How I came into teaching mindfulness

My love of meditation started on the library floor as an angsty 14-year-old. Integrating mindfulness in healthcare began in about 2004 when I was working in Dubbo NSW for the Sexual Assault Service and struggling with burn out, being a mum and finding an authentic sense of making a difference to people's healing journeys. Meeting Timothea at a conference and being introduced to MBSR through a workshop she offered changed my life profoundly.

In 2009, Jon Kabat-Zinn and Saki Santorelli visited Australia and 150 of us were gifted to spend 7 days with them, living, learning and breathing MBSR. My love for the brilliance of this program grounded in ancient wisdom, and for my teachers has never waned. In those early days facilitating MBSR in Dubbo the groups were large, racially diverse, transformative and free. I remember being filled with hope about the possibilities of MBSR being freely available as part of the healthcare system in Australia as it was in the USA and Europe. I still hold this hope dearly in my heart.

The learning journey is an unfolding lifelong path. I'm grateful to my teachers and to the extraordinary people who've shared their hearts and minds in groups in Dubbo, Coffs Harbour and Bellingen and for the ongoing revealing of the beauty, courage, creativity and compassion of human beings.

Background

I've been teaching MBSR since 2009 and have taught mindfulness and intensive retreats at CSU on the Graduate Diploma of Applied Mindfulness and adapted MBSR program for First Responders. In 2019/2020 I was involved facilitating trauma informed community-based mindfulness programs following the devastating fires and floods.

• Registered Psychologist - B Psych (Hons); AAPi, AABCAP.
• Senior Yoga Teacher (Yoga Australia)
• Teaching MBSR from 2009 - (Teacher Certification, Brown University)
• Mindful Self-Compassion Teacher
• Insight Meditation Dharma Teacher (authorised to teach by IMI)
• Teaching Insight Meditation Retreats - co-teacher with Mal Huxter since 2017
• Practising meditation & yoga for more than 25 years and attending annual silent retreats
• Experienced retreat facilitator having led several 3-day trauma resilience retreats in the past 4 years.

Specialisation

Lisa integrates teachings from the Buddhadharma, Contemporary Psychology and Yoga and has a strong commitment towards cultivating an engaged, embodied Buddhist path of presence. She co-ordinates Ocean Sangha in Coffs Harbour is grateful to live on Gumbaynggirr lands where she works as a psychologist in private practice and facilitates compassionate, mindfulness-based trauma recovery programs and Insight Meditation Retreats.  Website: www.mindfulnesspsychologywellbeing.com 

Teaching Philosophy

My aspiration is to continue to support people, through an alchemy of ancient wisdom teachings and modern science, to cultivate inner and outer balance in meeting the social and environmental challenges we face collectively on the planet.