Dr. Rachel Golden (RYT 200) has been a dedicated student of yoga since 2019, including practicing in Ashtanga, Hatha, Power, Sivananda, and Vinyasa styles. In summer 2022, she completed her teaching certification at the Sivananda Yoga Ranch in the Catskill mountains. Rachel has also completed Breathwork Teacher Training Certification through Loka Yoga School, an accredited program with the Yoga Alliance. She values yoga’s unique ability to enrich physical, emotional, and intellectual aspects of life in interconnected ways, and found these benefits especially meaningful in navigating challenges brought by the pandemic. She is also an enthusiastic writer, educator, musician, reader, dog lover, and student of the Sanskrit language and classical yogic texts.

Abhaya Darpana (Rev. Dustin Davis) has worked over 25 years in the hospital critical care setting. He brings his intimacy with the illness, death, and dying processes to bear in Dharma sharing. He is also passionate about Dharma as a central support for dealing with addictions of all kinds.​Abhaya's spiritual journey includes being raised Catholic and attending elementary parochial school with Nuns as teachers, then diving deeply into Full Gospel Protestant teachings, and later involvement with Unitarian Universalism. He committed to the path of Dharma in 2010 subsequently spending several months of cumulative time in silent meditation retreats and thousands of hours in personal practice and study. Abhaya is ordained as a Dharmacharya (Buddhist Lay Minister) in the Embracing Simplicity Contemplative Order under Venerable Pannavati and the late Venerable Pannadipa and he is an affiliated teacher at Heartwood Refuge and Retreat Center. His primary practices of Samadhi, Satipaṭṭhāna (4 Establishings of Mindfulness) in the style offered by Bhikkhu Anālayo, Ānāpānasati (Breath Based Mindfulness), and the Brahma Vihāras (Heavenly Abidings) spring from an affinity for the approaches offered in Early Buddhism. He also has an appreciation for the later traditions, having undertaken Vajrayāna and Zen retreats including formally receiving the 5 Mindfulness Trainings from Thích Nhất Hạnh in 2013. He has two lovely grown daughters, and an amazing canine companion named Bodhi who has served as a therapy dog in hospitals, nursing homes & addiction treatment facilities through the University of Tennessee's Human Animal Bond in Tennessee (HABIT) program.​  Abhaya is also an affiliated teacher with Lotus Light Contemplative Community Center in Knoxville, TN and serves on their Board of Directors.

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Lynn Smith is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and psychotherapist specializing in trauma therapy and trauma sensitive mindfulness. [She is the founder and director of The Center for Mindfulness, LLC at Mind Body Knox. ] Lynn holds a Master’s Degree in Clinical Social Work from the University of Tennessee. She is a faculty member of the EMDR Institute and a Level 1 Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction teacher. Lynn received teacher training from the Mindfulness Center at Brown University where she is currently pursuing teacher certification in MBSR. Additionally, Lynn has received training in Mindful Performance Enhancement Awareness and Knowledge (mPEAK) coaching from the University of California San Diego’s School of Medicine and is a Certified Mindfulness Coach. She has participated in advanced mindfulness and breathwork training from organizations including the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies, Insight Meditation Society, Breath-Body-Mind, Ser Integral and the Copper Beech Institute. Lynn is particularly interested in the intersection between mindfulness practices and trauma therapy, utilizing a trauma sensitive approach to best meet the needs of her students and clients.