Movement is love—this has been true for Kat since she was a toddler riding in a stroller on her dad’s long runs, joyful to be included in the daily ritual. The internal stillness that occurs when the body is moving became a daily need and rhythm of life. Movement is often the answer when the mind can’t find the answers it is craving with words. Kat found many forms of movement throughout her upbringing, but soccer and cross country running were integral. Yoga was introduced in 2013 but became a serious practice a little later after an eating disorder and a hip fracture in college. The shift from competitive sports to a practice born of pure openness and acceptance was not initially graceful but very needed. Yoga started to soften her edges and grow a new sense of self outside of a lifelong perfectionist lens. Yoga helped her return home to herself and still does every time she steps on her mat.

The desire to expand into teaching yoga was around for years but became a reality in 2020. She enrolled in a local 200-hour teacher training right at the cusp of the pandemic. The pandemic experience was a traumatic and terrifying one, as Kat is a registered nurse and continued to work on one of the first covid units at her hospital. Teacher training and daily yoga became the distractions from a grim reality. After her teacher training, she began teaching outdoor classes out of West Glow Farm and later opened Alma. Alma has grown into a beautiful and warm community that she never could have dreamed up herself. Alma has become a sanctuary for her and hopefully everyone who walks through the doors.  

Kat’s teaching style leans powerful and grounding with a focus on honoring oneself and listening to the inherent inner knowing all humans have if they allow it to be heard. Yoga is a practice of meeting oneself again and again with radical acceptance. Kat may love a mindful class, but she also loves a spicy hot class (like 103-105 degrees). Kat’s belief system is a mix of magic and peer-reviewed research, which she thinks are basically the same thing anyway, there just might not be research to prove all magic (yet). Outside of practicing yoga, Kat maintains a regular weightlifting routine (yay muscle and dense bones), loves to take walks with her two big boy dogs, Frank (aussiedoodle) and Ash (great pyrenees mix), and works as an RN at VUMC and Ascension Saint Thomas.