Kaira Jewel Lingo is a dharma teacher who has a lifelong interest in blending spirituality and meditation with social justice. She is the author of We Were Made for These Times: Ten Lessons in Moving through Change, Loss and Disruption, and editor of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh’s Planting Seeds: Practicing Mindfulness with Children.
Kaira grew up in an ecumenical Christian community where families practiced a new kind of monasticism and worked with the poor. At the age of 25 she entered a Buddhist monastery in the Plum Village tradition and spent 15 years living as a nun under the guidance of Thich Nhat Hanh. She became a Zen teacher in 2007, and is also a teacher in the Vipassana Insight lineage through Spirit Rock Meditation Center.
Now based in New York, Kaira teaches and leads retreats internationally, provides spiritual mentoring, and interweaves art, play, nature, racial and earth justice, and embodied mindfulness practice in her teaching.