Dawn Gaden, a licensed counselor and coach at Mind Body Counseling and Coaching PLLC, is a certified intenSati instructor who is passionate about her work.
“It will change your life,”said Gaden. If you want something different, if you want to change your life, do intenSati.”
There are numerous ways to make yourself feel good before your day starts or after a tough day on the job. You can run, lift weights, meditate, any number of activities to exercise the mind and body. The intenSati method – the word intenSati is derived from intent, for intention, and Sati, which is Sanskirt for mindfulness – is one that combines dance, martial arts and yoga. It uses movement, meditation, mantras (affirmations), and naam music to create a unique experience that exercises not only the mind and body, but your spirit as well.
Gaden became a registered yoga instructor in 2005. She is a mother of four boys, who in 2006 were all under 5 years-old, so she worked from home as a part-time school teacher. Not having a lot of time on her hands, she would buy workout DVDs.
“I found this woman, her name is Patricia Moreno, who is the creator of intenSati, ” said Gaden. I found some videos of her doing kickboxing yoga or dance yoga and I fell in love with it.”
In 2016, Gaden became fully committed to intenSati. She went to New York to train and become a certified intenSati leader.
“I pulled out my intenSati video one day and I just said to my husband, ‘I’m going to training. I need to learn how to teach this. I need to spread the word. This is such a powerful practice,’” said Gaden. “It’s more than a workout, it really changes the way you think and feel about yourself.”
Gaden is a lifelong Michigan resident, growing up in Rochester. IntenSati originated in New York, and Gaden wanted to spread this practice to her own community.
“There is a really large intenSati community in New York…I would live intenSati on my Facebook page once a week and then I was teaching here in Brighton in a studio.”
Gaden says that once people attend their first class it is very easy for them to catch on, similar to riding a bike.
“What I found is because it’s a pretty dynamic class so it’s different then what anyone has ever done,” said Gaden. “So what I found is that when people come back to the second class they are like, ‘Oh wow, how quickly I catch on’.”
“There are plenty of things that can happen in life to make you doubt yourself” Gaden said, “the intenSati movement will help you change your thinking for the better”.
“There will always be things in the world outside of us that we cannot control and that we have to figure out how to move through the issue,” said Gaden. “When we change our mindset, when we can decide, ‘What can I control’, ‘What can I do’, not ‘What can’t I do’. Instead of looking at our struggle we look at what’s possible. And that’s what the practice is really all about.”
For questions or more information about the intenSati method, you can contact Gaden by email at mindbodycounseling407@gmail.com or by phone at (810) 623-7375.