Jamie Bristow is Co-director of The Mindfulness Initiative, a policy institute about mindfulness and compassion training that grew out of a program of mindfulness teaching for politicians in the British Parliament. After supporting UK politicians to establish the UK Mindfulness All-Party Parliamentary Group and conduct a policy inquiry throughout 2014, Jamie took over as Director in 2015 to launch the seminal Mindful Nation UK report. He has since grown the Mindfulness Initiative into an influential policy institute, authoring and producing a series of publications and working with decision-makers around the world to integrate inner capacities and contemplative practice into politics and the public policy landscape. Jamie was formerly Business Development Director for Headspace and has a background in psychology, climate change campaign communications and advertising. He is also a teacher of Insight Meditation, a Buddhist tradition that’s associated with Gaia House, IMS and Spirit Rock retreat centers. Jaime has been featured on the Mind & Life podcast.
Konda Mason is a social entrepreneur, eco-spiritual thought leader, mindfulness teacher and justice advocate working at the intersection of social and financial justice and planetary healing. Konda was introduced to Tibetan Buddhism in 1982. Her love for Vipassana began in 1996, working with Jack Kornfield at the Vallecitos Retreat Center. She has taught at Spirit Rock since 1997, starting as a yoga teacher. Konda’s dharma training includes the East Bay Meditation Center Commit to Dharma program, Spirit Rock Community Dharma Leader and she is a recent graduate of the 2020 Spirit Rock Teacher Training program. Konda teaches daylongs, retreats and workshops.
In addition to her spiritual pursuits, Konda is a social entrepreneur, the Founder/President of two nonprofits working at the intersection of social, financial and climate justice. Her work centers conversations at the Intersection of Land, Race, Money and Spirit. She is passionate about reversing the harm the extractive financial system has had on all living systems, and the harm of racism in America. Her work with RUNWAY and the founding of Jubilee Justice, Inc. and Potlikker Capital encapsulates the restorative work she does with Black urban entrepreneurs and Black rural farmers, respectively. She is driven by her desire to witness a world that is environmentally regenerative, spiritually fulfilling, socially just and economically equitable. You can subscribe to her podcast “The Brown Rice Hour” on the Be Here Now Network.
In 2019 Konda was nominated as one of the Top 35 World-Changing Women in Conscious Business, a list of courageous female-identifying game-changers paving the way for positive global impact. In the same year, Konda was selected to give the commencement address for Presidio Business School in San Francisco and was awarded an Honorary MBA.
Konda sits on the Boards of Directors of On Being with Krista Tippett, Lion’s Roar Publications, Paul Hawken’s One Generation, the Historic Clayborn Temple in Memphis, TN and is a Trustee at Mills College in Oakland, CA.
Katharine Hayhoe is an accomplished atmospheric scientist who studies climate change and why it matters to us here and now. She is also a remarkable communicator who has received the American Geophysical Union’s climate communication prize, the Stephen Schneider Climate Communication award, the United Nations Champion of the Earth award, and been named to a number of lists including Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People, Foreign Policy’s 100 Leading Thinkers, and FORTUNE magazine’sWorld’s Greatest Leaders. Katharine is currently the Political Science Endowed Professor in Public Policy and Public Law and co-directs the Climate Center at Texas Tech University. She has a B.Sc. in Physics from the University of Toronto and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Atmospheric Science from the University of Illinois and has been awarded honorary doctorates from Colgate University and Victoria University at the University of Toronto.
Kyle Whyte is George Willis Pack Professor of Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan. Previously, Kyle was Professor of Philosophy and Community Sustainability and Timnick Chair at Michigan State University. Kyle’s research addresses moral and political issues concerning climate policy and Indigenous peoples, the ethics of cooperative relationships between Indigenous peoples and science organizations, and problems of Indigenous justice in public and academic discussions of food sovereignty, environmental justice, and the anthropocene. He is an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation.
Kyle has partnered with numerous Tribes, First Nations and inter-Indigenous organizations in the Great Lakes region and beyond on climate change planning, education and policy. He is involved in projects and organizations that advance Indigenous research methodologies, including the Climate and Traditional Knowledges Workgroup, Sustainable Development Institute of the College of Menominee Nation, the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians’ Climate Change Program, and Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga. He has served as an author on reports by the U.S. Global Change Research Program and is former member of the U.S. Federal Advisory Committee on Climate Change and Natural Resource Science and the Michigan Environmental Justice Work Group.
Kyle’s work has received the Bunyan Bryant Award for Academic Excellence from Detroiters Working for Environmental Justice, Michigan State Universitie’s Distinguished Partnership and Engaged Scholarship awards, and grants from the National Science Foundation.
kelley nicole palmer is a black, queer creative and community advocate based in Charlotte NC. kelley uses the practices and philosophy of yoga to guide her work in creating equitable and sustainable access to wellness for BIPOC. Along with teaching movement, meditation and contemplative practices, kelley leads retreats, hosts workshops and contributes to multiple teacher training programs. Kelley is a writer and collage artist focusing that work on black liberation, wholeness and healing. kelley serves as a founding member of The Sanctuary In The City, a Charlotte based non-profit that focuses on equitable healing spaces for BIPOC all over the world. kelley also serves as communications manager for Accessible Yoga and as a trainer for Accessible Yoga Training School.
Reggie began his yoga journey in November 2014 seeking to alchemize and navigate extreme professional adversity. Through disciplined practice, ruthless focus and surrender to inner peace he has adopted the yogic path, now as a 500 hour certified yoga teacher who has extensively studied with leading teachers such as Faith Hunter, Amy Ippoliti, Yogarupa Rod Stryker and Sri Dharma Mittra and countless other amazing teachers he has encountered along the way.
Reggie teaches Members of Congress, Congressional Staff, leading progressive organizations and individuals, sharing techniques for growing peace and ease as a foundation, not an afterthought. He also advises yoga communities, yoga studios, teachers and the broader wellness industry on the importance of diversity and inclusion, opening the practice to all and eliminating exclusionary cultures and habits.
His teaching practice is designed for all levels and lifestyles, the only thing required is an open mind. The focus of his teaching is to bring more peace and balance to activists AND to guide the wellness community toward being more engaged, concerned citizens. Achieving this balance is how we catalyze transformative change.
In addition to his yogic activities, Reggie has held many senior strategic and logistical roles across a variety of fields, ranging from global marketing, digital and community organizing, government relations, international education to Presidential campaigning. He currently serves as a senior political strategist for a leading progressive campaigning organization Move On, managing their relationships, impact and communications with Capitol Hill. He received a BA in philosophy from Yale University and an MBA in international strategy from the Vlerick Business School in Belgium.
Lyla June is an Indigenous musician, scholar and community organizer of Diné (Navajo), Tsétsêhéstâhese (Cheyenne) and European lineages. Her dynamic, multi-genre presentation style has engaged audiences across the globe towards personal, collective and ecological healing. She blends studies in Human Ecology at Stanford, graduate work in Indigenous Pedagogy, and the traditional worldview she grew up with to inform her music, perspectives and solutions. She is currently pursuing her doctoral degree, focusing on Indigenous food systems revitalization.
Oladosu Adenike Titilope is an eco-feminist and a climate justice activist; an advocate for the restoration of Lake Chad for sustainable development and regional stability. In 2019, she became the recipient awardee of Ambassador of Conscience in Nigeria from Amnesty International. She has showcased her climate action at World Economic Forum events, UN Climate change conference (COP), and others. Same here she was invited for the first UN Youth Climate Summit in New York.
Daniel Grupe, Ph.D., is an Associate Scientist at the Center for Healthy Minds at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research utilizes a community-engaged, mixed methods approach to investigate the benefits of mindfulness and related contemplative practices for promoting resilient responses to stress and trauma, focusing specifically on individuals impacted by the criminal legal system. In partnership with community-based organizations and system-impacted individuals, he is working to develop, implement, and evaluate peer-facilitated and strength-based approaches to support mental health during the transition from prison back into the community. His research also investigates the benefits of mindfulness training for police officer stress and mental health, and the role of contemplative practices for meaningful reform efforts that bring about greater well-being for police officers and the broader community.
