Meet Ben
IFS & Somatic Coach, Zen Student, and former Management Consultant
Ben Schoelzel -
Find Rest, Befriend Your Emotions
& Inner World
- Make easier decisions
- Find ways to rest the mind
- Explore & deal with unpleasant experiences & emotions
I lived my life for a long time by logic and reason and did the things I thought I should be doing to "be happy". The thing was - it didn't make me happy.
That made me wonder: What makes us truly happy? What is this thing we call "mind"? Why can our minds make us suffer?
One of the ways for me to engage with these questions is to meditate. It's also a powerful tool to map out our mind and thus our experience of the world.
I've done silent retreats, stay(ed) at Buddhist temples, trained as a children's hospice worker, and attended and hosted dozens of workshops and retreats around somatic bodywork.
That made me wonder: What makes us truly happy? What is this thing we call "mind"? Why can our minds make us suffer?
One of the ways for me to engage with these questions is to meditate. It's also a powerful tool to map out our mind and thus our experience of the world.
I've done silent retreats, stay(ed) at Buddhist temples, trained as a children's hospice worker, and attended and hosted dozens of workshops and retreats around somatic bodywork.
- Former management consultant
- Zen monk
- Lives in in Berlin at a Zen temple under guidance of Zen Master Gu Ja
After having been born and raised in Germany, my study days took me to the UK, Hong Kong, China, and Taiwan. During my life abroad, I also got in touch with meditation.
Living the life I thought I should be living, I joined the management consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and moved on through various profit-driven organizations, increasingly wondering "what is worth doing?".
Besides questioning the existing system in its overall purpose, I also realized that the system is built on exploitation: of oneself, of others, of the world around us.
Disgruntled, I started Deep Breath (now Samaṇa) with a friend of mine, partially wanting to become rich and famous (the should side of me), partially looking for ways to engage with my own suffering - something I had also done via training as a children's hospice worker, diving into the Berlin clubbing scene and various other distractions.
Over time, I realized that collaboration instead of competition needs to be one of the skills we train.
This requires empathy, understanding of the other, and presence. I also realized that life is best well-lived, rather than mapped out. That being stuck in our heads removes us from a large part of the experience of the world. I realized that suffering is part of the human experience and it makes most of us do crazy things!
That this is not the only way though.
This brought me to Samaṇa, an attempt to transform our minds and find ways to engage with ourselves more skillfully.
Living the life I thought I should be living, I joined the management consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and moved on through various profit-driven organizations, increasingly wondering "what is worth doing?".
Besides questioning the existing system in its overall purpose, I also realized that the system is built on exploitation: of oneself, of others, of the world around us.
Disgruntled, I started Deep Breath (now Samaṇa) with a friend of mine, partially wanting to become rich and famous (the should side of me), partially looking for ways to engage with my own suffering - something I had also done via training as a children's hospice worker, diving into the Berlin clubbing scene and various other distractions.
Over time, I realized that collaboration instead of competition needs to be one of the skills we train.
This requires empathy, understanding of the other, and presence. I also realized that life is best well-lived, rather than mapped out. That being stuck in our heads removes us from a large part of the experience of the world. I realized that suffering is part of the human experience and it makes most of us do crazy things!
That this is not the only way though.
This brought me to Samaṇa, an attempt to transform our minds and find ways to engage with ourselves more skillfully.
“
My life is my message.