Transform from the invisible to the invincible! Introducing Karin Pedersen, the inspiring and visionary owner of Wild Grace Energetics, a company founded with the mission of supporting women in finding their beauty, power, and voice.
From a young age, Karin Pedersen has been surrounded by extraordinary and powerful individuals. Karin grew up in both Denmark and Aspen, Colorado with her Olympic ski trainer father Tage Pedersen. At age 15 she met her Aikido teacher Tom Crum, who moved with the agility of a cat. Karin was deeply moved by the art of centering and the fluidity of Aikido with Tom. This is where Karin’s lifelong path began.
That evening at the Aspen library, where she went to her first lecture with Tom, she found the power of her center and everything changed! The power of ki, life force strength. That night she was clear that this was her path. He gave her another model of being, not only in her body but in the world. So she learned about life force through Aikido.
Her curiosity led her to him. She needed to know why her gymnastics coach and springboard diving coach would tell her to center before doing a routine. But none of the coaches knew how to answer her. That seemed kind of strange. She asked so many people and nobody knew. And then she met Tom. She learned how to move like the wind, effortless flow from her center, relaxed for no reason.
At age 22, right out of college, while living in Aspen and working with her father as a physical therapy assistant and trainer, she received a phone call from Dr. Morgan in Aspen. He asked if she would work for him as a coach for his patients. He told her that he heard she was good with people, and would she start right away? So for three years she was a coach for the internist in town and worked with his patients, one on one. She did everything from getting them physically fit to emotional coaching.
At age 25, Karin teamed up with Tom Crum and some of his other Aikido students and began teaching weeklong courses called “Ski Aiki.” They taught people how to ski and combined Aikido principles. This program was a very popular course for all levels of skiers.
At age 28, she became the personal masseuse and energetic coach to tennis great Martina Navratilova for five years. Karin taught Martina centering and the energetic principles of Aikido. It changed her game. She said that no one had ever taught her this before. And she wondered why? Karin then became the personal trainer and coach to one of the wealthiest men and families on the planet. She lived in Venezuela with the family and traveled to many countries during this time with them. Karin has always had a knack for being in the right place at the right time—or, dare I say, her timing is strangely impeccable…
Now, many of Karin’s clients and students experience this same phenomenon when working with Karin, a direct result of her unique presence and powerful attention and knowledge.
In today’s interview, I speak with Karin about her life, work, and transformative power as a personal coach and mentor. We talk about the power of moving from one’s center, staying embodied, and discovering one’s true calling in life. Karin also tells us about her current coaching services and her very special upcoming public lecture here in Ashland, Oregon.
Karin, thanks so much for taking the time to speak with me today and for doing this interview with me. I am very excited to learn more about your story and to share it with our community.
Thank you, it’s great to be here… I am grateful for the opportunity and to talk about my lifelong body of work. I look forward to letting people what I am doing.
Karin, to begin with you have always been surrounded by extraordinary individuals and one of those individuals was your father, Tage Pedersen. Please tell us a little bit about him and his role in shaping your life.
Sure, I always enjoy speaking about my father and the role he played in my life. To begin with, I was born into this talent or gift if you will. The acorn doesn’t fall far from the tree, and in my case, it did not fall far from my fathers tree! My dad was a powerful physical mover, a gifted healer/physical therapist and a coach. He had a deep understanding of what people were capable of regarding physical fitness. He also had a powerful, beautiful, calm, loving presence. People seemed to listen to him. He changed people’s lives through movement and dare I say, his presence.
He was one of the main people who brought movement into YMCAs all over Europe.
It went from a young boy’s Christian group to a place where people would go and get healthy and learn how to move (Karin currently teaches water aerobics in the mornings at the Ashland YMCA).
In his book, Getting in Shape to Ski, he wrote “our bodies are designed to move at a high-level.” I have never forgotten this line in his book, it has stayed with me my whole life.
Tage was born in Denmark and moved to Aspen, Colorado (when it was a small little mud town) after marrying my beautiful mother (I inherited my adventurous spirit from my mother).
In 1960, my father was a part of a program with the Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies. This was a program that brought in the top executives in the country such as the Kennedys and the vice president, Adler Stevenson, people like that. The program was to humanize them, because they were trained to only use their intellect, and they did not have a connection with their bodies or their intuition or creativity. So, my father’s job was to get them in shape, and to teach them about the power of their bodies.
When I was 10, 11, and 12 years old, I would be at the front desk checking them in, I would witness these men, and at the end of two weeks… they were completely different men. They were more available and opened with their hearts, and they were much more expressive with their whole being and body. They all just loved my father. Adler Stevenson wrote a chapter about his time with Tage in one of his books. This is when my curiosity took hold. I learned at a very young age that connecting the mind in the body and learning how to move in a certain way was and is life changing. He wasn’t just teaching them how to do sit ups and jumping jacks; it was who he was while he taught them. It was his presence. Tage had a beautiful, innocent, powerful presence from his heart. He had powerful attention, and these men could feel it. Everybody he worked with could feel it. This program put Aspen on the map. I was born into this way of being.
Karin, you had an awareness that something amazing was happening to the people that your father worked with, but it was not until later that you learned in more detail what was occurring. Please say more.
Sure, like I have mentioned earlier, I noticed after a while that it was something else my dad was doing with them. He was sharing his whole being with them. He embodied compassion, and he was a fierce, bad ass; he didn’t let them slide. And that is why he was chosen to be the Olympic trainer for the US Alpine Ski Team. He made Olympic athletes gold medalists. And when these ski racers talk about him, they cry, because of how he touched them. They loved him so much as a person and respected him deeply.
It’s not enough to just train someone how to do something. I learned from my father to bring all of me, my full attention to the table and that’s when real change happens in people. Hindsight, this is what I was doing with Dr. Morgan’s patients that I worked with. I was being with them. I listened, I saw them, I created safety and they changed, first and foremost, and then I taught them how to move.
People need to feel safe. No matter what you’re doing with people. He taught me how to be a safe person with my presence and my attention and of course my heart. Many people teach from their mind. Have you ever had a teacher where you are just so bored and can’t pay attention? That’s what I’m talking about: they aren’t with you or engaging.
One more thing that I learned from my father was mentorship. He was mentored by many in Denmark. Mentorship means it’s a one-on-one relationship or one-on-few. I know that’s where he got much of his wisdom and power. After my studies at university and college I knew I wanted to have mentors. I learn more powerfully with direct experience from people. And that is what I’ve done. I have had seven powerful mentors in my life. Each one studying for years at a time. I believe that’s what has made me what and who I am today. Direct relationship with others is unparalleled. It’s direct transmission, if you will. Over time.
My first mentor was my father, my second was Tom Crum, Aikido for 15 years. I then worked with Carlos Castaneda and the women of that Toltec lineage for two years. My fourth mentor was a Lakota medicine woman, Marilyn Young Bird, where I participated in six vision quests over six years and learned about the power of the Earth and the elements. I would sit on the earth with nothing but myself for four days and four nights. That brought me peace of mind and the ability to sit with myself without anything to distract me. Then, my mentor Judith Bluestone for 4 years. I became a certified screener in HANDLE Neurodevelopment issues.
When I moved to Ashland, I met Paul Richards, my 5th mentor for 20 plus years. He has taught me a much deeper level of movement, and what’s possible with how we move and perceive in this world. Paul has brought a whole other meaning to “How You Move Matters” and what Profound Motion is. Then Aaron Ortega was my 6th mentor; I studied karate for 8 to 10 years. I am currently learning sword work from the art of Kenjutsu. I am going for my black belt next year.
In the past three years I have become certified in Clara Zammit’s Women’s Centered Coaching programs for coaching and facilitation.
My promise to you is that I will take the time to deeply see what your needs may be and move from there together.
One of my great passions is to be a good mentor to my clients. I think it’s important to give them the full experience of working with a live person over time. We live in a culture where every time you open your phone there’s seven other things you want to do and be. What I know is that it takes time with one person to really embody what they’re teaching. We want it now; the culture wants it now. It Just doesn’t work that way. A wonderful example of this is becoming a great athlete or committing to a black belt in any martial art. It happens over years of hard work. You can’t get a black belt in a weekend course. I don’t care how good it is. I’m so grateful that I learned about mentorship through my father. I have a very special relationship with all my mentors. I treasure it. And It’s one of the biggest gifts I can give someone. My time, my attention, my presence, and my patience. I was trained to pass it forward, that’s how this works. What an honor.
Your company is called Wild Grace. Please talk about why you choose this name and give us an overview of the services that you are now providing here in Southern Oregon.
I chose the name Wild Grace because I believe, in my experience, that there is a very alive and wild aspect of us that does not get acknowledged or felt often. Certainly, it is not something we learn in our educational system. From very early on, we are trained to sit at a desk and pay attention for hours in a day. When we do that for enough years, whether it’s school or sitting at a desk job, our bodies forget what’s possible. And people begin to lose that body intelligence if they ever even had it. This is very sad to me. Many people don’t even know what they don’t know in this regard. When I used to be a physical trainer in Aspen my first question with a new client was “Have you ever been in top shape before? “If they said yes, I knew it would be easy. If they said no, I knew I had a different road to take them on.
If you watch any wild animal, they possess a wildness and graceful quality, and their presence is so beautiful and elegant it brings tears to my eyes. Not to mention most wild animals are very relaxed. They don’t hold tension in the same way humans do. I have learned a great deal from the majestic, wild creatures that we live among. Wild animals do not apologize for their beautiful presence. They just are that without any apology, ever…
My biggest passion is to awaken the wild and the graceful in people. Everybody has it inside, even the graceful part. They just weren’t taught. We all deserve to walk with beauty and grace, male or female. It’s not that far away, I promise.
I’ve been called the wild whisper… that’s what I do.
I would say, one of my superpowers is patience, and allowance. We need to feel safe to take as long as we need to take to come out and show up in our beauty, and I’m talking about beauty from deep inside, from our guts.
My favorite quote from Tom Crum, from his book Journey to Center, is “centering is the art of being fully alive. And wherever the art of centering is practiced, things change dramatically.”
This is where beauty is born or I suppose, beauty exists.
Karin, please talk more specifically about the coaching that you offer.
The coaching that I offer is for men and women. I work specifically with women regarding the blocks that tend to affect women. Women can feel like they’re not enough, or invisible, or not lovable, or any version of these. It is so deep in our culture to feel this way. I had these feelings as a young adult, and they still show themselves from time to time. One way to describe my coaching is that I am a somatic coach, and all that means is that I work with you on the physical, energetic and your limiting belief systems. When they get cleared out a bit, and you start to move from your womb and center, and your feminine grace starts to come in… there is a different woman. I’ve seen this over and over and over again the past 35 years.
I teach a movement class in the evening for women on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Classes are called the Dance of the Deep Feminine. I will also begin offering a once a month 2 ½ hour class on Sunday. The first class will begin July 21 from 4 to 6:30 in the evening. These classes are life changing. The women in my weekly classes call them magic class because of the transformational quality. You do not have to know anything about movement to join these classes. I take you on a journey out of your head, and into your body, center / womb space and heart, and then energetically into the Earth. Each night you come out a new woman, certainly more relaxed, and in touch with yourself and heart. And overtime these classes change the women. Including me.
I also work one-on-one with people, through the somatic coaching technique that I have cultivated over the years… which is a combination of my life, knowledge and experience.
I work with athletes; it does not matter if I know the sport you are doing. I will teach you how to move more efficiently, especially from your center and your energy system.
Karin, you have a particular interest in working in the elements. How does this assist you in helping your clients?
Yes, I always try to work with people and teach them about the natural world around them. Being connected to nature and the Earth somehow balances us more. I know I feel happier when I’m outside. There are many people that did not grow up outside.
So, I support them in that journey of discovery.
In 1997 the year of the flood, I worked at Ashland High School for six years as a student advocate. I designed courses for different groups and spoke with students in my student advocate way. Each summer I took a group of 4 to 5 high school young women out on a backpacking rite of passage. They had to carry their own food and clothes in a big backpack, and we did all sorts of exercises like the ones I have been describing. The weeklong journeys were life-changing for them. Being out in nature for a whole week does that all on its own.
You are also a somatic coach and trainer. Please talk about the power of connecting the mind and body on all levels.
We are designed to move in this way, to the degree we do not we may suffer in some way.
Karin, why do your clients choose to work with you?
My clients work with me because they feel change in themselves. They feel more joyous, empowered, more confident, beautiful; their nervous system relaxes, they experience their heart more open and available, they begin to understand what it is to move from their feminine essence.
Many times, my female clients experience feeling like they are not enough, and lack expression and voice. Let’s face it I think women just feel underseen from the culture.
Or if you’re just feeling exhausted and disconnected. This happens to all of us at different times in our life. Going through a divorce? This is the best medicine for that and other life challenges.
Karin, please share some recent testimonials with us which speak to some of these changes.
“How I’ve changed since working with Karin: I met Karin in the fall of 2022, and a time where I felt so broken, and I was very lost. After two years of working with her, I have completely changed. She has helped me know myself more, be more confident and deepen into loving myself in a huge way. With her support I have believed in myself in a way I never have before, and that has allowed me to go for my biggest dreams and even achieve some already! The presence she has taught me has truly changed my life for the better. Knowing what I now know I will never be the same. I can center and regulate my nervous system more easily, and I have way more trust in myself and the universe and the path that I am taking. I am endlessly grateful for Karin’s tools and presence in my life. It has been such an honor to work with her and receive her gifts and knowledge.” – Erica
“I carry you and the dance with me every single day, I bring you to the beach and to the springs and love playing together with the mermaids. What lucky woman who get to learn this magical art from you. What lucky women to get to have your attention on them. They will be forever changed. We are the lucky ones. I cannot wait to dance with u again. Love you with all my heart.”
– Lauren
“Karin paid exquisite, constant, patient and profound attention to me; she did whatever it took to catalyze my transformation into a woman versed and embodied in wild feminine beauty. She taught me that such beauty is an equal opportunity river in the universe. Beauty favors no one; it is accessible to us all if we can make ourselves available to it. Karin teaches us to make ourselves available to beauty. Karin is a force who gently, patiently, and unrelentingly elicits our raw beauty, wild feminine, and deepest essence. There is no one else who can do what she does.”- Julia Papps
“Brilliant! Karin Pedersen’s program is beyond amazing – she creates a space to move from lack of energy and confidence, from incapability and stiffness to authentic, feminine strength, knowing and aliveness. She is a transformational leader with extensive physical fitness, martial arts, bodywork, and dance training, who coaches top athletes. Karen’s intuitive body – mind integration program is for you if you have been playing small, feeling insecure, or an adequate, and if you want to experience life, affirming presence, and up level your game.” – Tonya, PhD
Karin, this month you will be offering two upcoming public lectures in which you will go into more depth about your life story and course work. Please tell us more.
Yes, I will be giving a live talk on the power of center and connecting body and mind and more on Aug. 13th at the metaphysical library in Ashland, Oregon. For specific times, and other dates, I will have it on my website Wildgrace.world.
I will also be offering a free 90-min master class, The Power of Energetic Presence and Centering. This is for men and women. Sun. July 28th at 4pm PST.
On Aug. 3rd I will also be offering a one-day live mini course to teach many of these principles I have been speaking of.
Finally, what are the next steps for someone who is interested in working with you?
I am offering anyone that is interested in my work a free one-on-one discovery call, where you can get to know me and ask me questions and see if there’s a fit for you with what I do. I like to have a tailor-made offering for you if that is what you’re looking for.
I also offer six-month and one-year deeper dive programs and coaching packages. These programs are powerful. I go into all the different layers I have mentioned.
I will be posting on my website all the different offerings and much more detail: Wildgrace.world.
Thank you Shields for this opportunity to share with this community, my gifts and talents. I hope to hear from some of you out there. It is my pleasure to offer. What I do is my passion and life’s work.
Thank you very much for taking the time to speak with me today.
Learn More:
Wild Grace Energetics
541-840-0096
