Today we’d like to introduce you to Mayme Donsker.
Hi Mayme, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
Thank you for asking. It’s an honor to share my story and, most importantly, the impact of our nonprofit, Tools for Peace.
Like many others, I began practicing mindfulness and meditation during a difficult period. After establishing my own practice, I felt more connected to myself and others. The same challenges were there, but I wasn’t alone. I was present and had a greater bandwidth and appreciation for life.
Over a decade ago, I discovered Tools for Peace, a non-profit founded in 2000 by a Tibetan Refugee, Venerable Lama Chödak Gyatso Nubpa (1951-2009). In response to youth violence in Los Angeles, he saw firsthand a life-preserving need to offer young people practical methods to cultivate compassion, peace, and well-being. Lama Gyatso helped establish a non-profit free of religious orientation but rooted in the unifying vision that kindness mitigates suffering. Today Tools for Peace continues to support youth and adult mental health, well-being, and academic and professional success through mindfulness-based social-emotional learning.
Our evidence-based curriculum is inspired by the Shi-Tro Mandala, an ancient Tibetan symbol that speaks to the basic goodness in all people, and attitudes like kindness and compassion that have a transformative effect, causing these innate qualities to grow.
“Always nurture and cultivate your own innate compassion and loving-kindness, which is nothing other than your own basic goodness, a basic goodness that exists in all beings.”
– Ven. Lama Chödak Gyatso Nubpa, Tools For Peace Founder
I was so impressed by the work of Tools for Peace that I had to witness it for myself. At the end of my first camp, I remember they led an activity on interdependence where they had a ball of yarn, and every camper and staff member tossed the yarn to another person who had impacted them in some way. Some people received the yarn multiple times. It became clear how all of the little things we do add up, holding a door, saying good morning, asking someone if they’re ok.
Then it occurred to me, have I been holding myself back?
That camp transformed me. I felt I had grown, and I could see I had a lot of growing to do. Tools for Peace taught me how to take down the walls that were limiting me from making a difference for myself and others.
Raymond Levy, a young camper at that time who later worked at Tools for Peace as a camp counselor, distilled the experience best when he shared,
“Out of mindfulness comes compassion. Once you understand yourself, you can understand others, too, and you can feel for them.”
I have seen many of our young people profoundly impact their communities; they are compassionate leaders. The Tools for Peace curriculum teaches that all of these positive qualities – compassion, kindness, equanimity, and joy – innately exist in all of us. If we pay attention, we begin to recognize our positive impact within ourselves, our communities, and our world. So we nurture those attitudes and work with our minds every day.
In 2013 I began facilitating Tools for Peace at our Summer Teen Camp and School-Based Programs. Many students continued to participate, grow, and benefit from our curriculum. Now they are compassionate leaders, joining our staff as camp counselors, facilitators, and camp directors. They continue to inspire compassion and kindness within themselves and countless others. They teach me. I hope that one day the organization is passed on to them.
As Executive Director, I reflect on Lama Gyatso’s beautiful story and try to align myself with motivation. I use these values to illuminate each step, from how we operate as an organization to how we engage our communities and deliver our programming.
I want this curriculum to benefit as many people as possible because it works. We just need more people to experience it for themselves.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It’s easy to do what you love. But I know many people – especially since Covid-19 – struggling with mental health. This has been an incredibly hard time for ourselves and the people we love. Youth are experiencing high rates of depression and anxiety due to a convergence of several complex social-economic factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, gun violence, structural racism, and other forms of oppression. Our curriculum addresses an essential need in young people. It creates a safe space for students to define peace and summon and reflect on experiences in which they received kindness or acted upon it, how it made them feel, and how it may inspire them to plant positive seeds in their communities.
I want students to feel safe, and I want them to feel more valued and connected to their community at school. I remember, after the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, my students in Los Angeles invited their peers to meditate on the football field. After sitting in silence, they expressed feelings and hopes for the future.
Out of a long moment of silence, a 13-year-old boy was compelled to share. His voice shook as he said, “I don’t want to see any of you get hurt.” He began to cry, adding, “…even those of you I don’t know, even if I don’t even know your name.” The other students gathered around him in a group hug.
Like this brave student, Tools for Peace inspires us to see our great capacity to make meaningful change. It arises from valuing every life as much as our own.
Lama Gyatso said,
“We spend a lot of time pressuring our children to win at sports or to get good grades, but not much effort is put into teaching them how to be good, kind people. Something is lost when we don’t help them cultivate those qualities.”
– Ven. Lama Chödak Gyatso Nubpa, Tools For Peace Founder
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
At Tools for Peace, we teach our kids that it’s courageous when they feel inspired to be kind or compassionate. So, please, be courageous and support our charitable School-Based Programs and Summer Teen Camp. Your donation is significant, and it matters.
Mission:
The mission of Tools for Peace is to inspire kindness and compassion in everyday life through mindfulness-based social-emotional learning programs. Tools for Peace’s (TFP) primary program areas include our School-Based Programs, Annual Summer Teen Camp, and Public Mindfulness Programs. All TFP programs utilize our evidence-based curriculum, which has been shown to improve focus, conflict resolution skills, and confidence and reduce stress in participants.
School-Based Programs:
Through our School-Based Programs, we serve 1,500 students each year, in partnership with L.A.C.E.R. Afterschool Programs and nine elementary, middle, and high schools, in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). This program supports youth mental health, well-being, and academic and professional success through mindfulness-based social-emotional learning. TFP School-Based Programs are offered 1-3 times weekly in classroom-based workshops and after-school clubs. Our curriculum provides students tools to develop positive attitudes, resolve conflicts, cope with stress and challenges, develop self-motivation and self-confidence, and feel willing, able, and equipped to help others.
In addition to engaging students in the TFP curriculum, our School-Based programs incorporate enrichment activities such as yoga, mindfulness meditation, journaling, art projects, mindful games, group discussions, and community service. Our School-Based Programs also include quarterly Parent/Caregiver Workshops utilizing the TFP curriculum to support parent learning and parent involvement. Parent/Caregiver Workshops are offered virtually in Spanish and English.
Summer Teen Camp:
In our scholarship-based Annual Summer Teen Camp, students enjoy a transformative week-long experience rooted in practicing mindfulness, learning meditation, and cultivating compassion, along with the usual fun camp activities like hiking, crafts, music, and game nights. Each year, camp hosts 40 youth (ages 13-18) in peaceful, natural settings outside Los Angeles in Big Bear, California. At least 75% of participants are LAUSD students attending TFP School-Based Programs.
“This is my first time being at a camp. I was really nervous, but everyone was so welcoming, and I felt so at ease. I have learned a lot about myself, and I started to notice the negative views that I’ve had, but I have a different perspective now. This camp has helped me with things I’ve been really wondering about, that I wanted to change, but I didn’t know how.”
– Camper, Astrid
Public Mindfulness Programs:
TFP Public Mindfulness Programs are fee-based workshops, trainings, and series utilizing our curriculum to help youth and adults build mindfulness and compassion skills and support all aspects of learning. TFP has offered mindfulness programs in partnership with Occidental College–Eagle Rock, Los Angeles; Beyond the Bell–Los Angeles Unified School District; Inner-City Arts–Los Angeles; Norton Simon Museum–Pasadena, and Hammer Museum–Westwood, Los Angeles.
We’d love to hear about any fond memories you have from when you were growing up?
What a meaningful question. My fondest memories were simple pleasures, like lying down in the grass looking at the sky, feeling peaceful, content and relaxed.
Pricing:
-
Tools for Peace is available to host mindfulness-based workshops in a variety of settings for youth and adults. TFP workshops, trainings, and ongoing series are available in-person in California and Minnesota and virtually anywhere! Please reach out to [email protected] for more information, including pricing. Tools for Peace is a nonprofit organization. Please consider supporting us so that we can provide social-emotional tools for students who need it the most. Your donation will allow us to continue to serve at-risk and underserved communities at no cost. Here are ways to donate: General Tools for Peace fund: Paypal: https://www.paypal.com/donate?
hosted_button_id=3CHUMK47NANK Venmo:toolsforpeace Get us back to camp fundraiser: https://www.toolsforpeace.org/ summer-teen-camp U Host a fundraiser for Tools for Peace on your social media account!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.toolsforpeace.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/toolsforpeace
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/toolsforpeace
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/tools-for-peace
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ToolsForPeacePasadena/videos
Image Credits
Big thanks to L.A.C.E.R. Afterschool Programs for granting image permission for our Tools For Peace Clubs. Also, to our staff who took our Summer Teen Camp photos.
