Joyful Mind Project

who we are

Meet our leadership team

Samara Dotson, Co-Executive Director, (she/her) has supported the growth of many nonprofit and grassroots organizations, including those with missions of disrupting youth homelessness, Intimate Partner Violence, and climate injustice.  She’s a dedicated mindfulness practitioner and served as a core member of the Youth and Family Program at San Francisco Zen Center, supporting families through engaged Buddhist practice.

As a female-identified single parent, Samara is utilizing a liberation frame for raising children, educating outside of traditional school systems, and supporting families interested in alternative education. She is happy to support JMP’s mission of bringing ease and equity, joy and justice into the world.

On the weekends you might find her hiking trails, wading in tide pools, analyzing the health of trees in their ecologies, investigating and investing in Afro-Indigenous farming methods, indulging in her passion for photography, or participating in communities dedicated to compassionate action.

Karyl Averill, Co-Executive Director & Financial Officer,(she/her) is a fierce, female-identified single parent with lived experience navigating social, economic, and gender-based inequity. She is dedicated to helping community heal from late stage capitalism and determined to bring a gift economy forward so that inequity and injustice might yield to abundance and sustainability.

As a community organizer and systems thinker, Karyl worked at the ground level of Occupy Wall Street where she honed skills for utilizing non-hierarchical organizational structures that foster equity from the inside out.  As an essential member of JMP’s leadership team, Karyl oversees the organization’s finances, including initiatives with JMP as the fiscal sponsor. Her vision of a world beyond the scarcity perpetuated through dominant culture norms is a guiding light.

Karyl has supported JMP since before its inception, helping initiate the organization’s classification as a nonprofit 501c3 in 2016. On the weekend, you might find Karyl working in the garden, making soup for a friend, or helping create abundance within community and family systems.   

Tara Stafford, MSW, LCSW #29674 (she/her) has over seventeen years of experience. She possesses extensive experience in direct clinical practice, social services program development, nonprofit work, as well as education, training and development of students, interns and staff. She spent five years teaching at California State University East Bay's School of Social Work.

Tara currently owns a private practice and offers telehealth and in person services in Sonoma County. In her role at Joyful Mind Project, Tara provides clinical supervision and is helping develop structures and policies that support the growth of the organization.

On the weekend, you might find her camping, spending time with her family, practicing yoga and offering women's circles in her community. Tara can be found @ tarastafford.org

Chelsea True, MA, CMI, AMFT #127199 (she/they) is dedicated to working with people who have been historically denied access to resources. Her work as a psychotherapist is rooted in Buddhist Psychology, Liberation Psychologies, and Feminist Psychotherapy. As a Registered Associate Marriage and Family Therapist, Chelsea’s clinical work is supervised by Tara Stafford, MA, LCSW #29674

Chelsea holds a Master of Arts degree in Counseling Psychology and is an Adjunct Lecturer at California Institute of Integral Studies. She is a also Certified Mindfulness Instructor (CMI) and holds a certificate in Integral Somatic Trauma Therapy from the Embody Lab. She served as the Youth & Family Programs Coordinator at San Francisco Zen Center for nearly a decade.

On the weekends, you might find her playing with her dog on the beach or working to create a nurturance culture where people of all backgrounds and abilities can thrive.

Morgan Hewitt, MA has been practicing mindfulness in the Soto Zen lineage of Suzuki Roshi for nineteen years, serves on the Joyful Mind Project Board of Directors, and has studied with Mindful Schools, a leader in mindfulness education.  She earned a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Washington, a Master of Arts in Special Education from California State Sacramento, and an Master of Arts in Journalism at the University of Wisconsin Madison.  She has been an educator for twenty-five years.  Ms. Hewitt was also a guidance counselor for ten years and has worksd as a Certified Health Navigator at Sonoma Valley Hospital in the Cancer Support Clinic, which provides complimentary therapies including mindfulness to people going through cancer treatments and those in remission from cancer.  As an experienced educator, a seasoned mindfulness practitioner, and a certified health-navigator, Ms. Hewitt is well qualified to oversee the efficacy of our projects.

Mark Stefanski, MS, CMI is a Mindful Schools Certified Mindfulness Instructor, serves on the Joyful Mind Project Board of Directors, and has enjoyed teaching mindfulness in our after school programs.  He has taught high school science for more than thirty years, serving on the faculty of Marin Academy in San Rafael. Mark has held positions as Marin Academy’s Dean of Freshmen, its inaugural H.D. Thoreau Faculty Chair for promoting education for environmental sustainability, and as the leader for the Senior Vision Quest Program.  Embracing a model centered on peer education, Mark leads teen mindfulness circles in San Rafael and consults with mindfulness programs in other Bay Area schools and youth organizations.

meet some of our collaborators

Shelly Hughes, Herbalist, Mindfulness Instructor, has worked with youth of all ages, sharing her passion for the inter-related worlds of nature and mindfulness.  She is an artist, a gardener, and a mother — and possesses a fierce love for native and medicinal plants. Shelly holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Biology and brings nearly a decade of experience as an Environmental Educator in Sonoma County to her work.  Shelly is a seasoned meditation practitioner and is lay-ordained in the Soto Zen lineage of Suzuki Roshi. She served as a core member of the Youth and Family Program at San Francisco Zen Center, supporting families through engaged Buddhist practice, and has studied with Mindful Schools.  Shelly first brought her expertise and joyful presence to the JMP team in 2018, weaving nature-based practices into our after school and summer programs.

Susi Brennan, MA, CMI is a Mindful Schools Certified Mindfulness Instructor and has taught in public schools for over twenty years and now helps create school-wide mindfulness programs in the Bay Area. Her work in schools and the communities they serve has fed a passion for social justice through building reflective and compassionate learning communities.  She believes strongly that teachers and staff who embody mindfulness and compassion have the greatest impact on the well-being of the whole school community.  Susi sat on the guest panel at the first retreat held by JMP’s Mindful Educators Alliance, has shared mindfulness in our after school programs, and served as a thought-partner for school-wide implementation at Bayside Martin Luther King Jr. Academy in Marin City.

Jylani Ma’at Brown, CMI is a Mindful Schools Certified Mindfulness Instructor, founder of the Practice Peace Project, and a veteran educator bringing many years of experience within public, private, and independent schools to her work with youth.  She is extremely deliberate about integrating diverse, children’s literature and culturally relevant content into the programming.  Social justice and issues of global competence are frequent themes in her work that encourage preliminary and deeper contemplation.  As a woman, mother and teacher of African descent, jylani takes pride in creating space for both her cultural heritage and expression to be an integral part of her mindfulness practice. Jylani encourages and facilitates programs that offer every participant the opportunity to fully see themselves in the moment and to honor their culture in their practice as well. She served as a thought-partner for initiating school-wide implementation at Bayside Martin Luther King Jr. Academy in Marin City.

Steve Stonearrow, Native American storyteller, traditional Lakota Medicine Man, and member of the Little Thunder Medicine Society.  Steve is a cherished Joyful Mind Project guest teacher and has shared his gift of storytelling with the children in our after-school programs and at our Family Mindfulness Days.  We’re looking forward to Steve's return and the honor of receiving his powerful medicine during these challenging times.

Pam Walton, MA, LMFT, CMI is and Mindful Schools Certified Mindfulness Instructor and is currently serving as a Mental Health Clinician for the Napa Valley Unified School District (NVUSD). She holds master’s degrees in Physiology and Clinical Psychology and is certified in Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT).  Pam has been studying and practicing mindfulness for over thirty years, including several years in intensive retreat settings. She currently teaches mindfulness and leads trainings on mindfulness, mental health and trauma. Pam co-led the Mindful Educators Alliance, a Joyful Mind Project initiative that brought a series of retreats and trainings to the Northern San Francisco Bay Area. She has a small private psychotherapy practice in Napa.

With Gratitude to our dedicated team

Many of the people supporting our organization provide services on a volunteer or sliding scale basis, allowing us to offer low-cost programs, with no one ever turned away for a lack of funds. The generosity of our partners allows abundance to grow in our communities and in the world.