Katie, Gwen, Kathleen, Wade & Mandy

Kathleen Kastner Mortenson
www.kathleenkastner.com

Kathleen opened Maya Yoga in 2002 and has been teaching yoga in Kansas City since 1996. ” Yoga will lift your consciousness, improve your health, transform your body and most importantly deepen your connection to your Self, to God and to all beings. It’s a powerful transformative practice to those who are open and willing to change and grow in their lives. Owning Maya Yoga has been such a gift, because I have been touched by so many amazing people from all over the country who share my love and passion for yoga. I love teaching yoga and watching people transform on the mat and in their lives. Yoga gives them a real sense of internal strength and courage that flows into every area of their lives. I want to thank all of my teachers and students for sharing their love and wisdom with me, bless you all.”

Kathleen is originally from Salina, KS and has a Master’s degree in Exercise Physiology and a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism, from the University of Kansas. After college, Kathleen worked in San Diego for Dr. Deepak Chopra as his Personal Trainer and at the Pritikin Longevity Center in Santa Monica as an Exercise Physiologist. Kathleen was one of the original co-owners of the Yoga Gallery and also taught at Maha Yoga in Los Angeles, CA, where she met her husband, Wade in a Mysore class!  She completed Tim Miller’s ashtanga teacher training in 2000 and Max Strom’s vinyasa teacher training in 1999. Her other yoga teachers include: Trish O’Reilly, Bhavani Maki, David Williams and Jorgen Christiansson.

Kathleen’s first DVD, “Teen Yoga,” is a level 2 vinyasa class for all ages and is available on the Store page. Kathleen and Wade have a beginner’s yoga application for the iPhone & iPod Touch:www.pretayoga.com.

Kathleen is also vegan and a passionate animal advocate.  May all beings be happy and free of suffering: “Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu.”

Wade Mortenson

Wade Mortenson

Wade co-owns Maya Yoga and enjoys teaching Ashtanga and Vinyasa yoga classes to lift energy and create a challenging class that helps prepare people to reach new heights in areas of their lives that they did not know were possible. He is a compassionate and inspiring teacher who enjoys introducing beginner and experienced practitioners to yoga and encouraging them to evolve in their practice.

Wade discovered Yoga while living in Henderson Nevada and almost immediately began integrating Yoga into every aspect of his life. Knowing that he wanted to share the gift of Yoga with as many people as possible, Wade has completed teacher trainings with Maggie Verderame of Las Vegas Nv. And Tim Miller of Encinitas, Ca. “Yoga has changed my diet, my body , and my overall health and sense of well being. Most importantly it has deepened my connection to God. I encourage anyone who has yet to try Yoga to come with an open mind, an open heart and prepare to be amazed.”

Wade was a police officer in Anaheim, CA for ten years prior to making a drastic shift in the direction of his life. Wade has taught Yoga at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, the Freeman Yoga center in Fullerton Ca. And Maha Yoga in Santa Monica Ca. Wade is also an avid Reiki practitioner and enjoys working with the subtle energies of the body through modalities such as Yoga and Reiki. Wade Enjoys cooking vegan meals for his family as he feels diet is the foundation for health and wellness. He practices and teaches daily with his wife Kathleen at Maya Yoga in Kansas City MO.

Wade is the proud father of Kaden and Kaiah. And kitty cat dad to Julian, Oliver and Natasha.

Drew Corrigan
www.drewcorrigan.com

Drew was inspired to begin studying yoga in May 2004 after reading Kathleen Kastner’s moving articles on the Maya Yoga website. As a licensed massage therapist and connective tissue bodyworker since 1997, Drew is fond of saying, “the issues are in the tissues”. That means our unresolved emotional issues from the past, our habitual behavior patterns, and our ways of seeing ourselves, are mirrored in structure and function of our bodies.

For Drew, yoga is a compassionate path of healing, bringing inner peace, serenity, balance, a sense of freedom, and a reconnection to our Divine Purpose and Calling. A Yoga Alliance registered teacher, his classes reflect the teacher training programs he has undertaken with Rolf Gates (Vinyasa), Sadie Nardini (Core Strength Vinyasa), Jill Miller (Yoga Tune Up), Bhavani Maki (Ashtanga) plus many other wonderful teachers, local and out of state.

Besides practicing yoga and bodywork, his other passions include energy healing, teaching massage, preparing live-food cuisine, reading, spiritual cinema, listening to music, and most of all, MAKING A DIFFERENCE!

Mandy Dolan

Mandy Dolan

Mandy Dolan began exploring her passion for yoga with Kathleen Kastner Mortenson in  2004. Her continuing education includes workshops and intensives with Bhavani Maki, Kim Schwartz, Bryan Kest, Govindas, Mark Blanchard, Doug Swenson and Saul David Raye. Most recently she completed an Ashtanga Second Series Intensive with Tim Miller at Mt Shasta. The balance and harmony it has brought her led to her desire to share the gift through teaching. Mandy views yoga as a spiritual, philosophical, and energetic journey that inspires greater understanding of and connection to the true Self within.

Shannon Connell

Katie Van Oermen

I found yoga nearly 14 years ago while living in Tucson, AZ. At my first class the teacher asked me if I had ever done yoga before and I told her no. Her response was, “well, you have yoga in your body”; yoga has since become one of the great loves in my life. I have taught on and off for 12 years and served as co-editor for the Arizona Yoga Associations Newsletter, before moving back to Kansas City.

Ashtanga has been my primary hatha practice but I have studied Iyengar, Bikrim, Anusara and what a lot of people refer to as flow yoga. While living in the southwest I was blessed with the opportunity to meet and practice under a number of truly gifted teachers. David Swenson and Maty Ezraty are two of my favorite Ashtanga teachers. I have also attended several of John Friend’s workshops and find his understanding of the human body and flow of energy to be brilliant. I have the deepest respect and love for Bill Counter and Darren Rhodes who were my first teachers. They made class about lightness and connection and taught me that the practice is never about how it looks on the mat.

Married now with a 4-year-old son my primary practice these days is the yoga of mommyhood. I also am a spiritual counselor. I help my clients connect and communicate with their own spirits, loved ones who have passed and angel guides. My classes will be based on the Ashtanga Series with lots of variations. I hope they will be interesting and challenging on the physical level while giving each student the opportunity to discover the yogi within!”

Gwen Hull

Gwen Hull

Yoga is my passion, and I want to share the wisdom of this ancient healing practice with everyone I meet.Yoga is about immersing yourself in your life, and becoming completely present in each moment-Living in the Now. I hope to encourage my classes to practice yoga with a deep awareness of the breath and a receptive body, not a striving mind. A daily yoga practice helps us be the best we can for the world- allowing ourselves to be open vessels for God’s spirit to move through radiating love and compassion.

My formal education was a B.S. in Health and Physical Education K-12 from the University of Missouri 1991, and a M.S. in Exercise Physiology & Biomechanics from the University of Kansas 1998. I was a Health/ Wellness teacher at Winnetonka High School and coached tennis & track my first few years out of college. I have taught fitness classes since 1986 and yoga for the last ten years to a wide variety of people-kids, seniors, pre-natal, rheumatoid arthritis and chronic pain sufferers, teenage rehab for drug addiction and obese people.

I studied formally with Genvieve Crosslin (Ashtanga/vinyasa style) and Mic and Stephanie Goodman of satsang yoga (sivananda style).I taught the anatomy and pre-natal portions of their teacher training the last two sessions.

Over the last ten years I’ve taught over 1,200 classes and, I have attended workshops by Doug Swenson, David Williams, Bhavani Maki, Max Strohm, Kim Schwartz, Mark Blanchard, Brian Kest, Saul Raye, Tim Miller, Anna Forrest, Joseph Le Page, Jeffery Cohen, and many others.

I have a commited self-practice outside of my teaching, and I practice weekly with the many wonderful teachers we have in Kansas City. I’ve practiced with Kathleen, one of my favorites, since 2002. Someday, when the kids are a little older, I would love to do a teaching intensive at White Lotus Foundation in California.

I have been married to a wonderful, loving man, Alan Hull, for seventeen years and we have four children; Tanner 14, Amanda 12, Natalie 8, and William 5. Yoga has been my saving grace during pregnancy and parenting. I bring all of this experience to my teaching, and before I begin a class, I open my heart to God’s love and ask that my teaching may be what each person in the class needs at that moment. I look forward to practicing yoga with all who read this.

Peace and many blessings.