Shinei Monial

Shinei Monial started practicing Zen meditation intensively when she met her first teacher, Satya Vayu, in 2007. She lived as a renunciant with him for five years, devoting herself to zazen and taking up a lifestyle of radical simplicity. In 2012 she entered residential training at Great Vow Zen Monastery, where she lived until 2020. She was ordained at the monastery by Chozen and Hogen Bays in 2015 and is a preceptor and dharma holder in the White Plum lineage.

Soten and Shinei met at Great Vow and discovered their shared love for the outdoors and simple living. The two began leading Zen meditation retreats together in the wilderness of the Pacific Northwest in 2016. In 2020, they married and embarked on a 3,000 mile pilgrimage, walking from northern Mexico to Panama before spending a year as assistant teachers at Sangha Jewel Zen Center in Corvallis, OR. 

Their teaching focus has been on facilitating Zen meditation in nature settings. They have lead many week-long Zen retreats in the Cascades Wilderness, as well as extended immersions along the Pacific Crest Trail, in rural Oregon and Mexico, and in the Peruvian Amazon.

In 2025 Soten ran 1300 miles on foot from Mexico to Washington state as a fundraiser for the new Bells Mountain Dharma Center where they both now live as resident teachers with their small community, young daughter, and dog.