It's getting down to the wire with my last bits of website stuff. I've come a LONG way and must say... I'm pretty darn proud of what I've done. This really isn't an actual blog post, just a few words to get in this section so that I can feel like every part is done-ish.
I'm off for now. Until next time...
With loads of loving-kindness,
Brenda xo
For quiet disruptors ready to stop performing, start feeling, and build lives rooted in inner care, collective care, and fierce love.
Brenda is a foul-mouthed, spirit-led, stardust-and-light-filled being — a complex system of atoms, neurons, and soul navigating a whole human experience in a world shaped by white supremacy, patriarchy, and extraction. Her bloodlines trace back to the Jíbaro mountain people of Borikén (colonially known as Puerto Rico). She carries the sacred, sensual, and spiritual legacy of her ancestors, rooting her life and work in ancestral knowing and embodied resistance.
She works as a caregiver, seed-planter, and possibility-holder; also known as a mindfulness-based mentor, meditation teacher, and movement guide. She supports people in recognizing where they've drifted out of alignment with their values, helping them reconnect to their body's wisdom and move toward lives rooted in reciprocity, joy, and collective care.
Brenda's study lineage includes trauma-sensitive mindfulness training with David Treleaven, dharma and liberation work with Lama Rod Owens including "The Dharma of Spiritual Abolition" and "Love & Rage," nonviolent communication with Roxy Manning & Oren Jay Sofer, transformative healing work with Toi Marie Smith, mindfulness teacher training through MNDFL (300 hours) as well as MMTCP (2 years) and Mindful Mentor Training with Tara Brach and Jack Kornfield. She's also trained in Reiki mastery, decolonial business practices with Gieselle Allen, and reclaiming intuition work with Dra. Rosales Mesa, among many other revolutionary teachers who've shaped her practice.
She understands that how we care for ourselves shapes how we show up in relationship, community, and the systems we participate in. Inner care is not separate from collective care, it is what makes it possible. By supporting people in coming back into relationship with themselves, Brenda helps shift how they relate to others, how they build community, and how they move through and challenge the systems shaping our lives.
Her work is liberation-centered, heart-focused, and decolonial. She leads meditation sessions at Move. Breathe. Be. JC in Jersey City Heights, NJ, creating spaces for community healing and embodied presence.
Her clients are often quiet disruptors, observant creatives and deep-feeling thinkers who once followed the rules of dominant culture but now see through its emptiness. They come with curiosity and leave with clarity, ready to reimagine themselves, their relationships, and their communities through a decolonial lens.
For nearly two decades, Brenda taught hundreds of people across the globe to access their sensual power through salsa dance. Today, she supports clients in discovering their unique rhythm and purpose through embodiment, reflection, meditation, rest, and movement; releasing internalized oppression and building lives that feel aligned, alive, and self-defined.
Brenda lives on Turtle Island as part of the Boricua diaspora on unceded Munsee Lenape land (currently known as Hoboken, NJ). She shares a home with one of her many brothers, and together they care for their 96-year-old mother—an everyday practice of devotion, dignity, and love. She brings that same care into her work and community.
She holds intersectional identities as a queer, working-class, white-presenting Boricua rooted in her lineage. She is also a sister, titi, best friend, sensual lover, committed student, dark chocolate snob, chocolate chip cookie devourer, random drooler, proud goofball, and unapologetic night owl.
When she's not caregiving, she's chillin with her son and cats, streaming her favorite shows, or dreaming, and scheming, toward liberation.
If you're done living out of alignment and ready to come home to yourself, your body, and your truth, Brenda is here to walk with you.
Connect with Brenda:
Website: Authenticwholeself.com
Instagram: @authenticwholeselfliving
