Lama Tsultrim Allione is founder and resident teacher of Tara Mandala, a retreat center located outside Pagosa Springs, Colorado. She is author of Women of Wisdom and Feeding Your Demons. Born in New England, she traveled to Asia in her late teens and at the age of twenty-two became the first American woman to be ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist nun. Recognized in Tibet as the reincarnation of a renowned eleventh-century Tibetan yogini, she is one of the only female lamas in the world today. She has been awarded the international recognition of "Outstanding Woman in Buddhism" by a panel of distinguished scholars and practitioners in Bangkok, Thailand. Between teaching internationally, she enjoys time with her three children and six grandchildren.