collaboration with cultural historian Thomas Berry, and The Hidden Heart of the Cosmos (1996). Brian produced a twelve-part video series, Canticle to the Cosmos (1990), participated in the BBC television series, Soul of the Universe, the PBS series, The Sacred Balance, and produced the DVD series The Powers of the Universe (2005). Dr. Swimme lectures worldwide and has presented at conferences sponsored by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, The World Bank, UNESCO, The United Nations Millennium Peace Summit and the American Natural History Museum. A new film, Journey of the Universe (co-written with Mary Evelyn Tucker) will be released in 2011. www.brianswimme.org

James Stark, M.A., F.E.S., is the co-director of the Regenerative Design Institute (RDI). He co-founded and co-directs the Ecology of Leadership program which creates powerful circles of change-makers by rooting itself in deep nature connection, inner transformation, and leadership skill development in order to revolutionize one’s life and service in the world. James is also a senior trainer in the 3-year, full-time Regenerative Design and Nature Awareness training program, preparing young global community leaders for the “Great Turning” of our era. James has committed his life to exploring how we – our communities, and our entire species – might move into harmony with our selves and the natural world. He considers the programs at RDI a nursery for growing visions of the new era, and provides skills and tools to bring those visions to life. After earning a master’s degree in Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica James turned his attention towards helping people explore and tend their inner garden. Like the natural systems and patterns that guide permaculture, his focus is to help others compost their constraints while creating healthy soil for their world visions to grow. www.regenerativedesign.org

Cathryn Couch, MBA, is a professional chef, evolutionary astrologer andactivist who is passionate about changing our relationship with foodas a vehicle for discovering a deeper relationship both with one's Self and with the larger universe. She has worked in the corporate and not-for-profit worlds, including four years as Director of Communications for The Hunger Project-U.S., an educational organization focused on changing our understanding of the causes of and solutions to hunger in the world.

In 2006, Cathryn founded The Ceres Community Project, a nonprofit working to restore food to its place as the foundation of health for people, communities and the planet. Ceres teaches teens about cooking and eating for health by engaging them as volunteer chefs in a program that provides beautiful and nourishing meals to families dealing with cancer and other serious illnesses . www.ceresproject.org