VALERIE DAI HATSU | Benevolent kitchen

Valerie Duvauchelle

Valerie is a passionate advocate for activating new ways of being in the world. She believes that to live fully we need to allow for a radically different relationship to the world and to ourselves.

Her specific interest is in the application of new ways of being in community and seeks to understand the invisible evolutionary impulses that occur when we do things together.

She is a Tenzo cook in the Zen tradition and through her books, programs and retreats brings the universal teachings of this tradition into community living. She is most well known for the design and development of the Onboarding Process which bridges 20 years of learning in Zen temples with conscious community experience.

Her dedicated practice is to cultivate a posture of "being witness” in her life.

She embodies the balance between deep commitment and spontaneous playfulness.

Valérie is a pioneer within Life Itself and co-curator of the Bergerac Praxis Hub.

Dai Hatsu

My encounter with the shôjin ryôri began with sitting in zazen at the temple of Sojiji in Japan where I lived for 13 years. It was through the body, sitting, doing, chanting together with the monks that the resonance was made for me. It was only on my return to France in 2012 that I began to study the traces of Zen Buddhism. Deeply rooted in secularity, I experience the posture of zazen as a process of inclusive adjustment to the world, a disposition of "beingwith" and the practice of food as the space of resonance co-constructing the world.

BIO:

From 2003 to 2007 I practiced at the temple of Soji -ji ( Tsurumi, Kanagawa prefecture) under the reverence of _cc781905-5cde-3193-bado_bado_bb5dododa oshi and discover the practice of Zen cooking with the Tenzo (cooking practice) 3b- 136bad5cf58d_ Roshi.

It is also at Soji-ji that I meet Isshô Fujita that I will follow later 3b- 136bad5cf58d_at Chizanso in Hayama (near Kamakura).

My life is then divided between my vegetable cooking workshops, my Zen practice, permaculture and my 58 trips to temples 5cde-3194-bb3b-136bad5cf58d_meeting tenzo.

In 2012 I returned to France with the desire to pass on this practice to everyone and created La cuisine de la bienveillance.

In 2014 I met Dainin Joko Procoppio who offered me the role of Tenzo

IN 2017 I take the vows (tokudo) of moniale

In 2018 I join the order of mountains and clouds in the footsteps of Pierre Taigu Turlur

In 2019 I share the practice of goodwill food while roaming and regularly visit intentional communities (Tamera among others)

In 2020 I explore the question of community as a transformative process in the current societal context. In this spirit, I am also engaged in the cooperative ofMIC(houses of collective intelligence)

IN 2021, I affirm my commitment to the network LIFE ITSELF as responsible for the development of collective practices and develops the projectPraxis at the hub of Bergerac where I continue to this day to reflect on a Praxis of food for communities.