A personal note from our outgoing Executive Director:
After nearly 12 years of life-changing work with SIYLI, I am departing from the team this month. For me, this is the absolute definition of a bittersweet change. When I joined SIYLI in 2013 as a new mom in a coordinator role, I still held unspoken beliefs that both work-life balance and emotionally intelligent teams were fundamentally impossible things.
With gratitude, I can say that the staff and community at SIYLI have made a believer of me time and again. From the mindful-listening dyads held at regular staff meetings by co-founder and first CEO Marc Lesser, to weekly meditations together for a decade, to the team offsites held on a picnic table where my colleague Auri Whitaker led us in unpacking the liberatory consciousness framework—this team has continued to raise the bar for bringing deep awareness into every moment of our collective work. I have learned through real practice with my colleagues that it is possible to bring our full selves—emotions, passions, agendas, conflicts and all—to the work, and that this both feeds our success and enables us to care for ourselves.
As we shifted to focus on supporting the public sector in 2022, I found myself delighted at the chance to serve those bringing their compassion to the front lines of our world, and I have been floored by the dedication and love that our constituents bring to their work. And given so much global change and uncertainty, which only seems to be accelerating, we keep hearing that incorporating emotional resilience and awareness-based (self!)compassion are needed now more than ever.
For this reason, I am excited for SIYLI to usher in a new phase of building on our work with our team, Auri Whitaker and Malene Bell, and our new Executive Director (returning to SIYLI after several years running contemplative nonprofits), Peter Weng. I am humbled by the energy and expertise this team brings, and I see their wisdom as the path to SIYLI’s ongoing moonshot—to support those serving the world to deeply thrive through mindfulness and compassion tools.
For my part, I am heeding the call to return to family (my son, who was a baby when I joined, just turned 12!), and after a few months’ time to start my own path of supporting individuals and groups through coaching, facilitation, and contemplative modalities. Collaborating and contemplating with the SIYLI community–with you—has been truly one of the greatest gifts that life could offer. And I look forward to the exciting next chapter for SIYLI!
With heart,
Lindsey Kugel
Meet SIYLI's new Executive Director:
Peter Weng is returning to SIYLI after founding the EWS Collective, which is focused on supporting nonprofit environmental and social justice organizations to increase mental well-being and mission-attainment. He was also previously the CEO of Healthy Minds Innovations, affiliated with the Center for Healthy Minds neuroscience research center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
In Peter’s first stint at SIYLI, he was the Chief Business Officer. Peter spent many years as a technology executive at Google, including as the Director of Search Quality Evaluation, and in multiple roles in Dell, Inc. He has worked in the United States, United Kingdom, China, and Poland and also held management and engineering positions in industrial water treatment at Rohm and Haas and Argo Scientific.
Peter serves on boards and advisory councils for organizations related to the arts, contemplative practice, Asian American Pacific Islander advocacy, and outdoor education. He also was a semi-professional rollerskate dancer and performing musician. Peter's contemplative practice is rooted in Ch'an Buddhist and Insight Meditation practices and he has been a Search Inside Yourself teacher for more than 12 years.
Peter holds a bachelor’s degree in agricultural and biological engineering from Cornell University and master’s degrees in environmental engineering and international business from the University of California, Los Angeles.