An International Career of Education, Exploration
and Cultural Mastery

Recently, I began to find new ways to apply my extensive training in different contexts, focusing on helping people navigate personal and organizational challenges. Drawing on my deep expertise in Indo-Tibetan meditation practices and diverse leadership approaches, I developed innovative programs that integrate ancient wisdom with modern insights. These initiatives empower leaders to navigate uncertainty, drive transformative change, and thrive in complex environments. This phase represents a significant expansion of my work, emphasizing the use of meditation as a dynamic tool for fostering personal and organizational growth across various sectors.

I am currently the Khyentse Foundation Macready Senior Lecturer in Tibetan Buddhism at the University of Sydney in Australia. Working in the School of Languages and Cultures, I offer language training (including Tibetan and Sanskrit), courses on Indo-Tibetan religions and Central Asia, I am also developing units on tantric Buddhism as well as advanced courses related to meditation as a technology of change.

Building on my extensive leadership training and academic background, I further enhanced my credentials with advanced certifications in leadership and coaching. My exploration of diverse leadership approaches, complemented by my deep expertise in meditation practices, led to the development of a unique leadership program. This program, which I am currently writing as a book, serves as the foundation for multiple startups. Each business leverages meditation techniques to help leaders navigate uncertainty and change, providing innovative solutions tailored to different segments of the wellness and personal development market.

After completing two academic monographs, I sought to broaden my impact by engaging in projects aimed at a wider audience. Returning to the field of economics, I pursued an Executive MBA, leveraging this training to launch new business ventures. My work during this period focused on integrating ancient meditation practices with modern scientific insights to drive authentic and sustainable transformation, both in individuals and organizations. This approach redefines meditation as a technology of change, empowering clients to harness shifting realities as catalysts for profound transformation.

After completing my PhDs in Europe and the United States, I embarked on a new adventure. I successfully competed for fellowships from the Khyentse Foundation (2019-21), the Lady Davis Foundation (2020-21), the Azrieli Foundation (2021-23), and the Mandel Scholion Research Center (2021-24) to become a postdoctoral researcher at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel. Settling in the vibrant city of Tel Aviv, I rewrote my second dissertation and published it as a book titled Tibetan Sky-Gazing Meditation and the Pre-History of Great Perfection Buddhism. During those years, I also started work on a new research project dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of tantric meditation practices in Indo-Tibetan religions. In the meantime, I continued teaching courses at various universities in Israel and Switzerland.

During a six-month research project at Saint Petersburg State University in Russia, I delved into the writings of Sergei Mikhailovich Shirokogorov (Серге́й Михайлович Широкогоров, 1887-1939), a distinguished Russian/Chinese anthropologist whose career spanned from Paris to Beijing, traversing the Siberian borderlands of the Russian Empire. My study focused on Shirokogorov's pivotal role in linking my diverse research interests, particularly the intersections between Central Asian religions influenced by Tibetan Buddhism and Western anthropology. This exploration also shed light on Shirokogorov's profound impact on Ernesto de Martino, a significant figure in my research, who was an avid reader of Shirokogorov's works.

In 2018 and 2019, I successfully defended my two PhDs at the Universities of Bern and Virginia. The year after, rewrote my first dissertations in order to publish it in the form of a monograph. Given that this thesis was of almost biblical proportions (the dissertation was almost 1000 pages long), this was a major undertaking. Myfirst monograph, titled The Life and Work of Ernesto De Martino: Italian Perspectives on Apocalypse and Rebirth in the Modern Study of Religion, has been published by Brill in the prestigious Numen Book Series in 2021. Thanks to a generous grant by the Swiss National Science Foundation, the book has been published in open access and can be accessed here.

For my PhD research at the University of Virginia, I spent 18 months in the Himalayas, more specifically in Kathmandu, Nepal. Funded by a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad (DDRA) Fellowship from the United States Department of Education, I passed my time reading ancient scriptures and commentarial literature of the famous Tibetan Buddhist tradition, known as the Great Perfection (rdzogs chen, Dzogchen). Living with local people and benefitting from the inimitable mentorship of the late Laxmi Nath Shrestha, I also learned fluent Nepali.

After finishing my master’s degree, I started working on a research project on Ernesto de Martino (1908-1965), a historian of religions that I first encountered during my undergraduate studies at the University of Lausanne. I received a generous doc.mobility fellowship from the Swiss National Science Foundation to conduct my dissertation research in de Martino’s archives, which were hosted at one of the oldest musical institutions in the world, the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. Even though my archival research officially ended after 18 months, I still struggle to leave the eternal city and still spend much of my time in Rome.

My trip around the world was cut short as I decided to settle in the United States, where I spent time in various locations before settling in Charlottesville, Virginia. Although I was admitted into the MA-PhD program at the University of Virginia to conduct a comparative study of contemplative practices in Hinduism and Judaism, I quickly became passionate about the study of Tibetan religions and made this the focus of my coursework under the supervision of David Germano and Kurtis Schaeffer.

After completing my BA, I spent a year and a half traveling around the world. During this period, I spent extended periods of time engaging in meditation and yoga practice, both in group and solitary retreat settings. 

Thanks to generous grants from various institutions associated with the University of Lausanne, I spent my summers studying Hindi, Hebrew, and Tibetan at the Mussoorie Language School in Northern India (2006), the Hebrew University of Jeruslaem in Israel (2007), and the Rangjung Yeshe Institute in Nepal (2008).

I completed my undergraduate studies in religious studies (sciences des religions) with a focus on Judaism and Indo-Tibetan religions at the University of Lausanne, in the French part of Switzerland. Besides providing me with fundamental philological and cultural training in these religious traditions, the program has decisively shaped my career trajectory by exposing me to a diverse range of methodological approaches, which still inform my research today.

After high school, I initially started to study economics at the University of Zurich, before spending two semesters at the University of Siena (Italy) and the University of Denver (USA). Standing at a crossroad in my life, I also completed the Camino de Santiago. It was during this period of exploration that I first encountered the world of religions, igniting my enduring fascination with practices of self-transformation. Little did I know that I would return to business school almost two decades later...

Born into a family with Italian origins as the oldest of five children, I grew up in the German part of Switzerland in the city of Zurich. I specialized in the study of modern languages during my years at the Gymnasium learning English, French, and Spanish. I actually did not like going to school and had consistently low grades. I was a child with much energy and spent much of my time playing sports.