Gigi

I discovered meditation in 2015 during my sophomore year of college. I had stumbled into a class on the history and psychology of buddhist meditation, and I was introduced to a way of seeing and being in the world that completely changed my life. There was a mysterious, but unmistakable sense of familiarity with the ideas I was uncovering, which made this time in my life feel more like a homecoming than a new discovery. Something deep inside me was beginning to wake up. The world shimmered with beauty, connection, and life, and the pull to explore this mystery more fully was so strong that I decided to spend that summer on my own sort of pilgrimage. I spent three months traveling to different retreat centers and monasteries, and what I thought would be a brief dip into another world was actually the beginning of a long journey of discovery. Prior to my encounter with meditation, the sciences, particularly psychology and neuroscience, served as my primary means for investigating consciousness and the human experience. I quickly came to find that meditation was an equally valid (if not superior) tool for exploring reality and the mysteries of being alive.  And so with my Cognitive Neuroscience degree informing and corroborating my contemplative explorations, I dove even more fully into the path of meditation. And the melding of these two disciplines has become my life’s work.

I continued my academic study of the mind by mastering in Clinical Psychology with a concentration in spirituality & mind-body practice at Columbia University. I focused my studies on the investigation of spiritual and self-transcendent experiences. I also continued my direct investigation of the mind in my meditation practice. With over 700 hours of formal practice and 85 days on retreat, I’ve spent the last few years training at centers like Amaravati Buddhist Monastery, Insight Meditation Society, Spirit Rock, and the Monastic Academy. I’ve worked with a wide range of teachers, including Jack Kornfield, Ajahn Amaro, Robert Thurman, Sharon Salzberg, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Kristen Neff, Chris Germer, Michele McDonald, Jesse Maceo Vega-Frey, Soryu Forall, and Loch Kelly but I consider myself to be primarily a student of Har-Prakash Khalsa and Shinzen Young. This training led me to becoming a Level Two Unified Mindfulness Coach, where I work with groups and individuals interested in achieving greater insight into themselves and the world. 

Alongside my sister Kayla Falk, I am also the co-founder of Art of Human Being, where we combine positive psychology, cognitive neuroscience, behavior change science, and evidence-based contemplative practice in order to cultivate awakened hearts and minds.