Dr. Rick Hanson

Lead Teacher

Rick Hanson, Ph.D., is a psychologist, Senior Fellow of the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley, and New York Times best-selling author. His books are available in 26 languages and include Resilient, Hardwiring Happiness, Buddha’s Brain, Just One Thing, and Mother Nurture. He edits the Wise Brain Bulletin and has numerous audio programs. A summa cum laude graduate of UCLA and founder of the Wellspring Institute for Neuroscience and Contemplative Wisdom, he’s been an invited speaker at NASA, Oxford, Stanford, Harvard, and other major universities, and taught in meditation centers worldwide.

Dr. Hanson has been a trustee of Saybrook University, served on the board of Spirit Rock Meditation Center, and was President of the Board of FamilyWorks, a community agency. He began meditating in 1974, trained in several traditions, and leads a weekly meditation gathering in San Rafael, California. His work has been featured on the BBC, CBS, and NPR, and he offers the free Just One Thing newsletter with over 120,000 subscribers, plus the online Foundations of Well-Being program in positive neuroplasticity that anyone with financial need can do for free.

Leslie Booker

Co-Teacher

Booker brings her heart, wisdom, and compassion to the intersection of social justice, yoga, and mindfulness. She has shared these practices with vulnerable populations in New York City since 2006, working in juvenile detention centers, residential treatment centers, and on Rikers Island. She travels nationally utilizing the foundation of Dharma and embodied wisdom practices to support the sustainability of front line Changemakers.

Booker is on faculty with the Prison Mindfulness Institute and Off the Mat Into the World, and teaches at Insight Meditation centers across the country. She is a co-founder of the Yoga Service Council at Omega Institute, the Meditation Working Group of Occupy Wall Street and Urban Sangha Project in NYC. Booker is a co-author of Best Practices for Yoga in a Criminal Justice Setting, a contributor to Georgetown Law report Gender & Trauma, and Sharon Salzberg’s book Happiness at Work. She is a graduate of both Spirit Rock’s Mindful Yoga & Meditation and Community Dharma Leaders trainings, and is currently in their 4 year Dharma Retreat Teacher training.

Tara Mulay

Co-Teacher

Tara Mulay combines a deep love of classical Theravada teachings with a focus on bringing the practice alive in modern daily life. She co-founded the San Francisco People of Color Insight Meditation Group in 2015 and has been a leader of Mission Dharma since 2010. She is a graduate of Spirit Rock Meditation Center’s Community Dharma Leaders Program and a current participant in the 2017-2021 Insight Meditation Society Teacher Training Program. Tara has undertaken intensive practice periods in both the United States and Myanmar. Her dharma offerings have been heavily influenced by Burmese styles of insight meditation, which emphasize a continuity of non-conceptual moment-to-moment awareness, as well as by her over 20 years of practicing criminal defense law.

Dr. Peter Grossenbacher

Co-Teacher

Peter Grossenbacher, PhD, teaches at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado, where he serves as Professor and Department Chair in Contemplative Psychology. A Mind & Life Fellow, he offers integrative scientific perspectives on meditation and contemplative education. Peter started meditating in 1980, and teaches meditation in Shambhala and other settings.

After graduating with honors from U.C. Berkeley, he worked at Stanford Medical School in brain imaging research. He trained in cognitive neuroscience and earned his doctorate in experimental psychology at the University of Oregon. His book, Finding Consciousness in the Brain, offers insights into the brain’s involvement in conscious experience. After researching attention and synesthesia at the University of Cambridge and the National Institute of Mental Health, Dr. Grossenbacher joined the Naropa faculty in 2000. Since founding the Consciousness Laboratory, he directs research on meditative development the teaching of meditation. His work has been covered by the New York Times, Smithsonian Magazine, and Discover Magazine, as well as numerous radio interviews and newspaper articles.

If you are a guest with mobility, visual or hearing disabilities and would like to request accommodations or offer suggestions on how to make Shambhala Mountain Center more accessible, please contact our Guest Services at 1-888-788-7221 or frontdesk@shambhalamountain.org.

Rick’s talks, guided meditations, and perhaps additional teachings will be videotaped as quietly and discreetly as possible. The voices and images of retreat participants will not be included in the recordings, which will be edited into an online program that participants will receive at no charge in 2019. This program will be offered for sale, and given freely to anyone with financial need.