December’s Meeting Topic: Equine-Assisted Learning, Therapy and Coaching

Finola Annibella
Equine-assisted learning, therapy and coaching is highly effective and fast-growing. Horses are used as our partners to help heal trauma of all kinds, improve leadership and teamwork and provide personal and professional growth. Join us in December to hear from a panel of 3 experts how this unique method of healing and coaching works, why it is so effective and why working with horses can be so powerful. 
 
Kerry Borcherding – Kerry Borcherding holds a Masters in Transpersonal Counseling Psychology and is a Certified Gestalt Equine Facilitated Psychotherapist and Somatic Experiencing Practitioner. Kerry is international coach and trainer, and in addition, is the program director and lead facilitator of Hope Held by a Horse, a non-profit organization that supports women with breast cancer to learn, grow, and heal in the company of horses. It was the first breast cancer program of it’s kind in the world. She has been featured on iHeartRadio, KOA, Bloomberg Radio, Five to Thrive, 9 News, and in the Daily Camera and Huffington Post. 
 
Kami Guildner – Kami Guildner helps entrepreneurs and executives around the world “Live Out Loud” in voice, visibility and meaning. She weaves soulful-inspiration into mindful business strategies, helping her clients succeed in life, business and worldly impact. With decades of leadership, marketing, strategic planning and business growth expertise, Kami guides her clients powerful through marketing, branding and business strategies that work. Kami is the Best Selling author of Firedancer: Your Spiral Journey to a Life of Passion and Purpose and Pony Pondering Inspiration Cards. Kami is the founder and host of Extraordinary Women Radio™ – a podcast featuring wildly successful women living out loud in voice, vitality and vigor. In addition, she founded Extraordinary Women Connect™ – a series of intimate events for wildly successful women connecting in meaning, purpose and shared support.
 
Sarah Bohnenkamp –  Sarah J. Bohnenkamp, is “A momma of two lil love muffins. Wife. Singer (and bad guitar player). Leadership Coach. Developer. Dreamer. Horse lover.” She led several corporate teams through massive organizational changes, she served as an Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer in the beef industry (an industry that she did NOT grow up in), and today she’s leading her own business where she coaches leaders and entrepreneurs who blaze epic trails. Sarah also spends time speaking and consulting with organizations like the Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef and the National Institute for Animal Agriculture, working on tough issues like sustainability and antibiotic resistance. Equine Guided Education has been integrated into her work for more than eight years and she loves it when she can combine her passions for horses and leadership development!

October Speaker: Jonathan Manske, How Our Brains Get in the Way of Success

Finola Annibella

Jonathan Manske is the world’s only Cerebral Sanitation Engineer. He has created unique and highly effective tools and strategies to help people “take out their head trash”.

About Jonathan:

I have been studying people, potential, and performance since the late 1980’s.

I am tremendously passionate about assisting people to let go of their limitations, remember their magnificence, and pursue their greatness!

To this end I have created many unique and powerful tools, techniques, and strategies that create positive and meaningful change in people’s lives.

The question I am asked so often is, “How did you get started with what you do?”

As a kid, I remember hearing people complain about their jobs. This never made any sense to me. I remember thinking, “If you do not like what you are doing then go do something else. Life is too short to waste.”

So even as a kid, I had curiosity about quality of life and how one goes about creating and living a great life.

In college I was a biology major and my plan was to go to medical school. I took the MCAT (medical college admissions test) and it was time to start applying to medical schools.

Then three things happened that caused me to hesitate.

A retired doctor friend urged me to not go to medical school. He felt that the field of medicine had become too restrictive and that there was no freedom to really practice medicine the way it should be practiced. His advice really shocked me.

My mom had a heart to heart talk with me. She told me that she did not think that I would be happy being a doctor. She did not believe that it was the right fit for me. Her advice made me wonder. (She’s a smart lady!)

Then I had a heart to heart with myself. I realized that I was experiencing an incongruency. I did not like going to the doctor and would only go if I was gravely injured. I also had some serious questions about the benefits of medicine. My father’s life was extended by ten plus years but the quality of that time was another matter altogether. Yet, I was still planning on becoming a doctor. That did not make much sense to me.

So, I decided to have an altruistic adventure and join the Peace Corps while I figured this out. This seemed like a far better option than going through the hassle of applying, spending $50,000 (or whatever a year of med school costs) and putting myself through the brutal first year of med school when I was not certain that was what I really wanted to do.

In the Peace Corps, I served in The Philippines as a freshwater fisheries specialist.

While in The Philippines, I was exposed to the philosophy of Eastern health and wellness and treating causes rather than symptoms. This made so much more sense to me than the Western medicine paradigm ever did. (The really funny thing about this is that I went to college at CU Boulder and Boulder has a huge alternative health community. But I turned a blind eye to that scene for 4 years and then traveled half way around the globe to discover what existed in my own back yard.)

Then I met and started studying with an energy-healing master. I really dove into that world. Through all the work I did, I first learned to feel energy and soon after developed the ability to see energy.

Even though I studied for a while with the energy-healing master, my greatest teacher was my own curiosity. I figured out many advanced techniques before they were taught to me. When I got into a situation that seemed to be over my head, I did not panic. I just got curious and a new angle, strategy, tool, or technique would appear. I learned so much from the people I worked with.

I have worked with thousands of people with everything from headaches to terminal cancer.

Ultimately I developed my own unique body of healing work.

September Speaker: Jeff Weist, Lobbyist

Carey Madsen

Jeff Weist is a professional lobbyist who has spent 20 years assisting his clients in all aspects of government relations, including strategic planning, lobbying, political fundraising, coalition building, grassroots and communications.

Jeff believes he has the best job in the world, turning his passion for crafting public policy into a lifetime profession helping his clients navigate the often byzantine maze of government.   

Jeff has been interested in public policy since high school. He continued those pursuits in college at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, where he majored in Political Science, and acted as Managing Editor of the Georgetown Guardian newspaper.

During his tenure in Washington, DC, Jeff served as Legislative Director for U.S. Representative Dan Schaefer (R-CO).  He advised the Congressman on economic, telecommunications, budget, utility, tax and banking issues and had the privilege of playing a leading role in the first major re-write of the nation’s telecommunications laws in 60 years, as well as crafting groundbreaking utility regulation and tax reform legislation.

After coming home to his native Colorado, Jeff was Director of State Government Affairs for AT&T Broadband, the nation’s largest cable television company, as well as its predecessor company, Tele-Communications, Inc. (TCI). In that role, he oversaw legislative affairs and coordinated lobbying efforts region and nationwide.

From AT&T, he graduated to contract lobbying in 2002, and is proud to have cultivated more than decade-long relationships with many of his clients. From major corporations, medium and small businesses, trade associations to nonprofits, Jeff understands the needs of business owners and membership driven organizations alike.

Despite his passion for his work, Jeff tries hard to lead a balanced life that centers on his two teenage boys. Together, they enjoy a wide range of very fun hobbies, including: fly-fishing, shooting, skiing and high-powered rocketry.  Jeff is a Boy Scout Assistant Scoutmaster, and former Cub Scout Cubmaster.  Jeff has also volunteered on numerous boards including the Denver Art Museum Asian Art Association and the Colorado Association of Commerce and Industry.

June Speaker – Bob Vanourek, Leadership Wisdom from the Masters

Leadership expert and award-winning author, Bob Vanourek is the former CEO of five companies, ranging from a start-up to a $1 billion company. Bob is the author of two award-winning books: Leadership Wisdom: Lessons from Poetry, Prose, and Curious Verse and the co-author of Triple Crown Leadership: Building Excellent, Ethical, and Enduring Organizations, called “the best leadership book since Jim Collins’ Good to Great.”

Bob is a former board member or chairman of eleven organizations, an adjunct university instructor on leadership, and a high honors graduate of both Harvard and Princeton universities.

Bob will read inspiring passages from some of the masters of literature with deep meanings for all of us. After each passage, brief interactive discussions will be held among DAB members about the lessons we can glean from these masters for practical applications in our busy lives. Be ready to dive deep, think hard, and be inspired by the masters.

May Speaker – Andrew Wien, The Dynamic Leadership Center

INTRO TO MINDFULNESS
Modern science has shown that the brain is malleable. What we think, do, and pay attention to changes the structure and function of our brains. Mindfulness is a way to change the wiring of our brains for the better. With training, you can improve focus and productivity, strengthen communication and relationships, better manage difficult experiences, and increase resilience. Come learn what mindfulness is and how it can help you do just that!

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN
What mindfulness is and the latest neuroscience supporting it  How your brain typically performs at work, and whether or not that is effective  Quick, simple exercises to start incorporating mindfulness into your routines

ABOUT ANDREW
Andrew founded the Dynamic Leadership Center to help his generation be more productive at work. He believes that small tweaks in how we use our brain can fundamentally change our work performance, effectiveness of relationships, and overall fulfilment. (Oh, and make companies more profitable too).

Andrew’s background makes him uniquely suited to have an impact. He …
* is a millennial — he grew up during 9/11, does not carry cash, and is dependent on a charged cell phone
* has a depth of business experience — he excelled at The Boston Consulting Group (BCG), where he saw a stark contrast between how BCG and their clients motivated and engaged their workforce
* is active in shaping the mindfulness community — he collaborates with leading experts to create content, facilitates sessions in companies and his community, and has a dedicated practice of his own.

In his free time, Andrew seeks out endurance/adrenaline sports (i.e. setting hard goals for no apparent reason) and meditation (i.e. sitting in excruciatingly uncomfortable positions for mind numbing lengths of time).

TESTIMONIALS
“It so easy to lose perspective in the workplace, like these deadlines or emails…. And it was a good way to regain perspective.” 

“It helps you make better decisions, and those decisions led to better outcomes.”

“It has made me more patient, more empathetic, more able to see things through other’s eyes.”

March Speaker: Rosalie Chamberlain, Dimensions of Diversity

Rosalie Chamberlain is the Director of Rosalie Chamberlain Consulting & Coaching. She is skilled leadership and executive coach and consultant, having worked with a broad range of corporate, government, and private industries, both national and international. Additionally, she is a nationally recognized speaker and program facilitator. Rosalie has more than 18 years of coaching experience working with individuals and groups on leadership development, team building, talent management, career transitions, and helping organizations become successful and inclusive environments.

She specializes in helping leaders obtain leadership mastery and enhance or develop critical skills that maximize the talent of the workforce of their organization, as well as identify and understand any potential blocks and beliefs that hinder progress.

Rosalie specializes in leadership assessment and effectiveness, multicultural competencies, leadership influence, talent management, organizational culture and managing and leveraging diverse talent. She has unique experience with respect to organizational culture, having worked with multicultural organizations with complex diversity and inclusion challenges to develop and implement strategies, behaviors and best practices for building inclusive organizations.

She is the author of Conscious Leadership in the Workplace: A Guidebook to Making a Difference One Person at a Time (2016). Rosalie is a contributor to The New York Times, HR News Magazine (International Public Management Association for Human Resources), Strategic HR Review, Talent Executive, Chief Learning Officer, ABCNews.com, Onward Nation, Strategy Driven, Recalculating: 97 Experts on Driving Small Business Growth, Center Valley Business Times, American Diversity Report, as well as multiple national and international blogs.