About Nancy

Nancy Hathaway is passionate about helping couples, mothers, early childhood caregivers, groups, those with substance use disorders, basically anyone who is interested in exploring and bringing more Mindfulness into everyday life of relationship with self and other.

She holds a Masters Degree in Education with a track in Counseling Psychology and is licensed by the State of Maine as the first Licensed (Clinical) Pastoral Counselor in the Buddhist tradition. She is taking graduate level courses in the Climate Change Institute at the University of Maine with the direction of bringing resilience to young people who are affected by the psychological impacts of climate change.

Nancy began her Buddhist studies in 1974 sitting a one month meditation retreat in Kopan Monastery, a Tibetan Buddhist Monastery in the Himalayas near Kathmandu, Nepal after traveling overland into Asia to find a meditation teacher. Since that time, she has studied extensively with Asian and Western teachers in the Zen, Theravada, Mindfulness, and Tibetan traditions. For six years she was a resident in a Zen Buddhist Temple where she studied and trained in a monastic setting. She has taught meditation for 40 plus years. As a Senior Dharma Teacher in the international Kwan Um School of Zen, she was ordained as a lay Buddhist clergy and pastoral counselor in 1980 at the Providence Zen Center in Cumberland, RI.

"I'm Breathing, Are You?" is an essay published in two anthologies for mothers, Finding Your Inner Mama and Your Children Will Raise You by Shambhala Publications. This same essay was selected for the anthology The Best Buddhist Writing 2006 also published by Shambhala. along with Thich Nhat Hanh and the Dalai Lama. Wondrous Child is an anthology for grandparents that includes Nancy's essay on bringing together Native Maine and Buddhist Kwan Seum traditions for grandmothers. Nancy has written for Shambhala Magazine, Buddhadharma, Primary Point, and various organizations on Mindfulness in everyday life.

In 1994 she worked with Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., in the Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction Program in the Massachusetts Prison System through the Massachusetts Department of Corrections after interning in the Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction Clinic at the Center for Mindfulness at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worcester, MA. In the early 90s she founded the program Being Present with Our Children; parenting mindfully in Cambridge, MA, offering classes and trainings for mothers who want to be more mindful with children. She is the mother of two grown, successful, and happy sons who were born and raised in their early years in a Zen temple. She had a weekly Saturday morning short feature radio show on WERU 89.9 FM, streaming online, Tips for Mindful Parenting. In 2005 she founded the Center for Studying Mindfulness - In Work, Family, Health, & Relationship through which she offers one on one in office and phone consultations, workshops, Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction trainings, and retreats for individuals, couples, mothers, groups, CEU and CME continuing education courses for healthcare professionals and corporate events.

Her private mentorship consultation practice is on the Blue Hill Peninsula in Surry, Maine as well as phone/ZOOM consultations. As a licensed psychotherapist her specialty is Buddhist psychological theory and mindfulness-based strategies. Nancy enjoys working with individuals, couples, parents, mothers, families, healthcare professionals, and basically anyone interested in integrating mindfulness into Work, Family, Health, and Relationship.

Nancy has taught in a variety of settings: hospitals, colleges, prisons, recovery re-entry centers in Maine, and throughout New England in universities such as Harvard Work and Family Center of Harvard University, MIT, Brandeis, Maine Medical Center and Eastern Maine Medical Center in Maine, grammar schools with teachers and students, banks, the Rubin Museum-NYC, Coalition for Hispanic Family Services Arts and Literacy Program in New York City, medical centers and nursery school programs for parents. She speaks semi-annually at Empty Gate Zen Center in Berkeley, CA and Cambridge Zen Center in Cambridge, MA, and has offered workshops in South Korea, Poland, and the Czech Republic.

She is part-time faculty at the University of Southern Maine graduate and undergraduate courses for teachers in the Department of Education and at the Lewiston-Auburn campus. She teaches at Colby College in their JanPlan program and has taught Mindfulness workshops at Maine Medical Center, Eastern Maine Medical Center, Maine General, Maine Coast Medical Center for physicians and healthcare professionals. She is certified by Mindful Schools. She offers CEU courses for teachers Pre-K through 12, healthcare professionals, counselors, physicians, dental team members, prison staff. She has also led workshops for corporations such as the Mitre Corporation and Twist Biotech.

She speaks at conferences such as the Maine Medical Association, Maine Principal's Association, Maine Association of Middle Level Educators, Early Childhood Conference, Maine Professional Counselors Association, Maine Psychological Association, school districts, Committee on Substances Network including Project Hope and is available for talks.

Being 11th generation Maine, Nancy is delighted to be back home in Maine living close to the Morgan Bay Zendo, on the coast of the Blue Hill Peninsula, where she is on the Board of Trustees. She has been a past board member of the Kwan Um School of Zen, Cambridge Zen Center, Providence Zen Center and past president of the Single Flower Sangha at the Cambridge Buddhist Association. She is past chair of the Surry Conservation Commission, a member of the Early Childhood Interest Group of the Healthy Peninsula Project in Blue Hill, Maine, Downeast Substance Treatment Network, and on the board of the Maine Chapter of the International Appalachian Trail. She is passionate about saving Maine's dark skies, which has the largest area of dark sky east of the Mississippi River and thinks of herself as the instigator of newly designated Dark Sky Sanctuary, Katahdin Woods & Waters National Monument. Recently, she co-founded the new non-profit, Dark Sky Maine with the mission of giving attention to Maine's precious night skies.

To set up an appointment for private mentorship consultations in person or by phone, Facetime, or Zoom, for a workshop or corporate event:

Contact Nancy at: ApplyMindful@gmail.com

Inquiries Welcome