is the Founder and Executive Director of the Institute for Mindfulness-Based Approaches (IMA). She began teaching Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) in 1993 and has been training MBSR teachers since the founding of the IMA in 2001. She is certified to teach MBSR from the Center for Mindfulness (CFM), and holds a PhD in Performance Studies and a degree in education. Dr. Lehrhaupt began practicing Zen meditation in 1979 and has received full authorization as a Zen teacher in the White Plum Lineage of Taizan Maezumi Roshi. In 1976 she fell in love with Tai Chi and Chi Kung and went on to train with some of the leading representatives of the first generation of Asian teachers in the West. For over 20 years beginning in 1982 she directed innovative teacher-training programs in meditative movement. She is the Co-Author of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction: The MBSR Program for Promoting Health and Vitality (2017) and author of Tai Chi as a Path of Wisdom (2001). She is also the author of Riding the Waves of Life: Mindfulness and Inner Balance (in German, 2012). Dr. Lehrhaupt, who was born and grew up in New York City, has been living with her family in Germany since 1983.

holds a Master’s degree in Counseling and Adult Education from University of Toronto, Canada. He worked in mental health research at the Department of Psychiatry of the University of Toronto.  Amir has been in study and practices of mind-body integration in mental health and balanced living since year 2000.  He has undergone MBSR Teacher Training Certification at the Centre for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, and has been teaching MBSR to different groups including Mindfulness trainers, corporate staff and executives since 2005.  He is the co-founder/director of the Indian based Omega Wellbeing, founding director of the only hospital-based MBSR program in the Middle East region in Iran, and a senior certified mindfulness teacher at UMASS Medical School.

Amir holds workshops and retreats internationally for public and private organizations.

born 1962, is co-leader of the (Mindfulness Practice)'Achtsamkeitspraxis Berlin' since 2012. His interest in spiritual development and meditation was awakened in 1985. When he trained as a bookseller in the Rhineland, he made a fundamental decision to dedicate his life to practicing and deepening the Buddhist practice. During a stay of several years in the Triratna Sangha in Great Britain, he was able to intensify his practice and study of Buddhism. At that time, he worked in cooperatively run companies and certified as a yoga teacher in 1994. Since he became familiar with Jon Kabat-Zinn’s book ‘Full Catastrophy Living’ in 2005, he continued to practice and train as teacher within the context of MBSR. In 2008 he certified as MBSR teacher, in 2009 as MBCT teacher and also trained as MBCL teacher. He continues to widen his experience and offering in the direction of ‘mindfulness at work’, for example at the Potential Project. He feels fortunate to meet people in different ways and to support them on their way to more awareness, clarity and kindness.

is the owner of Bloom Studio in Oslo, Norway where she works as a yoga and Mindfulness teacher. She has been practicing yoga and meditation since she was a teen-ager and has trained as a teacher of MBSR with the IMA. She is also a certified Yogaworks, Ashtanga Vinyasa, Restorative, Yin and TRE teacher. Elise has been teaching yoga for 15 years and teacher trainings in Mindful Restorative Yoga for the last 3 years. She travels extensively teaching yoga and trainings with focus on interception, mindfulness and deep rest in Europe and beyond. 

René Slikker, M. Sc.,  is a psychologist and physical therapist. His specific interest is mind-body medicine and personal development. As a psychologist, he combines mental and physical wellbeing with return-to-work programs. He has worked in the United States, Great Britain and Germany as a physical therapist. When he learned about MBSR and Jon Kabat-Zinn, he was immediately inspired and still is. He was one of the first students to train in MBSR with Johan Tinge and his teaching staff at the Institute for Mindfulness in Holland in 2008. He has worked as a mindfulness teacher trainer at the post-doc program of the Hogeschool Utrecht. He has taught numerous MBSR courses and guided several retreats. He started practicing Zen Buddhism in 1998 and has integrated this into his work. At present, he works as a Buddhist psychologist in his own practice in Amsterdam. He and his wife have also founded and teach in a small Zen temple.

completed her study of the Science of Human Movement at the Free University of Amsterdam in 1989. She works as a psychomotor therapist in mental health care. She is also a teacher of MBSR, MBCT and Breathworks. She has a background in the martial arts (Aikido) and became a practitioner of Vipassana in 2001. She trained as an MBSR teacher at the Center for Mindfulness (CFM) in the U.S. in 2004 and 2005. Continuing her development as an MBCT teacher, she participated in the Advanced-Training for MBCT offered by the University of Bangor in 2008. She acted as senior teacher and assessor during a multi-clinic study on MBCT by Radboud University. Since 2006 she has been on the faculty of the Dutch Institute for Mindfulness as a trainer of MBSR and MBCT teachers. She completed her formal training as a supervisor at the British Centre for Supervision and Team Development in 2013. Her involvement in psychosomatics led her to train as a teacher of Breathworks. She serves as senior teacher and senior coordinator for IMA.

Trainer, coach and therapist for individuals and team support for companies. Doctorate in Technical Science from The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL). 20 years of experience in academic research, in business management.MBSR teacher trained by the Institute for Mindfulness-Based Approaches (IMA) MBCL instructor trained by the founders of Mindfulness-Based Compassionate Living (MBCL). Personal contemplative practice for many years. Co-founder of O'Centre Formation in Friborg, Switzerland. Training focused on presence and connection.

Kıvılcım has been interested in mindfulness and compassion since 2015 and has been an accredited mindfulness and compassion teacher since 2016.  Her favourite topics to work on, think about and share are toxic stress, burnout, anxiety, meaning, complex trauma, post-traumatic development and compassion. Kıvılcım, who completed her mindfulness teacher training at Oxford University (Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy) and Bangor University (Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction and Cognitive Therapy) in the UK and at IMA (Institute of Mindfulness Based Approaches), also received training on compassion-focused therapy from the Compassionate Mind Centre founded by Paul Gilbert and is a trainer of the Compassionate Mind Programme.  In the fields of trauma analysis, she uses Somatic Experiencing and EMDR schools. Kıvılcım has also received basic training in Psychodynamic therapy, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Gottman Couple Therapy. Kıvılcım, who has a bachelor's degree in Psychology and History and a master's degree in Clinical Psychology and Organisational Psychology, continues her Mindfulness and Compassion work on the Mindcare Academy platform, which she founded, and also offers adult and couples therapy.

After specialising in Psychology and Clinical and Cognitive Neurosciences, Selin Ilgaz rolled up her sleeves and set out to experience the practice of Mindfulness, which she had always been curious about and researched at the university. Her meditation adventure, which started with scientific research, was embodied with a 10-day silent Vipassana retreat in Nepal in 2014. Afterwards, she repeated the Vipassana retreat in Indonesia (2015) and Greece (2016). Meditation and Mindfulness quickly became part of her daily life, and she still regularly attends retreats and trainings. She first completed her Mindfulness MBSR Trainer Training in 2016 with Mindful Academy Solterreno in Spain and then with IMA (Institute for Mindfulness-based Approaches). In 2019, she completed a 200-hour yoga teacher training. She co-founded MindCare Academy – Mind-Body based approaches in 2021 that became the cooperating partner of IMA in Turkey. Her personal practice is inspired and influenced by bodily practices such as yoga and dance, somatic studies and analytical psychology.