Meditation and Meetings with a Teacher

Come Sit With Us

Weekly Meditation:

Mondays

CityZen meets in person in Santa Rosa twice a month and via zoom every Monday evening at 7:00pm for: silent seated meditation, walking meditation, dharma talk, tea, and discussion. Please contact gbrandt@sonic.net to receive the link or the notices to attend these evenings. 

Wednesdays:

Deanna Hopper leads a Wednesday evening meditation program via zoom. Please contact: deannarhopper@gmail.com to receive the link.

4th Monday of the Month

Open Sit and Meeting with a Teacher

On the 4th Monday of the month, the evening will consist of open unstructured meditation and will also include a meeting with a teacher via Zoom, if you so choose. Please contact gbrandt@sonic.net to receive the link or the notices to attend these evenings. 

In Person, Zoom, or telephone Meetings with a Teacher by appointment:

You may contact: 
Rachel Mansfield-Howlett Roshi directly at rhowlettlaw@gmail.com
Michelle Brandt Sensei at koanview@gmail.com 
and Gary Brandt Sensei at gbrandt@sonic.net.

(Dana Donation for Meetings With a Teacher is based on a sliding scale as you are able to contribute: minimum suggested amount is $35)

Our Teachers

Rachel Mansfield-Howlett Roshi (Western Dragon)

Rachel is a public interest environmental attorney, Zen Roshi, and Professor of Law with degrees in botany, environmental horticulture, and law.

Born into a family of ranchers, farmers, and schoolteachers in rural Oklahoma she moved with her family to southern California in the 1960s, attended college in Chico and settled in Sonoma County in the early 70s with her husband, Brian Fuke Howlett, an artist and Zen teacher in a separate lineage. Rachel traces her Chickasaw heritage through her maternal grandfather, a descendant of former Chickasaw leader Daugherty (Winchester) Colbert.

Rachel founded CityZen in 2011, offering a style of Zen practice for modern American life. A 40-year practitioner of Zen, she was authorized to teach Zen and koans in 2003 and received full transmission, Inka Shomei, in 2009 in the Pacific Zen School lineage from John Tarrant Roshi. Complimentary to her environmental law practice, she teaches a western style of Zen that emphasizes social justice, environmental, and community values.

She is a regular speaker on Monday nights and offers 'Meetings With a Teacher' by appointment. (See 'About Us' page for more information)

Deanna Rose Hopper Sensei (Lotus Dragon)

All things are made of compassion — I believe you have to touch the suffering that is within your reach.

Deanna Rose Hopper is an old hand at Zen, having practiced for thirty years. She was authorized to teach in 2019, and received dharma transmission as Sensei in 2023 from Rachel Mansfield-Howlett Roshi in the Pacific Zen lineage. She is the holding teacher for the Fort Bragg sangha, a branch of CityZen, meeting every second Wednesday at Evergreen UMC, Fort Bragg.

A longtime cancer survivor, Deanna has a BA in English and worked as a massage therapist and preschool teacher for many years. She is now retired and lives with her husband and cat in beautiful Fort Bragg.

Asked why she agreed to teach, Deanna speaks of gratitude to her many Zen teachers at PZI and CityZen. “They threw me a lifeline, and it saved my life. I finally connected with koans through my love of poetry. Some took me down to a very deep place. There, I knew, in my body, that the hands and eyes of Guanyin are undeniable —that all things are made of compassion, and that this is so in all circumstances.”

Rachel Mansfield Howlett Roshi says of Deanna: “More than anyone I know in the dharma, Deanna brings the awakening of the koans into her daily life, and teaches them in that way. She works with them in an extended manner, taking all the time she needs with a koan. Deanna is an emotive, passionate teacher, “Service is central to my life. You have to touch the suffering that is within your reach.”

Deanna is a regular speaker at CityZen’s Monday Night and Wednesday Night Meditation. 

Michelle Brandt Sensei (True World)

Michelle came to Zen in her early twenties and took Buddhist vows in 1989. In 2016, she received dharma transmission as Sensei from Rachel Mansfield-Howlett Roshi in the Pacific Zen lineage. 

Since 2005, Michelle has been studying Japanese tea ceremony (Urusenke) as an extension of her Zen practice. She has also trained to provide interfaith spiritual direction, intrinsic coaching, medical qigong and hypnotherapy. She is currently working with the Harmony Union School District in Occidental and has a wonderful hypnotherapy practice in Santa Rosa.

Michelle’s teaching is grounded in beauty and curiosity. Her experiences with Zen consistently reinforce the wonder and joy of everyday things and she values the healing, grounding, and perspectives the Zen koan tradition offers.

She explains, “The Way meets you right where you are, as you are. Can we do the same? This practice asks us to attend to our lives and to ask questions. If you are curious by nature and willing to cast a light on your own mind, relaxing your notions of how things are or ought to be, your life can reveal itself to you in unexpected and welcome ways. As a person who lived through and with illness, abuse, anxiety, depression, criticism and fear, I was drawn to the unencumbered, “clean slate” of Zen. I wanted and expected understanding, clarity, even mastery, but what I’ve received is a deep gratitude for life and a foundational experience of belonging. Being here is a gift, everything around us confirms it.” Rachel Mansfield-Howlett Roshi says, “Michelle reveals the beauty and awakening that can be found in the intimate moments of life when you're able to meet this moment as it is.”

Michelle is a regular speaker at CityZen’s Monday night meditation and offers 'Meetings With a Teacher' by appointment. 

Gary Brandt Sensei (Community Dragon)

Gary is a Santa Rosa native and writer of fiction. He has worked as a bartender, bookseller, editor, and teacher, and holds a B.A. in Liberal Arts. 

A 30-year practitioner of Zen, Gary first doing koan work with John Tarrant Roshi and Joan Sutherland Roshi. He began practicing with CityZen in 2011 and received authorization to teach as Sensei from Rachel Mansfield-Howlett Roshi in 2023. Gary was given the dharma name Community Dragon. 

He is keenly interested in the way the koan curriculum—an uncanny literary tradition in its own right—enlists the imagination to route us back to our native joy. He believes Zen is essentially a practice of the heart.

Gary is a regular Monday night speaker and offers 'Meetings with a Teacher' by appointment. He also leads quarterly walks in nature 'A Walk in the Park' as a silent dharma practice.  

  Chris Bell Sensei (Dragon Song)

Chris is an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister with a lifelong interest in religion and spiritual matters. He grew up in a liberal Christian church in Cleveland, Ohio and was introduced to Zen and Taoism by his mother, a spiritual seeker in her own right. He earned a B.A. in religious studies from Cleveland State University in 1993, and a M.Div. from Harvard Divinity School in 2005. He started practicing Zen in 1995 under the instruction of Richard Baker Roshi at the Crestone Mountain Zen Center in Colorado. He was introduced to the Rinzai koan curriculum in 2001 by Rev. James Ford and the teachers of Boundless Way Zen in Massachusetts. 

After moving to California to become the minister of the local U.U. congregation, Chris connected with his current and lasting teacher, Rachel Mansfield-Howlett Roshi. Roshi Rachel invited Chris to begin giving dharma talks in 2017, and in 2023 she gave him dharma transmission as Sensei in the Pacific Zen lineage. 

Chris’s teaching emphasizes the joyful insights and playful activity of Zen. “Once we’re released from the snares of opinions, stories and pre-conceived ideas, we’re free to respond in a fresh and vital way – then life, even with its undeniable hardships, can be fully embraced. It’s beauty and creativity may be truly savored. We might even find that we’re having fun.” The koans themselves assert this truth repeatedly, Chris says. “They delight in playing with language, occasionally enjoy shocking us, and are sometimes even slapstick. ‘Wake up, sleepy-head!’ they laugh as they poke us in the ribs with the stick.” 

Chris lives in Portland, Oregon, leads grief groups and holds monthly meditation for a church group of Trinity Cathedral.