Mark Nunberg began his practice in 1982 and has been teaching meditation since 1990. He co-founded Common Ground Meditation Center in Minneapolis in 1993 with Wynn Fricke and continues to serve as one of the center’s Co-Guiding Teachers. Mark has studied with both Asian and Western teachers and finds deep inspiration in the teachings of the Buddha. Mark practiced as a monk for five months in Burma and completed four three-month retreats at Insight Meditation Society Retreat Center, as well as many months of intensive retreat practice at The Forest Refuge. Mark continues to be a grateful student of Buddhist practice. Administratively, Mark oversees programming at the retreat center.

Shelly Graf has been practicing in the Insight Meditation tradition and has called Common Ground their spiritual home since 2003. They are a graduate of Insight Meditation Society’s four-year teacher training program and lead residential retreats at IMS and other retreat centers nationally. Shelly currently serves alongside Mark Nunberg as one of Common Ground's Co-Guiding Teachers. Shelly oversees programming at the city center.

Shelly has an interest in integrating the teachings of the Buddha as deeply as possible into the fabric of our lives and as such, they have a special interest in waking up to whiteness as part of this total and fully integrated path of awakening. Whatever Shelly’s role may be, they will always be a grateful student of Buddhist practice first.

Wynn Fricke is co-founder of Common Ground Meditation Center, where she served on the board for nine years and continues as an active leader, teacher and practitioner. She has practiced in the Thai Forest and Mahasi Sayadaw traditions and has taught movement as part of Marcia Rose’s Self-No Self and the Creative Process retreats. Wynn was Vice President of the Buddhist Insight Network, a non-profit organization that serves as a resource for Insight teachers and sanghas across the country. She is currently in the Spirit Rock/Insight Meditation Society Teacher Training program. Wynn is also a professional choreographer and formerly the director of the dance program at Macalester College in St. Paul, MN.

Gail Iverson is a longtime leader and teacher at Common Ground. She led the Intro to Mindfulness Meditation workshop for many years. Gail has been practicing mindfulness meditation since 1987 and practicing at Common Ground since 2002. She was chair of the Board of Directors for 6 years and was part of the Operational Team for our Retreat Center.

Gabe Keller Flores has been part of the Common Ground community since 2008, when he was a high schooler falling in love with the Dharma. He currently serves as Operations Manager. He has practiced with Ajahn Sucitto, Gil Fronsdal, Rebecca Bradshaw, and many other wonderful teachers at Insight Meditation Society and Insight Retreat Center, and has spent over a year of his life, cumulatively, on silent retreat. As a practitioner and teacher, he’s interested in the integration of love and wisdom and the natural process of awakening taught by the Buddha.

As Operations Manager, Gabe oversees communications, registration, and the beautiful panoply of volunteers that host programs, ring meditation bells, fix broken things, arrange flowers, and make food for our retreats (among other things)! Email him at gabe@commongroundmeditation.org to talk about volunteering.

Formally trained with a Ph.D. in Philosophy, Patrice Koelsch began sitting at Common Ground Meditation Center in 1995. Patrice is a graduate of Spirit Rock’s Community Dharma Leaders Program and completed a year-long Buddhist Chaplaincy Training Program at the Sati Center for Buddhist Studies. She has practiced meditation at monasteries in Thailand and Myanmar. Patrice has provided hands-on care for persons in the last stages of HIV/AIDS and worked for many years in HIV education and client support services. For more than two decades she has been facilitating meditation groups in correctional facilities. She is on the Board of the Minnesota Multifaith Network, and volunteers with ISAIAH and Faith in Minnesota to bring about a multicultural democracy, a caring economy, and a just climate future.

Stacy McClendon (she/her) is a dedicated Insight (Vipassana) meditation practitioner and teacher rooted in her home sangha, Common Ground Meditation Center. With years of experience guiding retreats and mindfulness practices, Stacy is passionate about making the Dharma accessible and meaningful for all people. She is especially committed to creating welcoming, intentional spaces where BIPOC individuals can explore the protective and liberating wisdom of the Dharma.

Stacy brings a warm, grounded presence to her teaching, supporting others in navigating stress, cultivating compassion, and meeting life with clarity and care. In addition to her work in meditation communities, Stacy brings mindfulness into workplace settings, offering practical tools that help individuals build resilience, enhance well-being, and engage more fully in their professional lives.

Nancy Boler is our bookkeeper! Email her at bookkeeper@commongroundmeditation.org to talk about donating and more!

She is also our main yoga teacher. She has been teaching since 1999. She draws from her background in Kripalu yoga, Iyengar yoga, and mindfulness meditation. Her class instruction focuses on physical alignment, breath awareness, yoga philosophy, and development of wholesome mind states. For additional yoga offerings visit https://boleryoga.com/

Mary Clark became committed to a meditation practice after attending a heart-opening Thich Nhat Hanh retreat in 2009. Retreat practice continues to be a source of enhanced mindfulness, ease, and joy for her. She has guided a community group for Mental Health practitioners and leads meditation at a local prison. She has taught Mindful Self-Compassion at the center and at the University of Minnesota, where she works as a psychotherapist. She is continually grateful to the Dharma for enabling her to translate her direct experience into wise understanding and is committed to contributing to communities of growth and transformation.

Phillip Cryan serves as Executive Vice President of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa, a union of more than 50,000 healthcare workers in hospitals, clinics, nursing homes, and consumer-directed in-home care. He has been a meditator for more than 25 years and an organizer, activist, educator, writer, and policy analyst in pursuit of social, racial, and economic justice for most of that time, having taken an interest in justice work as an expression of Dharma practice. He has practiced primarily in the Thai Forest Theravada tradition of Ajahn Chah and the Chan/Pure Land tradition of Venerable Master Hsuan Hua. He became an active member of the Common Ground community in 2013 and has served on the Board of Directors since 2020.

Before she knew about the Dharma and Common Ground, Risa Cohen found a copy of Jack Kornfeld’s book, The Wise Heart, in the gift shop of a yoga studio. After reading it, she went on her first silent retreat at Spirit Rock. Many retreats and years later, she feels grateful for the communities of practitioners that have supported and sustained her commitment to the Dharma and for her wise teachers. She participates on the Board of TCVC, at Common Ground in the Children’s Program and Buddhist Studies (Sutta Studies in the past), with Minneapolis Insight, and on retreat at CG Retreat Center. Her daily practice includes standing meditation and qigong, and she completed a qigong teacher mentorship with Mimi Kuo-Deemer.

Rick Condon was first introduced to the Dharma on a meditation retreat in 2009 and began practicing meditation and studying the Dharma at Common Ground in 2015. Since then, he has participated in the Buddhist Studies program and regularly joins weekend and residential retreats.

Rick is a dedicated practitioner, and his practice continues to evolve. Currently, he is working with perceptions of emptiness, loving-kindness, and compassion in meditation and daily life. He feels deep gratitude for the programming and teachings that have been freely and generously offered by the center.

He served on the Finance Committee at Common Ground for the past two years and has recently joined the Board of Directors as the Treasurer. He also serves as a practice leader at Common Ground's retreat center.

In the community, Rick works as a small business owner and offers his time and support to several nonprofit organizations that aim to reduce the effects of global warming and help communities struggling to adapt to the challenging consequences of these effects.

Rick is married and a parent to four children and two cats. He plans to retire from his business this year to spend more time with his family, on his practice, and in support of the inspiring work that many nonprofits in his community are engaged in.

Louise Delagran has been practicing meditation as a member of Common Ground since 2002 and has a lifelong yoga practice. She served as Chair of the Common Ground Board of Directors during the period when Common Ground purchased Prairie Farm and is inspired by the beauty and benefit that has sprung from that action. Louise received training in mindfulness facilitation from the Mindful Awareness Research Center at UCLA and taught mindfulness and wellbeing at the Bakken Center for Spirituality and Healing at the University of Minnesota prior to her retirement. Her heart lies in the teachings of the Buddha and the deep refuge of retreat practice.

Moved by the Buddhist commitment to non-harming and aspiration to awaken, Tony Fernandez has made daily practice central to his life since 1998. He began practicing in the Theravadan tradition in 2000, sitting several residential retreats each year since then, led by a wide variety of lay teachers or monastics in the Thai Forest Tradition. Many of these he helped organize as an officer and member of the original Board of Madison Vipassana (MVI) for more than seven years. Inspired by the teachings of Ajahn Sucitto, he tries to keep his own practice simple and heart-centered while committing to social justice and standing against oppression based on race, gender, or sexual orientation.
He continues to assist MVI and frequently leads the Sunday night sitting group in Madison. For the last five years, he has taught weekly meditation groups in prisons with the Wisconsin Prison Mindfulness Initiative. Tony greatly appreciates his connection with the Common Ground community and guiding teachers. He is especially grateful for the opportunity to do independent practice at the beautiful Prairie Farm retreat center and is honored to assist as a practice leader.

Pietro Ferrero was born and raised in Northern Italy and moved to Minneapolis in 2008 to pursue a postgraduate degree in engineering at the University of Minnesota. He started practicing meditation in 2012 during a challenging period in his life. Pietro is very grateful for being part of the Common Ground community since 2016 and having had the chance to sit at numerous residential retreats at both the Prairie Farm and Metta meditation centers. His greatest inspiration is the teaching of the Buddha about the truth of suffering and the possibility to end it. He’s deeply committed to follow the path of practice and he strongly believes that, regardless of one’s circumstances, the mind can be trained and the heart can be opened. In 2023 Pietro successfully completed the two-year Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification Program offered by Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach.

Tracey Ghilardi began practicing mindfulness in 2006 through her work as a psychologist. She found Common Ground in 2012 and is deeply grateful for, and inspired by, this community. Her retreat experience includes two practice periods at Kyaswa Monastery in Sagaing, Myanmar (Burma), which profoundly influenced her understanding of generosity. Emotional healing and trust in the protection of the Brahmaviharas (loving kindness, compassion, appreciative joy, equanimity), both in daily life and on the path of deepening wisdom, are some of the fruits of the practice for Tracey. She is dedicated to supporting one another’s work toward peace and wellbeing for all.

Matthew King has sat a variety of teacher-led retreats at Insight Meditation Society, Spirit Rock, and the Metta Meditation Retreat Center, including two three-month retreats. He has also sat self-retreats at Prairie Farm and Kevala Retreat. His focus is on a relaxed and receptive awareness, with the intention of opening the heart to love more fully. Matthew served as the retreat manager for the 2019 Common Ground Labor Day retreat and besides serving as a practice leader, he will be spending a number of months each of the coming years as a caretaker at Prairie Farm helping to ensure retreatants have a space conducive to self-contemplation and an opening of the heart. When not sitting in formal practice, Matthew volunteers with the Wisconsin Prison Mindfulness Initiative, New Community Shelter, and Unity Hospice. He currently resides in Appleton, Wisconsin.

Jen Racho is a grateful student of meditation and Buddhist practice. She has been practicing meditation since 2003 in the Japanese Soto Zen and Vipassana tradition. Her retreat experience includes a three-month practice period at Green Gulch Farm near San Francisco. She has served on the board of directors of Minnesota Zen Meditation Center and currently helps lead the People of Color and Indigenous Sitting Group at Clouds in Water Zen Center in St. Paul. Through meditation and the Dharma, Jen has found a greater capacity for acceptance and love. She lives with her wife and dog in Minneapolis.