By Kristin Kilburg, Director of Medical Mindfulness and Yoga in the Schools Instructor
Kristin Kilburg is the Director of Medical Mindfulness at Challenge to Change. She graduated from Mount Mary University in December of 2017 with her Masters of Science in Occupational Therapy. She passed her national certification exam in January of 2018 and began practicing occupational therapy at a pediatric and orthopedic outpatient clinic. As she settled into professional life, Kristin simultaneously discovered a love of yoga. Deciding to invest in herself, Kristin completed a 200-Hour yoga teacher training so that she could share her love of yoga with her local community. She also obtained her children’s yoga teacher certification and began implementing the practices of yoga and mindfulness with her young patients. During the pandemic and its aftermath, Kristin began to experience the painful effects of burnout in her job, and decided to pursue a career change. This led her to Challenge to Change, and we are so grateful to have her! In addition to creating and implementing our Medical Mindfulness program as our Director of Medical Mindfulness, Kristin is one of our Yoga and Mindfulness in the Schools teachers.
Our mission at Challenge to Change is to spread mindfulness to as many people in our community as possible in order to help empower people to live their best lives. To that end, we have been working hard to develop a Medical Mindfulness program to serve our professionals working in the medical field.
People in healthcare are essential workers, and the work they do is valuable beyond measure. Unfortunately, those who work in the medical field are more likely to burn out than any other profession in our country. This is a call for help, and while this problem will require many minds and hearts to solve, we believe Medical Mindfulness will be an important tool that healthcare workers can utilize to help minimize their stress.
In addition, we believe that yoga and mindfulness can be especially helpful to those recovering from any type of injury, trauma, or illness. Moreover, with the right modifications, yoga and mindfulness can be made accessible to anyone. The quest to share this vision is also a part of our Medical Mindfulness program.
The mission of the Challenge to Change Medical Mindfulness Department is to offer accessible yoga and mindfulness techniques that support the mind, body, and emotional wellbeing of all people, regardless of ability. We believe in empowering medical professionals, caregivers, and patients to know how to integrate inclusive yoga and mindfulness practices as an alternative approach to healing.
To implement this mission, we’ve begun by offering presentations to healthcare staff sharing how yoga and mindfulness are helpful in managing stress and preventing burnout. The presentations offer hands-on practice in simple yoga and mindfulness tools that can be utilized during a workday whenever stressful situations arise.
Attendees of these presentations also receive access to our C2C Hub, which in an online portal that provides a wide variety of fitness classes and mindfulness practices participants can attend at their convenience.
Within the C2C Hub, I'm excited to announce my 30-Days to Build Your Own Mindful Toolkit Challenge!
Hear Kristin talk about the Mindful Toolkit Challenge
What is a Mindful Toolkit?
A mindful toolkit is a personal inventory of practices that support you in feeling your best.
Each day of this challenge presents you with a new tool to practice and reflection questions to consider to reflect on how the tool felt supportive to your overall wellbeing.
You will practice:
meditation
breathwork
journaling
yoga
By the end of the month, you will have practiced 20 mindful tools that you may choose to add to your own toolkit!
This challenge also includes a downloadable journal to guide you through the process.
As we continue to grow our Medical Mindfulness Department, we will offer trainings to those in the healthcare field, informational sessions for patients and workers, community outreach and integrations, and so much more.
Future content will include:
instruction on injury-specific movement
yoga for cancer patients
prenatal and postnatal yoga
breathwork series
30-Day meditation challenge
We can’t wait for what is to come!
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Our online wellness platform, the C2C Hub, has a library of yoga and meditation videos to help you connect to peace and calm. Get a FREE 2-week trial: https://www.c2cchallengetochangeinc.com