Jess has held leadership roles in top philanthropies, UN agencies, and social justice organizations around the world. She is a dynamic speaker across global stages, a sought-after speechwriter, and social change strategist. She has coached and mentored hundreds, from early-career to executive-level, to find and amplify their authentic voices. Jess’ recent work has centered on contemplative practice, finding joy in embodiment, and deepening connection to the natural world.

Jess was born exactly on her due date in the heart of New York City, the middle of three girls. She is the descendent of hearty witches, druid priestesses, and survivors from across Ireland, Germany, and other unknown lands. She carries an illuminating energy that allows her to plumb the depths of darkness while viewing the holographic truth of reality with a wicked sense of humor.

Jess studied religion and philosophy on academic scholarship as an undergraduate where she fell in love with the French mystic Simone Weil and did an independent study on Suffering. She lived for a year in Spain, and has since visited nearly 50 countries. Jess completed graduate work in Buddhist Studies at Harvard Divinity School, during which she was awarded a grant to spend several months living and working with Tibetan Buddhist nuns in remote northern India, focusing on health literacy and self-sufficiency. This led her out of the academy and into reproductive justice.

In 2007, she joined Planned Parenthood as a storyteller of abortion access in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, and on the weekends served as an abortion counselor at an NYC clinic. Later, as a board member for an abortion fund, she continued her work to affirm and hold space for those seeking agency in the face of stigma and oppression. She is a fierce advocate for gender liberation and justice, and roots for womxn, always. In recent times, her advocacy for reproductive justice has expanded into the birth world, holding space for the many wild experiences of womb bearers and painting placentas.

In 2012, she moved to Bangkok on a one-way ticket, cut and bleached her hair, and spent much of the next 15 months riding around on the back of a motorcycle while working for the United Nations. Jess regularly seeks physical, spiritual, and emotional experiences to challenge and refine her power, and she shape shifts and alchemizes rhythmically.

Jess is a meditation and yoga teacher, and Tibetan Buddhist practitioner. She is a lifelong student and practitioner of dharma, especially as it relates to the womb, death and dying, plants and the natural world, and anything edge, liminal, or wacky. She is based in Los Angeles with her husband, a new baby, a dog, and many, many happy houseplants.

Jess was trained in classical ballet at a young age and began practicing yoga around the same time. She danced with a local ballet company for 10 years, performing regularly in darker roles such as the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland and Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty; no fairies or princesses for her.

Her first experiences of meditation were accompanying her mother to the Siddha Yoga Ashram in upstate New York and practicing darshan with Gurumayi Chidvilasananda. Jess spent the next several decades in deep exploration of both movement and meditation, as they meandered closer toward convergence in her practices.

Jess views movement as a conduit for healing and has explored its many forms: competing in Spartan races and on Harvard’s bhangra dance team, exploring sacred feminine embodiment work and CrossFit, and practicing thousands of surya namaskars over the years.

In 2007, while completing her Master’s at Harvard University, Jess spent several months deepening her practice with Tibetan Buddhist nuns in remote northern India. She started studying meditation more formally after that, through Shambhala, in 2018 completed a 200-hour teaching mindfulness certification. Jess studied under Ethan Nichtern and Dr. Shanté Paradigm Smalls, with whom she took her refuge vows. She is now a member of the Bhumisparsha sangha.

In 2021, Jess left a busy globe-trotting job and moved into her campervan with her husband and dog, taking much-needed space to devote herself to contemplative practices. During that time, she became a yoga teacher and began teaching earth-inspired yoga (from the van) as she crawled up the Sierra Nevadas from Southern California to Canada and back.

Since then, Jess has completed hundreds more hours of additional training and deep study on topics ranging from anatomy and alignment in yoga to advanced meditation practices of the Vajrayana Buddhist tradition.

Jess’ mission is to create space that welcomes all bodies and enables a deeper experience of presence, self-efficacy, and joy. Her yoga classes are joyful, creative, and trauma-informed, weaving philosophy, metaphor, and humor. She draws inspiration from the natural world in its present state, Katonah yoga, Tibetan Buddhism, and the power of sound.

Jess wants her students to feel cared for, seen, and affirmed so that they can meet themselves where they are and go deeper if they choose. She balances reverence for yogic and Buddhist history with a sense of lightness about life and herself. She is honored to hold space in this way and grateful to her many teachers, her teachers’ teachers, and the lineages that enable her to do so.

Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy + Religion, Boston University

Master of Theological Studies, Buddhist Studies, Harvard Divinity School

200-hour Yoga Teacher Certification, Y7 Studio (200RYT, Yoga Alliance)

200-hour Mindfulness Teacher Certification, Shambhala NYC

Seven Homecomings Certification Course with Lama Rod Owens

Trauma and Embodied Social Justice in Yoga, Collective Resilience

Inspired Sequencing, Y7 Studio

Intensive Katonah study with Abbie Galvin of The Studio

Embodied Prenatal: The Art of Holding Space, Y7 Studio (Amanda Valdes)

Senior Fitness Specialist, American College of Exercise

Extensive training on social justice equity + inclusion with Funders for Reproductive Equity, Population Works Africa, Adaway Group, Thousand Currents, The Management Center, and Midwest Academy.

Death Doula training, Sacred Crossings; ongoing study on death and dying with Upaya Zen Center, Shoji, and Pure Land Farms (Death and Dying in the Vajrayana Tradition with Lama Justin Von Bujdoss).

Ongoing study with Alexandra Roxo on sacred femininity and creative embodiment.

Member of Bhumisparsha sangha (founded by Lama Rod Owens and Lama Justin Von Bujdoss)