Zel's Training

Academic

Zel completed their M.S. in Education with an emphasis in Social Justice Education in 2019 from Cal State Fullerton. Zel earned the Outstanding Graduate Award, and their thesis on Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Habits of Mind — which focused on the intentional cultivation of anti-racist habits in culturally responsive educators — earned the Outstanding Project Award for best Master's project. After completing his M.S. Zel worked as a substitute teacher in los angeles while teaching meditation through Unplug Meditation and building what is now Transgressive Medicine, assisting Tracee Stanley in her teacher trainings and facilitating his first palm healing training training in fall 2019. They've focused full time on Transgressive Medicine since 2020. Before completing their M.S., Zel also became permitted in Early Childhood Education/Child Development and graduated Magna Cum Laude from NYU with Bachelor's degrees in Environmental Studies and Sociocultural Anthropolgy, with a minor in Urban Design. In their prior professional lifetimes, Zel was a food sovereignty organizer, helping college students create sustainable food co-operatives on campus as alternatives to capitalist food infrastructure. He spent 6 years as a classroom teacher specializing in eary childhood and experiential education, including school gardens and cooking classes.

Mindfulness + Spirituality

In 2018, Zel began their formal training in yoga, meditation and reiki in 2018 after 10 years of personal practice. Zel completed his 200hr Yoga Teacher Training in the Sri Vidya tradition with Tracee Stanley and was the training assistant for Tracee's last YTT offering from 2019-2020. Zel has assisted Tracee with several offerings, including her 2020 Meditation Teacher Training through Yoga Journal and her weeklong retreat at Esalen Institute. Zel also completed his Yoga Nidra training with Tracee and Chanti Tacorante-Perez in 2019. From 2018-2019, Zel completed their Western Reiki training through conventional Level 4 with Kathy Benegas and Victoria Vives Khoung. In 2020, they began consulting with Marika Clymer on Traditional Japanese perspectives and Shinto inclusion in Reiki education.

Zel's personal practice is ancestor-centered and influenced by their formal training and by Hoodoo. They take classes and receive mediumship readings with Satarra Troutman. In 2023, Zel completed the Listening Line Training with A Sacred Passing and was named one of 3 Accessible Yoga Advocates of the Year. In 2024, Zel completed the 40-hour Accesible Yoga Training and plans to continue their death care education through A Sacred Passing.

Life + Community

Zel is multiply marginalized and multiply privileged, with their primary social identities being subject to excessive institutional and interpersonal oppression and their privileges creating the opportunities to survive and thrive in a world that is both infinitely generous and often hostile. This combination allows Zel to see solutions that others often miss.

Despite holding multiple violently targeted identities, Zel has lived in 3 and traveled to 23 countries outside the US and has earned a Bachelor's Degree from NYU, a Master's degree from Cal State Fullerton and formal certificates in yoga, reiki, and meditation. Such a combination of marginalization and privileges allow Zel to successfully run Transgressive Medicine in community and partnership with beautiful folks & orgs.