Born in the U.S, where she studied religion and art at Harvard, Ashmore began practicing meditation in 1985 and was authorized to teach in 1998. A gentle revolutionary, she has taught meditation through deep rest on silent, intensive retreats in a dozen countries. She has spent most of her adult life living in India with her teachers, and her nonprofit Open Dharma has supported awakening in thousands of people from any and no religion since 1999. In her teachings, Jaya Ashmore integrates her own love of meditation—and of life—with deep experience in the traditions of Buddhism, yoga, Advaita (non-duality), Christianity and Hindu mysticism, as well as ecology, embodied movement, and the Japanese art of Jin Shin Jyutsu.