Teachers

There are seven teachers altogether:
Christopher, Christelle, Denis, Ellaya, Ken, Chad and Ian

Christopher Titmuss is a former Buddhist monk in Thailand and India, Christopher teaches Awakening and Insight Meditation around the world. He has been teaching annually the Bodh Gaya retreats since 1975. He is the founder and director of the Dharma Facilitators Programme. He gives retreats, participates in Yatras (pilgrimages) and facilitates Dharma gatherings. A senior Dharma teacher in the West, he is the author of numerous books books including Light on Enlightenment and Transforming Our Terror and also editor of the quarterly Dharma e-Newsletter. Christopher is the co-founder of Gaia House, Devon, and lives in Totnes, Devon, England.
www.insightmeditation.org

Denis Robberechts was born in Belgium in 1969, Denis awoke to spirituality by being raised by a mother who herself is genuinely spiritual. His first practices at young age were martial arts. In the year 2000, he started learning music as a spiritual path under the guidance of Shri Parashuram Pandey, in Varanasi. After several self retreats, he met Christopher and Jaya in 2003 and found around them the support and inspiration of the sangha. He started to help with the teachings in 2005. Denis can be contacted by email at:

Christelle Bonneau who lives in a simple environment with her family near Foix, Tolouse, France, has facilitated groups in previous French Yatras, as well as led bhajans during the Yatra. Christelle is one of the organizers for this year's yatra. She has years of contact with the Dharma including intensive 10 day retreats and trips to India.

Ellaya Ayal Mor has been practising Dharma for the past 13 years or so. She experiences the path as being a long, ongoing, very beautiful process of unfolding, maturing, and deepening. She has spent extensive time in India, sitting retreats with Christopher Titmuss and other teachers, she has participated in two Israeli DFP's, and is an active member of Tovana, the Israeli insight association. Ellaya is a storyteller by profession and regards stories and storytelling to be an integral and inseparable part of her path. She finds stories to be powerful teaching and healing tools, that have the capacity to reflect life on its many levels and nuances, enhancing beauty, mystery, insight and wisdom.

Ian Davidson has been practising and exploring the Dharma for around 10 years in India and the West. He lives most of the year in the Moulin de Chaves meditation centre, an hour from Bergerac in the southern part of France, a centre he co-founded with Martin and Gail Aylward three years ago. The centre hosts a wide variety of dharma events, gatherings and workshops as well as living as a community. Ian also engages in forest restoration work in northern Scotland for the last seven years. This is part of the SanghaSeva initiative where we blending inner connection with service work in the outer world. Ian will be a co-manager of the Bodh Gaya retreats in January 2009. Ian’s exploration embraces Buddha Dharma and Advaita (non-Duality).

Chad Bennett from the USA has enjoyed solitude, especially in the outdoors, from an early age and in 2003 he formally stumbled upon the Dharma while volunteering as an English teacher in Thailand. He still considers the wilderness, in its raw changeable beauty, to be his primary teacher. An outdoor education instructor for over a decade, he co-founded "Inward Journey/Outward Bound®" in collaboration with the Shambhala Mountain Center, Colorado, USA. These programs integrated solitude and meditation with camping skills and physical movement activities including backpacking, rock climbing and canoeing. Since 2004, Chad has spent his winters in India, on pilgrimmage and practicing meditation. He has served as manager for Christopher’s annual Bodhgaya retreats since 2006.

Ken Streat was 19 years old when he travelled to India in 1976. His inner journey started with a youthful broken heart and the arising of the question, 'Is there an openness of heart that is completely free?' In searching for an answer to that question (and many others), he spent several years practicing Vipassana with SN Goenka and other teachers in The U Ba Khin tradition in both India and Burma. His inspiration for enquiry has come from the teachings and meetings with J Krishnamurti, Nisargadatta Maharaj and Ramana Maharshi. He sat with Christopher in Bodhgaya in 1983, in 1985 he came to Devon to manage at Gaia House. He has have lived near Totnes since that time. From 1985 to 2005 he was a trustee of Gaia House. Ken works for himself as a furniture maker and has written a book about his years on the road called Captain Buddha and his Amazing Dukkha Machine.