Ronya Fakhoury Banks

Ronya Fakhoury Banks is the founding teacher of Asheville Insight Meditation group, in Asheville, NC, which she has led since 2010. She has maintained a daily Vipassana meditation practice since 1985, spent two years sitting on Vipassana meditation retreats, as well as having had valuable experience as a Theravada Buddhist nun. She had the Theravada Buddhist teachings transmitted to her for five years by Buddhist monk and scholar Venerable Ujotika.

She is presently in the joint IMS/Spirit Rock teachers training program, a graduate of the Spirit Rock Community Dharma Leader program, and a mentor for Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach’s Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification Program. Although she has sat with over 30 different teachers, she considers Jack Kornfield, Joseph Goldstein, and Chanmyay Sayadaw her primary teachers. Ronya has led and co-led several residential and online meditation retreats since 2014. Her co-teachers have included John Orr, Donald Rothberg, Heather Sundberg, and Pat Coffey.

As a social worker, she works as a trauma-healing therapist, with an emphasis on healing intergenerational trauma. She also has an additional 25 years’ experience as a business consultant and entrepreneur. She is a published author in Tricycle magazine, and in Coaching/Consulting periodicals. Born in Kuwait of Palestinian-American descent and raised in Islamic faith, Ronya values justice and equality for all.