She studied contemporary dance and worked as a dancer and dance teacher until her early thirties when she had the opportunity to meet Ajahn SumedhoinEngland and to attend one of his Dhamma talks and then a retreat.[2] She was one of the first four women ordained by Ajahn Sumedho in 1979 as an anagārikā (aneight-precept novice) and in 1983 as a ten-precept sīladhārā.[3][4] After living at Chithurst Buddhist Monastery in England, Ajahn Sundara moved in 1984 to Amaravati Buddhist Monastery and was instrumental in founding the nuns' community there.[5] She went to Thailand in the mid-1990s, where she spent more than two years, primarily on retreat at forest monasteries. She has been teaching and leading retreats in Europe and North America for many years.[6] She currently resides at Amaravati Buddhist Monastery, whose history and relevance to women in Buddhism she has chronicled in the book chapter "The Theravada Sangha Goes West: The Story of Amaravati".[7]
^Angell, Jane (2006). "Women in Brown: a short history of the order of sīladharā, nuns of the English Forest Sangha, Part Two". Buddhist Studies Review. 23 (2). doi:10.1558/bsrv.2006.23.2.221. ISSN1747-9681.
