Our Team
We, Leah Grace and Micah McLaughlin…
…founded the Vitalist institute because we believe real transformation takes place in your body, on this earth, and through your connection with others. We’ve been a bit obsessive about our own healing journeys, our deep desire to find the medicine within us, and to share it with you.
After traveling the world seeking teachers and modalities of embodied transformation, we have gathered an incredibly gifted and passionate team. Our greatest mission is to show humans how to unlock their innate freedom in the simplest and most profound ways we know.
The Vitalist Institute staff is composed of trauma informed individuals who hold the sacred manner of this work with the deepest reverence.
Leah Grace
Leah Grace is a co-founder of The Vitalist Institute and one of the head instructors at the Vitalist School of Psychospiritual Transformation. With over 20 years of experience working with clients, conscious entrepreneurs and leaders, Leah’s journey has been guided by one question, “What is it that allows humans to live into their fullest potential?”
Through years of relentlessly pursuing mentors, training, and her own personal-development, Leah has developed her own unique methodology integrating tools rooted in psychology, spirituality, somatic and trauma therapy as a way to offer the most efficient and effective path to lasting transformation.
Leah’s believes her purpose in life is to lead the leaders. Using her tools, in a somewhat unconventional way, to work with practitioners and entrepreneurs to address everything from practicing aligned business strategy to healing unresolved trauma.
Her profound and intuitive ability to reunite individuals to their truest potential stems from a space of deep integrity and passion for this work. She is a champion for those longing to learn how to operate from a space of inner authority, clarity and authenticity so they can move towards a life of more purpose, freedom, and alignment.
Leah is a certified trauma professional and holds certifications from a multitude of organizations starting with Kalamazoo Center for the Healing Arts in Somatic Emotional Release & Bodywork Therapy in 1999. Since then she has received certifications and training from iPEC an accredited international coaching federation, level 1 & 2 certification of the Biodynamic Breathwork & Trauma Release System, Healing developmental trauma certification from BBTRS and more.
Micah McLaughlin
Micah McLaughlin is a co-founder of The Vitalist Institute and one of the head instructors at the Vitalist School of Psychospiritual Transformation. During his earlier training in traditional naturopathy, he discovered that in order to get to the true root of health, humans must get back to their true selves. Micah has worked for more than a decade incorporating the tools of psychology, spirituality, and somatic therapy to support clients in finding their innate freedom.
Micah was trained at the Naturopathic Institute of Therapies and Education and founded Continuum Healing in 2008. He further studied western herbalism, Bioenergetics, Reichien character structures, somatic coaching, and the Enneagram, deepening his passion to treat the whole person. In 2014, he co-founded the Wellness Collective with Leah Grace in Grand Rapids, MI and continues to assist clients, students, and practitioners in their transformational work.
Micah utilizes holistic dialogue, breathwork, and somatic therapies to support clients as they find their way back to full embodiment and presence. By working to integrate the childhood beliefs, developmental traumas, shock traumas, and patterned behaviors learned in youth, Micah supports his clients as they learn to FEEL again, making it possible to create lives filled with safety and meaning. Lives not dictated by past beliefs and habitual patterns, but lives immersed in the here-and-now, fully present to the unfolding experience of each moment.
Through this therapeutic process, physical and emotional pain is dissolved as the nervous system regulates and the mind and body are returned to homeostasis. Micah works with each client at the pace and intensity that allows them to safely find paths back to their authentic selves.
Kaycee Joy
Kaycee Joy is a psychospiritual practitioner, wife, mom of three, and is dedicated to helping the world heal. She specializes in teaching the queer community and it’s advocates how to drop into their bodies, step into their power, and remember who they were born to be. She is a multi trained and certified trauma informed healer in many modalities including: Psychospiritual, Life Coaching, Holistic Counseling, Reiki I & II, Quantum Healing Hypnosis Technique, and Rapid Resolution Therapy.
Ryan DeLuca
Ryan is a consciousness explorer and cacao enthusiast. His services include intuitive healing and holistic coaching, and his training includes: trauma-informed somatic healing; SOMA breathwork; Quantum Healing Hypnosis Technique (Delores Cannon’s method of past-life regression); Sound healing with voice; and Reiki l/ll. He’s passionate about how our thoughts and emotions impact our physical health, the science of spirituality, and the heart-brain connection. Ryan’s goal is to help clients restore their physical and emotional wellbeing, (re)align to their life's purpose by developing a stronger relationship to their intuition, and to empower clients to view life’s challenges as opportunities to learn and grow. Ryan believes we all have the capacity to heal ourselves, and that starts by regulating our nervous system and learning the language of our body and intuition. He offers 1:1 sessions and packages, and group workshops.
Jubilee Berry
Jubilee is an assistant and experience curator for the Vitalist Institute. An artist and alumni of the Vitalist School of Psychospiritual Transformation, Jubilee integrates her unique expression of joy in providing safety and love for Vitalist participants.
A former art educator of 15 years, Jubilee understands the soul’s aptitude and desire for self-expression and actualization. Jubilee’s experience assisting and celebrating individuals on their paths to self-discovery has been integral to her role in facilitating healing through safety and community.
Jubilee is driven by her profound capacity and belief in the power of love. A breath and bodywork assistant, she uses her hands, intuition, and heart to deeply care for the students and participants of the Vitalist Institute.
Sarah Simon
Sarah is our Sales and Marketing Assistant. She designs, schedules, nurtures and promotes all of the offerings for Vitalist Institute and Vitalist School. Sarah’s knack for organization and attention to detail keeps our office in tip-top shape.
Sarah is also a Registered Yoga Teacher and offers yoga classes through the Vitalist Institute. Helping people regulate their nervous system so that their body and mind can heal has been the most rewarding and fulfilling aspect of her teaching career. She is a certified member of Yoga Alliance (RYT) and a SHE RECOVERS yoga teacher.