Kathryn Cornelius started Whole Human Alchemy and Consulting in 2017 after a series of tragic events lead her from the corporate world onto a wellness journey that would help her guide others. Today, Kathryn serves as a wellness consultant to businesses, teaches workshops, and coaches private clients. “Live your soul truth! It’s your life. We’re all free, and we all have choice. Maybe sometimes we don’t feel free, but the fact is -- we choose what we eat, who we hang out with, how we spend our time, and what we say in our heads to ourselves,” says Kathryn.
In honor of the RECLINER community, she has created a curated guided meditation for RECLINERs across the world, which can be found by clicking this link! Here’s our interview with Kathryn.
Tell us about yourself and your journey to becoming a wellness consultant.
In 2005 I was working a corporate job. I guess you could call me a typical “type A” New Yorker when I decided to enroll in yoga teacher training. A few months later I was riding my bike when I got hit by a car, breaking my clavicle and suffering a major concussion. I was out of work for five months and used the “downtime” to dive into yoga in order to heal my body and spirit. Yoga became a way for me to heal my physical, emotional and psychological self, working through deep trauma. Through working on myself, I realized that we all live in trauma to some extent, whether it’s trauma we’ve experienced ourselves or inherited genetically. This lead me on a journey to listen to my intuition and live in my truth.
Eventually, I figured, you have to listen to the call to wellness. I decided to quit my corporate job, and, realizing a need for wellness in the corporate world, started Whole Human Alchemy and Consulting.
What is your typical daily routine?
I wake up between 4:30 a.m. and 6:00 a.m., hours of the morning that are considered in the Ayurvedic tradition to be the most balanced hours of the morning. I start my day with the repetition of a specific mantra given to me by a kundalini teacher in an ashram in New Mexico. Then, I will do some dry brushing and take a three minute cold shower. It might sound crazy, but I’ve been doing this since the autumn of 2018 and haven’t gotten sick since!
After my cold shower, I’ll do specific Kundalini exercises, working on different aspects that I’m exploring. Then, I take my dog for a walk, run, or do pilates. I try to stay off Instagram until around 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. to fully focus on my inner self. After exercising, I’ll do a cacao ceremony with specific cacao (Legacy Cacao) harvested and blessed by a Mayan priestess. Cacao is a heart-opening superfood, and so that’s the perfect time for me to do some writing and work on my business. Throughout the day I’ll see clients, do workshops, and perform my own sleep meditation.
Can you describe your practice of sleep meditation?
Through my experiences working through trauma and my journeys around the world, I’ve developed my own method of sleep meditation, or a yoga nidra experience. Typically, I will talk with a client about what they want to work through, and design a specific guided meditation tailored to those needs. I will guide the meditation over the phone, which can be done in the afternoon when energy is low or at night when the client wants to fall asleep.
What are your favorite RECLINER items?
I am loving the Brushed Grey Sleep Pant and Sleep Tee in Blush!