Santavajri was brought up in the North-East of England. She studied languages at Bradford University, then spent time working overseas before settling in London, where she lived for 25 years. It was here that she encountered the Dharma. She has been living in Triratna women’s communities since 1994, and working in several team-based right livelihoods since '96. She has great confidence in the effectiveness of these collective contexts to support the growth of us as individuals, and is committed to enabling more women to have access to them.
She is currently very involved with life at Tiratanaloka, and feels inspired by the vision of a bigger retreat centre with a bigger residential community, and many more retreat places for women who’ve asked for ordination. She’s also a private and public preceptor - conducting ordinations is a great privilege for her.
Santavajri enjoys spending time with her good friends and her elderly mother, as well as time on her own. She loves cycling and hiking, as well as travelling and seeing places. She has a great interest in all of the Arts, but particularly classical music and opera.