Mindful Skin, Mindful Embrace - College of Marin, Kentfield

Mindful Skin, Mindful Embrace is a one-day mindfulness mini-retreat at College of Marin's Kentfield campus in Marin County, California. It is part of the Mindful Biology series and is open to anyone curious about biology-informed mindfulness and a gentler relationship with their own body. The class is taught by Will Meecham, MD, a retired facial surgeon.

The premise is simple: your skin envelops your body and embraces your human spirit. Through the day, the class explores how skin connects us with the healing power of nature.

What to Expect

The day runs from 10 am to 3 pm. It begins with the science. You will review how skin protects the body, how it senses the environment, and how it connects us with the people we love. From there the class moves toward practice, exploring the body's living surface with inspiring imagery and guided contemplative exercises.

A central theme is letting go. Together the group releases unhelpful messages about how skin should look, and learns to honor what skin actually is and does. The approach blends life science with contemplative spirituality, so the biology is not just information to hold in the head. It becomes something to feel.

About Will Meecham, MD

Will Meecham, MD, is a former surgeon and self-described accidental mystic who teaches Mindful Biology, a blend of life science and contemplative spirituality. He has offered its insights and practices publicly since 2009. Its guiding phrase is "habitat restoration for human consciousness," and its meditations cultivate embodied experiences of awe, love and wholeness.

His path began in biology. After a solo trek of the John Muir Trail in his teens, he set out to become a field biologist and studied zoology and ecology at UC Berkeley. Graduate work in biophysics followed, then medical school at UC San Francisco. He trained in ophthalmology and became an oculofacial surgeon, treating skin cancers near the eyes and related problems. At forty-one, intractable neck pain ended his surgical career. That background in the anatomy and care of skin shapes this class.

The Setting

The class meets on the Kentfield Campus of College of Marin in Kentfield, California.

Before You Go

Mindful Skin, Mindful Embrace is one of several Mindful Biology mini-retreats offered at College of Marin, alongside classes on muscles and bones and on the senses. Each is a stand-alone day, so you can come to this one without having attended the others.