Rachel Lewis started meditating while completing her physics PhD at Yale. She has spent over 500 nights on silent retreat since 2003, including two three-month retreats. Her meditation training includes Spirit Rock's Dedicated Practitioners Program and Community Dharma Leaders program, and she is currently a trainee in the IMS retreat teacher training program, which involves apprenticing with Joseph Goldstein and other IMS teachers to teach retreats. She is also currently training as a practitioner of Indigenous Focussing-Oriented Therapy, a trauma therapy modality informed by an understanding of collective as well as individual suffering. Since 2010 she has taught classes and retreats in BC, including at a prison and in Vancouver's Downtown East Side. She has also developed a songbook of Buddhist music including her own choral arrangements of traditional chants. Her specialty is making profound teachings accessible through humour and story-telling. Listen to one of her dharma talks here: https://www.audiodharma.org/teacher/349/
So much of our lives can be driven by unconscious reactivity: the endless struggle to avoid painful or negative feelings. With mindfulness meditation, we can develop the skill of patience and presence, so that we can experience calm and contentment even in the midst of all of the challenges of our lives.