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Graduate Spotlight: Jamie Reygl
- EMI Faculty
- 4 minutes ago
- 6 min read
From Certification to Transformation: How Engaged Mindfulness Changed Everything
When Jamie Reygle enrolled in the Engaged Mindfulness Institute's teacher training in 2022, he had a clear, straightforward goal: earn a certification. As founder and executive director of InStill Mindfulness, a nonprofit bringing contemplative practices to underserved communities in rural southwestern Virginia, Jamie needed formal credentials to support the organization's growing work. What he didn't expect was that the training would fundamentally reshape his organization's mission and spark a transformation that would ripple throughout his entire community.
A Simple Goal, An Unexpected Journey
"All I really wanted was a certification," Jamie recalls. "That was what I went in for, to get the certification, to get that piece out of the way. But it turned out that I got a whole lot more out of the training than I expected, as did our organization."
Jamie had previously attended Fleet Maull's Path of Freedom training twice and knew the quality of instruction he could expect from the Engaged Mindfulness Institute. The IMTA-certified program seemed like a natural fit. But as the training progressed, particularly toward the end, something shifted.
The Missing Link
"Prior to the training, I did not know what engaged mindfulness was. I didn't even know it was a thing," Jamie explains. "In the training, especially towards the end, there's quite an emphasis on engaged mindfulness and what it is. And that was really influential for our organization."
The timing couldn't have been more perfect. While Jamie was completing his training, InStill Mindfulness was undergoing a strategic planning process. The concept of engaged mindfulness—taking practice off the cushion and into service—became the breakthrough the organization needed.
"It was like, this engaged mindfulness piece is the missing link," Jamie says. "It's the thing that we hadn't recognized we needed to be doing that we absolutely need to be doing."
From Insight to Action
What happened next was remarkable. Just six to seven months after completing the training in June 2022, InStill Mindfulness made a bold move. On January 1, 2023, the organization relocated its entire operations to Pulaski, an underserved community in rural Appalachia's Bible Belt—an area with little access to contemplative practices.
The organization's new vision crystallized: A mindful world for all. But this wasn't about simply spreading mindfulness everywhere. It was about making these practices accessible to people and communities who don't have ready access to them—and doing so through engaged service.
The transformation was dramatic. When InStill moved to Pulaski, they had a team of two people. Less than three years later, they employ 12 staff members, including five peer recovery specialists working directly with individuals experiencing homelessness and substance use disorder.
The Greyston Model: Listening Before Leading
Jamie credits one particular story from the training with inspiring their approach. Learning about Bernie Glassman and the Greyston Bakery—where Glassman moved to the Bronx to serve the community and discovered that starting a bakery would provide meaningful employment—provided a blueprint for engaged mindfulness in action.
"We didn't come into the community and say, 'hey, we want to do this,'" Jamie explains. "We came in the community and said, 'hey, we want to serve. How can we help?'"
That listening-first approach led to the development of peer recovery services, which didn't begin until a year and a half after the move. The organization has worked in local and regional jails and currently serves at the regional juvenile detention home. Their impact has been recognized by the local chamber of commerce, which nominated InStill Mindfulness for Nonprofit of the Year in just their third year of operation in Pulaski.
Where Mindfulness Meets Recovery
The work is challenging and deeply rewarding. InStill's peer recovery specialists—all of whom have personal experience with incarceration, homelessness, and substance use disorder—face daily triggers as they serve people going through the same struggles they've overcome.
"There are a lot of triggers there. There are a lot of things that can bring our peer recovery specialists back into substance use disorder or relapsing," Jamie notes. "These practices help serve them. And then they're able to pass some of what they're learning on to the people that are utilizing our services."
The trauma-informed mindfulness component of the training proved especially valuable. Jamie had heard about people experiencing difficulty with meditation practice but admits he'd been somewhat dismissive.
"To put it into way more context and at least stop me from being dismissive about that kind of thing and recognizing that it's a real issue—that was really helpful," he reflects. "Especially with the work we're doing now, having an understanding of trauma-informed mindfulness, because so many of the people that are coming through our center have experienced trauma."
Beyond Certification: The Training Experience
Though Jamie came to the training with 10-15 years of teaching experience, he found unexpected value in the curriculum's design. The training took place entirely online, a necessity in the post-COVID era that actually worked to Jamie's advantage as he balanced running a nonprofit.
"I really enjoyed the way that Fleet invited so many people into the training so that there's such a broad array of teachers," Jamie notes. "Most mindfulness teacher trainings don't have that broad array. So you're getting a whole range of perspectives. And I found that really helpful, too."
The small group format created deep connections among participants. While those relationships haven't remained as tight after the training ended—"which I think is often the way with these things," Jamie observes philosophically—at the time, the cohort became deeply engaged with one another's progress and development as mindfulness teachers.
Reading Joseph Goldstein's book on mindfulness as part of the curriculum further deepened Jamie's understanding of the practice. And Fleet's direct questioning of participants' motivations for teaching left a lasting impression.
"Fleet really addressed the question of, well, why do you even want to be a teacher? And really getting honest with ourselves about that," Jamie recalls. "I think many people come into teaching things like mindfulness with some ego, some level of ego. I know I did. And I think that aspect of it was really helpful for me as well."
A Grounded Practice
The training also impacted Jamie's personal practice, bringing him back to fundamentals. Having started exploring meditation and spirituality in his twenties, "looking for something" and "being a little ungrounded," mindfulness had already provided a stabilizing foundation. The training deepened that grounding.
"It helped ground that even a little more and bring me back to the basics of the practice, the fundamentals of the practice, which I think the course is very much about," Jamie reflects. "It's really embracing the fundamentals and not getting ahead of ourselves."
This quality of equanimity serves Jamie and his team daily as they navigate the emotionally charged landscape of addiction recovery and community service. "There are so many triggers. There's so much going on that it's very easy to get caught up in lots of things and get quite emotional about a whole lot of things. The practice itself helps develop a little more equanimity and a little bit more of a steady hand as you move through the world and engage with the community."
What Future Students Should Know
When asked what he'd want potential students to know about the training, Jamie emphasizes several key points. First, the exposure to a broad range of teachers—an uncommon feature in mindfulness teacher trainings. Second, that this isn't training for retreat leading; it's about teaching meditation effectively and safely.
"It's really about how to teach and lead meditation effectively and in a way that is not going to cause problems," Jamie explains. "Because I think sometimes people can lead practices or lead meditations, and actually it can be problematic."
But most importantly, he wants people to understand the engaged mindfulness component and its transformative power.
"This training is likely to change your perspective about what the practice is about and to give you a much deeper understanding of how the practice can serve both yourself and the community around you," Jamie says. "Teaching mindfulness is not just about, 'hey, I'm a great teacher.' It's about service."
From the Cushion to the Community
Jamie's journey illustrates the heart of engaged mindfulness: it's not enough to develop a personal practice or even to teach others to practice. The real transformation happens when we take our "tush off the kush" and serve.
"There's so much to that, that is beneficial to our community, but to ourselves as well," Jamie reflects. "And it's such rewarding work."
Today, InStill Mindfulness stands as a living testament to what's possible when mindfulness meets engaged action—when certification becomes transformation, and when practice becomes service. From their center in Pulaski, Jamie and his growing team continue to cultivate a mindful world for all, one person, one community, at a time.
Learn More
To learn more about InStill Mindfulness and their work in southwestern Virginia, visit instillmindfulness.org.
EMI Mindfulness Teachers Training
If you want to learn more about the foundations of mindfulness, deepen your own practice, and potentially offer the gift of mindfulness to others, check out our online trainings and the Meditation Teachers Training.