Sayalay Suññanandī

Sayalay Suññanandī (Sunya for short) was ordained in Frankfurt, Germany, on August 9, 2025 by Ven. Kusalasami, founder of Dhammachaya Buddhist Center, Denmark, as a 10-precept nun (Sīlashin) in the Burmese tradition.

Born in the USA, she was raised in Christian Science, arguably the best Christian sect to prepare one for Buddhism, and first encountered Buddhism in 1997 at the Rinzai Zen center Bodhi Manda, in Jemez Springs, New Mexico. As she learned more about the Dhamma, she found it challenging to practice Harmonious Lifestyle (sammā-ājīva) while working as an applied mathematician at Los Alamos National Laboratory, the center of nuclear weapons research in the United States.

Leaving New Mexico and her mathematical career behind in 2001, she moved, together with her two daughters and husband, to the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas in northern California, a community of monastics and laypeople in the Chinese Mahayana tradition, where they lived for three years. Through these Mahayana traditions, she was exposed to two models of renunciation- Zen priest and Bhikṣuṇī- and experienced the desire to “go forth into the homeless life”. However, the circumstances were not favorable for that, as her daughters were still young.

After building a new career as a consultant in knowledge representation (the other kind of AI), while working temporarily in Berlin in 2016 she encountered a monk in the Thai Forest tradition (Ajahn Leif Sudhammo of Jīva Kusala) on the subway, and offered him a carrot from her lunch. What blossomed from this “carrot-merit” was a gradual introduction to the Pali Canon from a variety of sources* and, starting in 2018, seven years (self-)training under the eight monastic precepts. She ordained as Anagārikā in August 2021 with Bhikkhunī Vimala at Tilorien Monastery, and then went wandering.

Sunya was honored to spent a good part of her Anagārikā years living and studying with Sāmaṇeri Akiñcanā in Germany and Sri Lanka. At present, she splits her time between Sri Lanka, the USA, and Tilorien. In Sri Lanka, she resides at the Sri Subodha Meditation Center, Ambuluwawa where she studies with her teacher Ven. Dhammashanti, a senior disciple of the late Rev. Dr. Madawela Punnaji, and is enrolled for a Diploma of Buddhist Studies at SIBARI.

*Sayalay Suññanandī wishes to acknowledge the following Buddhist teachers, guides, and sponsors, in addition to those mentioned above: Jiun Hosen, Osho of Bodhi Manda, Bhikkunī Guṇasāri of Mahāpajāpati Monastery, the disciples of Ruth Denison at Dhamma Dena Meditation Center, Bhante Sujata of Blue Lotus Temple, Vīmala Judy Franklin, Bhikkunī Vimalanyāni of Kloster Wassermond, Bhante Gunaratana Mahathera of Bhāvanā Society, Ven. Dhammawasa Thero of Sri Subodharama, Peradeniya.