Yokoji Zen Center was founded in 1982 by the renowned monk Taizan Maezumi Roshi.  Since 1995, Yokoji has been functioning as a year-round Zen Training Center for residents and non-residents under the direction of the abbot, Tenshin Fletcher Roshi.  It is one of the most respected Zen Training Centers in the Western World, regarded so by Japanese and Western teachers alike.  Additionally, multiple  members of the RNP foundation have attended sesshin (retreat) and/or stayed for some time period doing residential training.  We’ve found our time spent there invaluable.  For all these reasons we are proud to have donated 10,000 dollars to the center for them to continue the amazing work and teaching they are doing.

“ServiceSpace is an organization run entirely by volunteers. We leverage technology to encourage everyday people around the world to do small acts of service. Our aim is to ignite the fundamental generosity in ourselves and others, creating both inner and outer transformation.

ServiceSpace was conceived by volunteers, was built by volunteers, and is run by volunteers — all for the benefit of volunteers. Our projects range from a daily positive news service, to an acts-of-kindness portal, to a gift-economy restaurant. Regardless of the endeavor, we act in concert to create service opportunities for each other and to support each other’s service journeys.”

We find the work being done and the movement being created by Service Space to be paradigm shifting.  Oftentimes philanthropy is seen from a top-down approach – donating to large organizations that then help the people they serve.  Although there is nothing wrong with this approach, few have tried and executed a bottom-up approach like Service Space – encouraging simple acts of kindness in every day people to create large change in the world through an accumulation of seemingly small gestures of love. 

In order to support the work being done and the unbelievably selfless people of Service Space the RNP Foundation has donated to support the living costs of one of their volunteers and for the living costs for a man who was involved with service space to live his dream of being able to focus completely on his meditation and become a Buddhist monk. 

In researching the effects of mindfulness, the RNP Foundation found that it causes the most noticeable positive changes when taught to younger people who are in stressful, traumatic, and difficult environments. A juvenile detention center seemed to be the ideal choice as it fit these criteria while simultaneously being a controlled environment to help implement the program. The mission was to empower incarcerated youth and help them regain control of their minds, bodies, and lives through Mindfulness Instruction and this led to the formation of Mindful Futures Initiative (MFI) – the organization founded by the RNP Foundation to enact these goals. Bowles Youth Detention Center in Bakersfield showed great interest in helping start the program and were extremely helpful throughout the implementation process.

The mindfulness program at Bowles Youth Detention Center has now been instated for two years. This program is taught to youth who are under the highest security grade at juvenile hall. It now consists of three, hour-long classes two times a week as an increasing number of students are participating. The classes are optional during the recreation period, so these children are actively choosing these mindfulness lessons over video games and movies. The superintendents and staff have all noticed a decrease in violent incidents, better emotional regulation, and improved sleep amongst the youth.

Thus far, the classes are taught by our Head of Education, Christine Mcbride, who is an extremely talented, compassionate, trauma-informed mindfulness and art teacher. She opens with a mindful breath work session followed by art therapy and finishes with a question-answer session about letting go of limiting beliefs, dealing with stress, and finding peace. Although it initially took time to gain their trust, Christine has now made a massive impact on many students in the program to decrease violent behavior and anxiety as well as to instill confidence and peace. The students during the sessions are eager to participate and learn. Due to Christine’s impact, the program was awarded Outstanding Volunteer Services for 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 one of only three awards handed out to over one hundred volunteers.

Rikin Vasani joined the MFI team as Director. In addition to teaching mindfulness himself, has an extensive professional background in strategy and operations and a creative background in theater arts and acting. He has been instrumental in enacting the vision and expanding the scope of the program, as well as setting our expansion goals for the next few years. Since he joined, MFI has expanded its student reach dramatically across all of Kern County, hired and trained several talented teachers, and formalized and enhanced its education based on the most effective practices.

Just a few of MFI’s recent initiatives include building out mindfulness training for all guards and staff, creating a mindfulness certification program for the youth, and including peer to peer exercises for the students to assist one another in solving conflicts and regulating intense emotions. By doing so, mindfulness can permeate the entirety of the juvenile center and help create a cultural shift. It can be embedded into the lifestyle of everyone at the center rather than just a class two times a week.

Thus far, MFI has introduced mindfulness to approximately 350 individual youths and several more staff and guards. Approximately 75% of students returned for 1 or more classes, and 25% returned for 7 or more classes. MFI is approaching 5,000 student hours of instruction. What’s most exciting is that all these numbers are poised to grow dramatically over the next year with new youth centers, teachers, and enhanced education.

Due to the profound impact of the classes at Bowles, MFI has been expanded to all the Juvenile Centers in Kern County within the last six months. With such a large scope now, a team of teachers has been trained to help serve the incarcerated youth across the county. The MFI team are from diverse backgrounds and have all used mindfulness to overcome the unique challenges in each of their lives.

Their varied backgrounds and skill sets make them uniquely qualified to serve juvenile detention centers and assure that every youth’s needs will be met. To illustrate, one teacher has served extensive time in the juvenile system and used mindfulness to overcome the challenges he faced through incarceration, another already has experience working at Bowles heading a poetry class, and another is a Sound Healer who was raised by a father who was in the juvenile system and a stepfather who was a correctional officer.

MFI plans to expand beyond Kern County to all around California. They are currently in talks with Los Padrinos Juvenile Detention Center in Los Angeles and have been invited to present to the managers of all of California Youth Detention centers in November to potentially work with their youth as well.