Ex Officio Member, Board of Directors & Guiding Teacher

Born in 1975 in the Himalayan border regions between Tibet and Nepal, Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche is a much-loved and accomplished Tibetan Buddhist meditation teacher. His profound yet accessible teachings and playful sense of humor have endeared him to students around the world. Most uniquely, Rinpoche’s teachings weave together his own personal experiences with modern scientific research, relating both to the practice of meditation. He founded Tergar Meditation Community in 2009.

Member, Board of Directors

Ebi Atawodi believes in building sustainable products that can fundamentally change and impact people’s lives. She is currently on the product team at Netflix, as Director of Payments for Europe Middle East and Africa. Before that she was Head of Product at Uber leading the team based in Amsterdam focusing on global payments experiences across all Uber apps. Ebi started out with Uber as General Manager for Lagos in 2014 with a handful of cars on the road and grew to become Uber’s General Manager for West Africa growing it to a top 20 EMEA region.

Before Uber, she was Head of Corporate Communications and Sponsorships at Etisalat – where she created the Etisalat Prize for Literature – Africa’s most prestigious literary prize. She spent the first part of her career as a Full Stack Engineer working for various global brands such as Nokia, Booz & Company (now Strategy&), GlaxoSmithKlein, Channel 4 and Bupa. She holds a Bachelors with Honours in Electrical Electronics Engineering from the University of Nottingham and a Masters in Computing Science from Imperial College London with a focus on Artificial Intelligence and Infographics. Ebi is a competitive Hobie Cat sailor, an amateur rower, and passionate scuba diver (PADI rescue diver).

Member, Board of Directors

Sybelle has more than 40 years of professional experience, mostly as an executive at a large Caterpillar dealership in Brazil. She served mainly as head of Strategy and HR and in 2019 was trained to take over as a Board Member of Sotreq and SotreqPar – related companies. Sybelle is a psychologist, with an Executive MBA in management and strategy development at Warthon and the London Business School, having been a teacher of strategy and HR in postgraduate courses for 25 years, in addition to acting as a psychodramatist. President of Instituto Social Sotreq a non-profit company with 16 years of social work focused on the professional qualification of young people from underprivileged communities. She is still training as a social entrepreneur and currently mentoring young people in social vulnerability. In 2009 she attended the Mahamudra and took refuge with Mingyur Riponche, followed by the retreat in Minneapolis and the “Return to Nubri” pilgrimage in 2011. Since then, she has been participating and coordinating programs together with the Tergar Brasil team, having trained as a Tergar Facilitator in 2014.

Member, Board of Directors

Eliza Cheung is a clinical psychologist specializing in disaster mental health. She holds a PhD in Public Health and her practice, fieldwork, and research responds to natural disasters, disease outbreaks, and human-made disasters globally. Eliza has been learning meditation from Mingyur Rinpoche since 2006 and has been a facilitator with Tergar Asia. She has been a member of the Tergar Hong Kong and Tergar Asia management teams since 2014 and currently sits on the Board of Directors of Tergar Asia.

Executive Director, Instructor, and Member, Board of Directors

Cortland Dahl has practiced meditation for twenty-five years and is actively involved in the scientific study of meditation. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin, where he was mentored by renowned neuroscientist Dr. Richard Davidson, and an M.A. in Buddhist Studies from Naropa University. As an author and translator, Cortland has published numerous scientific articles and works on Buddhist philosophy and meditation. He currently serves as Chairman of Tergar International and as a Research Scientist and Chief Contemplative Officer at UW-Madison’s Center for Healthy Minds.

Chairman, Board of Directors

Rasmus Hougaard is the founder and managing director of the Potential Project, the global leader in mindful leadership and mindful organizations. They help leaders and organizations enhance performance, innovation and resilience through mindfulness and other practices grounded in neuroscience and research. Rasmus is based in Denmark and New York. He has a deep experience with dharma organizations, including as a teacher, center director, and board member.

Member, Board of Directors, and Tergar Instructor

Tim Olmsted has been a student of meditation for the past forty-five years. For twelve of those years, he lived in Nepal, working as a psychotherapist and studying with many of the greatest Buddhist teachers of our time, including Mingyur Rinpoche’s father, Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche. Tim is the founder, with Mingyur Rinpoche, of The Yongey Foundation and a senior instructor and cofounder of Mingyur Rinpoche’s community, Tergar International. Tim has also served as the director of Gampo Abbey, the largest Buddhist monastery in North America. He is the president of the Pema Chödrön Foundation.

Treasurer, Board of Directors

Annie Rosen is a strategic finance professional with nearly 20 years of experience in finance, strategy, and investing. She spent 14 years at Fidelity Investments as an Analyst and Portfolio Manager. She is currently Chief Financial Officer at Hologram, Inc. and serves as Chair of the Board of Directors at Fuller Craft Museum. Annie received a BA from Wellesley College with a major in Economics and a minor in Mathematics. With a particular interest in the intersection between meditation, science, and daily life, she has been a student of Mingyur Rinpoche since 2008 and involved with Tergar since its founding in 2009.

Member, Board of Directors

Khaldoun Shehadeh spent the past decade in various roles in the technology startup space, such as Chief Financial Officer, founder, VC investor, angel, and mentor. He specializes in early-stage companies and particularly enjoys building team capabilities, exploring creative business modeling, and growth strategies. Having lived in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, being born of mixed heritage parents and spending most of his life in international environments, Khaldoun is committed to promoting inclusive settings, appreciating differences, and celebrating people and cultures’ uniqueness. Since his teenage years, he has had a keen appreciation of the depth and efficacy of Buddhist philosophy and methods, growing up on a steady diet of books and instructions on the topic complemented by years of close interaction with well-respected teachers.