Bhante Yogavacara Rahula Mahatera born in Southern California as Scott DuPrez in 1948. Became a Buddhist monk in 1975 at Gothama Thapovanaya, Kalupaluwawa, Sri Lanka. Lived at the Bhavana Society, West Virginia, USA from 1986 until 2010. Bhante Rahula is now Director and Principal Teacher at the Pannasiha Lion of Wisdom Meditation Center in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

As a self-described “confused youth,” Bhante Rahula served a three-year stint in the army, then traveled in Europe and Asia. He spent much of this time living as a hippie, experimenting with a variety of recreational drugs. Eventually, he encountered Tibetan Lamas in Nepal and, after a month-long meditation course, began earnestly seeking a spiritually fulfilling life. He studied yoga in India, then traveled south and began learning about Theravada Buddhism. He ordained in Sri Lanka and lived there for 11 years, practicing in solitary caves and huts, learning Dhamma, and eventually leading retreats. Bhante Rahula describes his transformation from a young hippie and army dropout to a Theravadan bhikkhu in his autobiography, One Night’s Shelter.

He has also written a number of other books. Most recently Meditation: Body and Mind Connection, a manual about the integration of simple yoga and movement with vipassana meditation. Bhante Rahula has also written two other meditation manuals, Cutting through the Self-Delusion and The Way to Peace and Happiness, and a chronicle of his hiking and travels as a bhikkhu in India and Nepal, Traversing the Great Himalayas. The third, revised edition of his life story, One Night’s Shelter: From Home to Homelessness, Autobiography of an American Buddhist Monk, was published in 2004.

Read Bhante Rahula’s blog here.