Listen to Season 4 of AWAKEN

Isabella Rossellini grew up in Paris and Rome and is the daughter of actress Ingrid Bergman and director Roberto Rossellini. She started her career as a model, gracing the cover of over 500 magazines and representing the cosmetic line Lancôme for over 40 years. Rossellini made her cinematic debut as an actress in 1979 and has appeared in many films, including Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart, White Nights, Rodger Dodger, Cousins, Death Becomes Her, Fearless, Big Night, and Joy. She also lent her voice to the Disney-Pixar animated film The Incredibles.

Rossellini has a master’s degree in animal behavior and conservation and has received a PhD Honoris Causa from the science faculty at the University of Quebec at Montreal. She won several Webby awards for her short film series Green Porno, Seduce Me, and Mammas that offer comical and scientifically accurate insights into animal behavior. She also toured extensively worldwide with her theatrical monologues Green Porno and Link Link Circus.

Rossellini’s interests include the preservation of her family’s extraordinary cinematic heritage. She is the founder of Mama Farm, an organic farm in Brookhaven, NY.

Fatimah Asghar is an artist whose work spans different genres and themes. They have been featured in various outlets such as Time, NPR, Teen Vogue, and the Forbes 30 Under 30 List. They are the author of If They Come For Us and When We Were Sisters, which was longlisted for the National Book Award and won the Carol Shield’s Prize. Along with Safia Elhillo they co-edited an anthology for Muslim people who are also women, trans, gender non-conforming, and/or queer, Halal If You Hear Me. They are the writer and co-creator of the Emmy-nominated Brown Girls, and wrote and directed the short films Got Game and Retrieval. They are also a writer and co-producer on Ms. Marvel on Disney +, and wrote episode five, “Time and Again,” which was listed as one of the best TV episodes of 2022 in the New York Times and Hollywood Reporter.

Reem Assil is a Palestinian Syrian chef and activist, based in Oakland, California, working at the intersection of food, community, and social justice. She is the founder of nationally acclaimed Reem’s California, an Arab bakery and restaurant that builds community across cultures and experiences through the warmth of Arab bread and hospitality. Assil has garnered an array of top accolades in the culinary world, including James Beard finalist for Outstanding Chef and back-to-back semifinalist for Best Chef: West. Before dedicating herself to a culinary career, Assil spent over a decade as a community and labor organizer. Assil is the author of the IACP award-winning cookbook Arabiyya: Recipes from the Life of an Arab in Diaspora.

Richie Davidson is best known for his groundbreaking work studying emotion and the brain. A friend and confidante of the Dalai Lama, Time magazine named Dr. Davidson one of “The 100 Most Influential People in the World” in 2006. His research is broadly focused on the neural bases of emotion and emotional style, as well as methods to promote human flourishing; among these, meditation and related contemplative practices. He has conducted studies with individuals with emotional disorders such as mood and anxiety disorders and autism, as well as expert meditation practitioners with tens of thousands of hours of experience. His research uses a wide range of methods including different varieties of MRI, positron emission tomography, electroencephalography, and modern genetic and epigenetic methods. Dr. Davidson is the William James and Vilas Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin–Madison where he has been a faculty member since 1984. He is the founder of Healthy Minds Innovations, Inc., an external, affiliated nonprofit dedicated to supporting the mission of the Center for Healthy Minds.

Eve Ekman PhD, MSW, is a contemplative social scientist designing, delivering and evaluating tools to support emotional awareness in the fields of health care, well-being, and technology. She draws from interdisciplinary skills and first-person experiential knowledge from clinical social work, integrative medicine, and contemplative science and meditation. Ekman was raised in San Francisco with a love of New York bagels and social justice action and is a cold water ocean enthusiast.

Ross Gay is the New York Times bestselling author of the essay collections The Book of Delights and Inciting Joy and four books of poetry. His Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, and was a finalist for the National Book Award; and Be Holding won the 2021 PEN America Jean Stein Book Award. Gay is a founding board member of the Bloomington Community Orchard, a nonprofit, free-fruit-for-all food justice and joy project, and has received fellowships from Cave Canem, the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, and the Guggenheim Foundation. He teaches at Indiana University.

Jenny Odell is an Oakland-based artist and author of the books How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy, Inhabiting the Negative Space, and Saving Time: Discovering a Life Beyond the Clock. Her other writing has appeared in the New York Times, Atlantic, and Paris Review, and her visual work has been exhibited in museums and galleries internationally. Odell has been an artist in residence at Recology SF (otherwise known as the dump), the Internet Archive, and the San Francisco Planning Department. Between 2013 and 2021, she taught studio art at Stanford University.

Annabella Pitkin is associate professor of Buddhism and East Asian religions at Lehigh University. Her research focuses on Tibetan Buddhist modernity, Buddhist ideals of renunciation, miracle narratives, and Buddhist biographies. She received her BA from Harvard University and PhD in religion from Columbia University. She is the author of Renunciation and Longing: The Life of a Twentieth-Century Himalayan Buddhist Saint, which explores themes of non-attachment and teacher-student relationship in the life of Khunu Lama Tenzin Gyaltsen. More →

Prithvi Shrestha is a visual artist based in Lalitpur, Nepal. He draws inspiration from nature and his surroundings and aims to bridge the gap between the natural environment, technological progress, and human existence. His work looks into the interconnectedness of various elements in the universe, exploring the impact of technology on our sociocultural fabric. He has exhibited in five solo shows and has received several awards including The World Bank South Asia Region and the World Bank Art Program USA, Araniko Youth Award, and Himalayan Light Art Scholarship. Shrestha is the founder of Bindu, a space for artists.

Sonya Renee Taylor is a New York Times best-selling author; world-renowned activist and thought leader on racial justice, body liberation, and transformational change; international award-winning artist; and founder of The Body Is Not an Apology (TBINAA), a global digital media and education company that explored the intersections of identity, healing, and social justice through the framework of radical self-love. Sonya is the author of seven books, including The Body Is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self Love.

Asha Kama Wangdi’s journey in Western art began at school in Thimphu, but he chose to leave in order to become an apprentice, immersing himself in Bhutanese religious and traditional art at the National Fine Arts Centre. He later worked as an illustrator for the Bhutan Royal Government and earned a first-class honors degree from the Kent Institute of Art and Design in England in 1994. In 1997 Asha Kama Wangdi co-founded VAST Bhutan with two artists and has since mentored over 10,000 young individuals. In recognition of his contributions to art and the community, the artist was honored with the National Order of Merit (Gold) by His Majesty The King of Bhutan in 2010.

Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, the founder and spiritual director of Ligmincha International, is a respected and beloved teacher and meditation master in the Bon Buddhist tradition of Tibet. He has students in more than 25 countries, teaches around the world, and reaches thousands of students through his online programs. Trained as a Bon monk, Rinpoche now lives as a householder, allowing him to more fully relate to the needs and concerns of his students. Known for the depth of his wisdom and his unshakeable commitment to helping students recognize their true nature, he is the author ​of t​en books, including Wonders of the Natural Mind and the Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep.

Ocean Vuong is a writer, professor, and photographer and the author of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, winner of the American Book Award and The Mark Twain Award. The novel debuted for six weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and has since sold more than a million copies in 40 languages. A nominee for the National Book Award and a recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Grant, he is also the author of the poetry collections Time is a Mother, a finalist for the Griffin prize, and Night Sky with Exit Wounds, a New York Times Top 10 Book and winner of the T. S. Eliot Prize. Born in Saigon, Vietnam, and raised in Hartford, Connecticut, in a working-class family of nail salon and factory laborers, he currently splits his time between Northampton, Massachusetts, and New York City, where he serves as a professor in modern poetry and poetics in the MFA Program at New York University.