Marilynne Chöphel MFT is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (#MFT30442) and consultant who specializes in depth psychotherapy and the treatment of trauma with mindfulness, somatic awareness, and compassionate presence. Her areas of focus include managing anxiety, depression, medical conditions and disability, life transition, authentic self expression, conscious relationship, PTSD, and healing from life and relational trauma. 

As a Certified Sensorimotor Psychotherapist, she has completed advanced training in the treatment of trauma through the Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute, a comprehensive psychotherapy model designed to treat the effects of acute and complex trauma, as well as developmental and attachment traumas. She received EMDR certification through the EMDR Institute. She has participated in training for the treatment of PTSD for combat veterans and military families, and is a volunteer psychotherapist for The Coming Home Project, a non-profit organization committed to helping transform the wounds of war for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, their families, and their service providers. She is on the therapist referral list for Marin County's Victim-Witness Program for survivors of violent crime.

Marilynne’s work with couples focuses on mindful presence, attuned connection, conscious communication, and the sacred path of deep intimacy, and she has trained in several approaches to creating loving relationship including strengthening attachment bonds with Emotionally Focused Therapy for Couples. For more on her approach with couples, see Conscious Relationship.

She brings to her work a holistic perspective combining a graduate degree in Transpersonal Counseling Psychology from John F. Kennedy University’s Graduate School for the Study of Human Consciousness, with over 25 years experience teaching meditation and yoga. 

Marilynne has practiced Tibetan Buddhist, Zen, and Vipassana meditation since 1982, and studied through the Shambhala tradition. Her Advanced Studies Yoga Teacher Training was through International Yoga Studies, she graduated from the Iyengar Yoga Institute of San Francisco, and she has been a Registered Yoga Teacher-500 (inactive) through the Yoga Alliance credentialing standards. Her pranayama instruction has been through the Iyengar yoga tradition as well as with the master pranayama teacher Sri O.P. Tiwari, founder of the Kaivalyadhama Institute for research, training and therapy in yoga in India. Her somatic background has included dance and authentic movement, and being a certified practitioner of Trager Psychophysical Integration body work for over 15 years.

She has taught yoga, meditation, and relationship classes, workshops, and retreats throughout the Bay Area and beyond, including 8 years at Hakone Japanese Gardens in Saratoga, and for over 12 years at Century House for the City of Pleasanton. She has also taught for the Diablo Yoga Center in Danville; for the Cities of Los Gatos, Saratoga, and Livermore; has offered workshops throughout the Bay Area; and retreats at Land of Medicine Buddha in Soquel.

Since obtaining her B.A. degree in Psychology in 1973, Marilynne has over 40 years experience in counseling, teaching, management, and consulting. She served as a Deputy Probation Officer working with high-risk adults and youth, and co-directed a Youth Treatment Program for at-risk youth. She developed and administered a community-wide internship program for average, high risk, special needs, and gifted teens that won an award from the California State Department of Education for excellence in education. She served on the Board of Directors for the National Society for Internships and Experiential Education. She has developed and administered community-wide volunteer programs and business-education partnerships, and was a consultant for program and funding development for non-profit agencies.

Marilynne’s depth work is informed by 30 years of holistic study, practice, and teaching of psychotherapy, relationship, yoga, meditation, breath work, bodywork, and movement. Many teachers have inspired her work through the years, with deep bows to the Dalai Lama, Pema Chödron, Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, the Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, Thich Nhat Hahn, Chödon Rinpoche, Lama Thubten Yeshe, Jack Kornfield, B.K.S. Iyengar, Judith Hanson Lasater Ph.D., P.T., Elise Browning Miller, Donald Moyer, Milton Trager, Bryan Wittine Ph.D., Pat Ogden Ph.D., and Janina Fisher Ph.D.

Marilynne offers private sessions, groups, and workshops that draw from modern psychology, body-mind awareness, and the ancient practices of meditation and yoga. She is deeply committed to expanding awareness as a personal practice and as her life work. She is the mother of two adult sons, and lives in San Rafael close to nature.

Continuing Education Units
All classes and workshops are approved for CEUs for Licensed Marriage & Family Therapists and Licensed Clinical Social Workers as authorized by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences. (#PCE3734)

Marilynne's Given Name Chöphel Llamo, meaning “Dharma Increase Goddess” was the Buddhist name given to Marilynne in 1994 by The Sakyong, Jamgön Mipham Rinpoche, the eldest son of the Vidyadhara Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, who was instrumental in bringing Tibetan Buddhism to the West in 1963. He is the head of the Shambhala Buddhist lineage, the spiritual director of Shambhala a global network of meditation and retreat centers, and is the lineage holder of Naropa University in Boulder, CO.

For more information or to contact Marilynne:
(415) 492-1042 or email [email protected].