Media Bio

In a Nutshell

Brenda Ramos is a Spanglish-speaking, queer woman of Borikén Taíno heritage and a first-gen Diasporican with Jíbaro roots. A mindfulness-based mentor and life coach, meditation teacher, and intuitive movement guide, her work is rooted in decolonial and Indigenous praxis and a commitment to gender and queer liberation. Through Authentic Whole Self Living and her Framewerk, The Art of Radical Being, she centers folks of the Global Majority who feel disconnected from parts of themselves because of caregiving, aging, assimilation, or the demands of survival. She walks alongside them as they reconnect with their bodies, inner knowing, roots, and relationships. A caregiver for her 96-year-old mother, a cancer survivor living with dementia, Brenda knows, bone-deep, that inner care and collective care shape one another.

Brenda's work draws on formal mindfulness teacher training, Buddhist practice, trauma-sensitive mindfulness, Nonviolent Communication, and nearly two decades of teaching salsa dance. She lives and practices on the ancestral homelands of the Mohican and Munsee Lenape Peoples of Turtle Island, colonially known as Hoboken and Jersey City, New Jersey. She creates space for people to trust the wisdom they carry and return to relationship with themselves, one another, and the living world. When Brenda’s not dismantling the status quo, you can find her chillin’ with her son and cats, streaming her favorite shows—definitely with some dark chocolate within reach.

Deep Dive

Brenda Ramos is a Spanglish-speaking, queer woman of Borikén Taíno heritage and a first-gen Diasporican with Jíbaro roots who was born and raised between the Borikén archipelago and its diaspora. Her life and work are shaped by ancestral memory, mixed cultures, and an ongoing practice of remembering where she comes from while staying rooted in the present.

Brenda’s work as a mindfulness-based mentor and life coach, meditation teacher, and intuitive movement guide is rooted in decolonial and Indigenous praxis and a commitment to gender and queer liberation. She centers people of the Global Majority who feel disconnected from parts of themselves because of caregiving, aging, assimilation, or the demands of survival. Through Authentic Whole Self Living, she creates space for people to recognize the wisdom they already carry, trust their inner knowing, and reconnect with their bodies, roots, and relationships.

Her Framewerk, The Art of Radical Being, offers five movements of coming home: Remember, Reconnect, Reclaim, Realign, and Return. These rhythms invite us to recognize what is alive within us, reclaim what has been suppressed, and orient our choices toward what matters. Resonance, reciprocity, and interdependence run throughout: listening for what feels meaningful, tending our relationships, and recognizing how our lives shape one another.

This work cultivates Living Balance—an embodied relationship with change. Brenda’s Window of Living Balance gives language to the everyday rhythm of Leave, Pause, Notice, Return. Returning might mean resting, grieving, asking for support, setting a boundary, or becoming present enough to choose. Each return carries new experience and understanding.

For nearly two decades, Brenda taught hundreds of people around the world to access their sensual power through salsa dance. Today, movement remains central to how she invites people to listen to their bodies, reclaim joy, and explore choice. Her work meets the fullness of everyday life: caregiving, culture, grief, pleasure, conflict, and community. She explores these connections in her newsletter, The Practice of Tending, where she reflects on tending ourselves, one another, and the living world.

Brenda’s formal training includes MNDFL’s 300-hour Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Training, the two-year Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification Program with Tara Brach and Jack Kornfield, and their 16-week Mindfulness Mentor Training. Her broader study and practice draw from Buddhist and dharma teachings, trauma-sensitive mindfulness, Nonviolent Communication, restorative and decolonial practices, JourneyDance, Reiki, and positive psychology coaching. She honors the lineages and teachers who have shaped her work, including Lama Rod Owens, Lodro Rinzler, Adriana DiFazio, David Treleaven, Roxy Manning, and Oren Jay Sofer.

Brenda lives and practices on the ancestral homelands of the Mohican and Munsee Lenape Peoples in Hoboken and Jersey City, New Jersey. She is a program director in education advocacy and a caregiver for her 96-year-old mother, a cancer survivor living with dementia. She is also a mother, sister, titi, dark chocolate snob, and proud night owl. She knows, bone-deep, that inner care and collective care shape one another, and walks alongside people as they find their own ways of coming home. When Brenda’s not dismantling the status quo, you can find her chillin’ with her son and cats, streaming her favorite shows—definitely with some dark chocolate within reach.

Connect with Brenda:
Website: authenticwholeself.com
Instagram: @authenticwholeselfliving
Substack: substack.com/@authenticwholeselfliving
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