Ellen profile picture

Ellen

I am here for Friends

About Me


Hello! Welcome to my page! Although I don't have the time or the skill to make it very visually interesting, please know that this page meets you with love, peace and joy!


A little about me:
I currently live in Ann Arbor, MI with my husband and daughter. We moved here for our work in July 2004 after spending 8 years in NYC. Life here is definitely slower than it was in NYC (and cheaper!), but we are grateful for our friends here in the midwest. If only there were some mountains here! At least there are lots of lakes (and lots of rain).

I meandered across the country before coming to Michigan. I grew up in Boston, then moved to California for college. In between college and medical school, I spent a wonderful summer at 2 different ashrams of the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centres (upstate NY and Quebec). During this time I was certified as a yoga instructor which began my interest in yoga as a spiritual practice.

Then, I moved to NYC for medical school and residency training. In addition to studying insight meditation (vipassana), I spent my free time listening to jazz (Small’s, St. Nick’s Pub), learning Spanish and eating lots of Dominican food (El Malecon!). I was fortunate to have two opportunities to go on extended metta and vipassana retreats at the Insight Meditation Center in Barre, Massachusetts during this time of my life.p
I moved to Ann Arbor, MI in July 2004 with my husband and cat (Nick – named after St. Nick’s Pub in Harlem) to start new jobs. On Feb 12, 2005, our beautiful daughter was born and life has not been the same!




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All beings tremble before violence. All fear death All love life

See your self in others. Then whom can you hurt? What harm can you do?

- Dhammapada 129-130

My Interests



Univerisal Health Coverage

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)
Vipassana (Insight meditation) Insight Meditation Center, Barre, MA

I'd like to meet:

Thich Naht Hahn, Paul Farmer, Ram Das, Alan Ball, Spike Lee, Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, Pema Chodron, Ajahn Chah, Starhawk, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, Bill Moyers

Music:

Phish
Chopin
A Tribe Called Quest
Pharcyde
Jungle Brothers
Incubus
The Urge
Pixies
Dead Can Dance
Throwing Muses
Miles Davis
The Grateful Dead
Tosca
Nightmares on Wax

Movies:

Doing Time, Doing Vipassana

Television:

Six Feet Under
Northern Exposure
Charmed

Books:



The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin

Peace is Every Step by Thich Naht Han

Mary Oliver's poetry

Rumi's Poetry

Tolkien's books

The Mists of Avalon

Heroes:



Nelson Mandela
Dipa Ma
His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet

My Blog

Survival Flight Crash & Organ Donation

On Monday, a Survival Flight from University of Michigan Health System crashed in lake Michigan with a transplant team on board.  This event has been very upsetting to me and my family, espe...
Posted by Ellen on Wed, 06 Jun 2007 06:11:00 PST

Remembering 9/11/2001

Don't really have any plan about what I'm writing today.  I just feel a need to express my strong emotions today. A little over 2 years ago, I moved from Manhattan to Ann Arbor and it is remarkab...
Posted by Ellen on Mon, 11 Sep 2006 09:22:00 PST

Trying to change?

Since last writing in this web log, I have been struggling. Struggling to avoid my usual escapes and addictions.  Struggling with despair over the realization of how "checked out" from reality&nb...
Posted by Ellen on Mon, 04 Sep 2006 12:15:00 PST

Rumi's words

Come, come, whoever you are. Wonderer, worshipper, lover of leaving. It doesn't matter. Ours is not a caravan of despair. Come, even if you have broken your vow a thousand times Come, yet again, come...
Posted by Ellen on Mon, 04 Sep 2006 12:39:00 PST