Our Instructors
Kat Houghton PhD
Kat is a psychologist, a transformational coach and transpersonal hypnotherapist engaged deeply in the evolution of human consciousness. She gained her PhD designing and implementing play-based, parent-training programs for children with autism in underserved communities. She simultaneously co-founded and ran a digital health company which delivers leading edge mobile mental health interventions to those who would otherwise have little or no access to treatment (ilumivu).
She is an environmental and social justice activist focused on a community's rights to make decisions about where they live and to establish the rights of nature (see her TedX talk). She co-founded a nonprofit to support this work in Asheville, North Carolina (Community Roots).
Her current work uses hypnosis, eco-therapy, coaching, depth psychology, story telling and wilderness rites of passage to help people embrace their shadow and dismantle internalized systems of oppression - including racism, classism, sexism. Fascinated by the intersection of psyche and culture Kat is working to co-create a more beautiful world and be part of our collective liberation. She provides 1:1 services including hypnotherapy and past-life regressions at KatHoughton.com
Chris Parker
Chris is a self-taught mycologist who started cultivating mushrooms at 15. Since this humble beginning, Chris has continuously expanded his knowledge of mycology, botany, agriculture, permaculture and ecology giving him now 30 years of experience in mushroom cultivation, wild harvesting, and herbal medicine making. He founded and runs Asheville Fungi which provides mycological supplies including cultures, spawn, grow kits and tools across the country and fresh mushrooms locally.
He is passionate about food sovereignty and resilient local food systems and the use of fungus in innovative applications such as myco-remediation. He loves being in his mycology lab where he experiments with and expands various strains of mycelium.
Chris is a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and carries knowledge of ancestral food practices and skills such as arrow making, bow building, animal processing, flint knapping, and fire by friction.
He continues to be a teacher and mentor to many beginners and professionals who are interested in and share his passion for growing mushrooms for food, medicine and profit.