Biography of Boaz Feldman
Boaz works as a clinical psychologist and trainer, Dharma teacher and researcher. His areas of intervention are diverse, including corporations, public-private sectors, humanitarian NGO’s, community-based organisations, groups and individual clients.
Latest CV: November 2023
“My objective is to
enhance resilience and performance,
to support sustainable
healing and agency-centred
strategies through
embodiment and relational practices
individuals, corporations and communities.”
Education
Boaz has studied in various countries including Switzerland, England, Canada and Thailand. With his first degree in business administration and economics (BBA), he developed a solid basis for working efficiently, setting and meeting realistic goals. A depression in his early 20’s led him to ordain as a Buddhist monk in Thailand, where he practiced mindfulness meditation intensively for about 3 years.
He then decided to return to Europe, and started his studies in psychology at the University of Derby for his bachelor’s (BSc) and graduating from the University of Geneva’s Integrative Clinical Psychology Masters (MSc). In parallel got trained in psychosomatic therapeutic practices (Somatic Experiencing) and mindfulness-based interventions (Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy at Oxford/Bangor Universities). Boaz specialized in mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) in humanitarian emergenciesdesignin and implementing methodologies with a unique cross-pollination between clinical practice, psycho-biological sciences and wisdom traditions.
Boaz went to the graduates schools at the universities of Sunderland, South Wales and Oxford to pursue his studies in Buddhism. He was passionate about understanding the Buddhist psychology, the development of contemplative abilities and the role of Sangha, the community of pracitioners, in achieving the highest states of liberation, Nirvana.
Clinical & Corporate Practice
Boaz led numerous missions as an emergency psychologist in conflict affected countries (Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Myanmar), low-income regions (Eastern Europe, Turkey, Sub-Saharan Africa) and natural disasters (Thailand). He also began assisting in Somatic Experiencing Trainings in Switzerland and Ireland, and then became the lead European faculty in Organic intelligence for 5 years, while working in a multi-disciplinary psychotherapeutic practice with groups and individual clients in Geneva, Switzerland. His clinical areas of expertise include Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), burnout, depression and anxiety disorders.
His expertise from highly stressful humanitarian contexts has built a solid basis from which he worked in the corporate sector. He teaches Mindful Leadership at the Trinity College Dublin Executive MBA program, Contemplaction Programs for lawyers and mediators (in collaboration with the Geneva and Vaud Barristers, as well as the Swiss Chamber of Commercial Mediation), and has founded the Corporate Mindfulness Training Series PRO-X: Performance & Resilience for Organisational eXcellence.
Both SE and OI had a focus on individuals, and Boaz was interested in group and community processes, so founded NeuroSystemics, Swiss-based global not-for-profit training organization providing personal and collective embodied & relational healing and developmental experiences. He designed a 3-year complexity science, somatic and positive psychology-centred CARE Training program (Clinical Abilities for Resiliency & Empowerment), which he leads with his teams across the globe.
Dharma Path
As a child, Boaz was an introvert and, without knowing it at the time, was meditating and contemplating life deeply on a regular basis. It was during his first bachelors in Canada that he had intuitions of ordaining as a Buddhist monk and finding durable peace. He did an Erasmus program during which he ordained as a Buddhist monk in a local monastery. Boaz has been going on 3 months-long silent retreats in Gaia House (UK), the Insight Meditation Society (USA) and Shwe Oo minh (Myanmar) every year since then, maintains a daily meditation practice and generally keeps silent every day until 12pm. After nearly 20 years of dedicated meditation practice and study of the Buddhist texts, he graduated from the Bodhi College Dharma Teacher Training Program in 2023, and leads retreats in Europe and online.
Research
It was during his studies in psychology that Boaz developed an appetite for research. As part of his masters, he studied the effects of compassion meditation for conflict resolution at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Affective Sciences (CISA) at the University of Geneva. It was empowering for him to understand scientific epistemics and wanted to further refine his abilities in this field, as well as contribute to science with his community-based epxetise developed in humanitarian emergencies. He worked briefly at Life Itself Research, studying “deliberately developmental spaces” that exist in North America and Europe, and currently conducting studies in Relational Embodiment Residencies, designed and implemented by his own organization, NeuroSystemics, to understand some of ways in which to potentiate human learning, growth and development for a weller and wiser world (a formulation acccredited to Life Itself!).
He has been accepted in a doctoral program at the universities of Harvard Graduate School of Education and Zurich Medical Faculty of Implementation Science until 2028, in implementation and community-based citizen sciences with youth. He is interested the link between inner development and societal resilience.
Please see this page for a brief of past and present collaborations. For a more complete biography, please see the following LinkedIn page.
“Live each day as
though it were
your last,
learn as if you were
to live forever.”M.K. Ghandhi
