Rabbi Sheila Peltz Weinberg served as a congregational rabbi for 17 years. She has published widely on topics including feminism, spiritual direction, parenting, social justice, and mindfulness from a Jewish perspective, and has contributed commentaries to Kol HaNeshama, the Reconstructionist prayer book. She is the author of Surprisingly Happy: An Atypical Religious Memoir ; God Loves the Stranger: Stories, Poems and Prayers; and Let Us All Breathe Together: Prose, Poems, Practices as well as the CD Preparing the Heart: Meditations for Jewish Spiritual Practice. Sheila has taught mindfulness meditation and yoga to rabbis, Jewish professionals, and laypeople in the context of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. She is creator and coleader of the Jewish Mindfulness Teacher Training Program, and she currently serves as a spiritual director to rabbinical students, rabbis, cantors and other spiritual seekers.