Baltic | Nature Prescription: Interactive Session on Nature-Based Approach to Health
The Yale School of Nursing Offices of Planetary Health & Global Engagement and Student Affairs, in partnership with Yale West Campus and the Yale Baltic Studies Program, invite you to join us for Nature Prescription: An Interactive Session on Nature-Based Approaches to Health on Monday, September 21, from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m.
The event features Kristijonas Zickus, MD, Head of Ugdančių patirčių namai in Lithuania, and and Knellee Bisram, Founder and CEO of AHAM Education.
During the event:
Experience a guided walk and mindfulness practice in a natural setting
Explore how nature-based approaches can support mental health, wellbeing, and resilience
Engage in reflective observation and group discussion
Learn practical strategies for reducing stress and cultivating mindfulness in everyday life
Hear from experts in nature-based mental health and meditation
Discover connections between personal wellbeing and planetary health
Registration is required to attend: https://yalesurvey.ca1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_88s9v0TkadLbjAG
Speakers
Knellee is a highly respected global Mindfulness and Meditation facilitator. In her formative years, she was initiated into a lineage of nondual and presence-based teachings, which influenced a lifetime of personal practice. Her learning and teaching of eco-awareness and cosmovision is inspired by her ancestral Indian indigenous land practices, years of study with Thich Nhat Hanh’s Zen and the Art of Saving the Planet sangha, and facilitating Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, Conscious Parenting, Mind Body Medicine and other awareness-based courses and retreats to diaspora, faith-based and indigenous communities for over 19 years. Knellee was a founding community partner of the Broward County Public Schools Mindfulness Program, co-created b.Nature and mindfulness-based SEL curricula for teens and adults, produced the documentary short Healing People Heal the Planet, is co-editor of the Challenges Journal Special Issue on Planetary Health, and co-chairs the US Climate Action Network Action Team on Regenerative Economies and Accountability. Her focus is embedding deep presence and compassion to transform leadership, institutions and systems in the spheres of mental health, education, peacebuilding, gender equality and climate justice. Drawing from her career in international relations, Knellee serves as a consultant and curator of inner development in multilateral international negotiations, policy making and community-led action.
Kristijonas Žičkus is a psychologist, psychodynamic group psychotherapist, and graduate of Vilnius University, where he obtained a Master’s degree in Psychology and Criminology. He is the director of Ugdanciu patirciu namai, a Lithuanian NGO developing therapeutic farms and innovative relationship-based mental health services. For more than 15 years, he has worked with vulnerable children, adolescents, and young adults from adverse backgrounds in educational, social care, and mental health settings. His professional interests include relationship-based care, psychodynamic approaches, therapeutic communities, trauma-informed practice, and recovery-oriented mental health services.