J.D. Walther teaches, studies and writes about non-denominational Mindfulness. His Mindfulness research interest is how Mindfulness affects a leader’s motivation facing adaptive challenges, and a leader’s adaptive behavior. He is also interested in Dynamic System Theory and Mindfulness.
He is a Qualified Level 1 Teacher of the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course and he is a certified Mindfulness teacher of the Mindfulness Based Living Course (MBLC).
His Mindfulness training was primarily through the University of Aberdeen in Scotland – Master of Science: Studies in Mindfulness Program, with the Mindfulness Association in the UK. He trained to teach Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction at the Brown University School of Professional Studies. He has also trained at the UCLA Mindfulness Awareness Research Center (MARC).
JD began learning about the brain after founding and leading an energy technology company that adapted an advanced neuroscience, brainwave pattern recognition technology for isolating geologic attributes in seismic data. He is the co-inventor of two energy exploration US Patents related to this work.
Most recently, JD worked for a non-profit organization near downtown Houston that provides emergency food and clothing to homeless and low-income families. Using Lean Startup Methodology, he led a partnership with the Houston Food Bank, which built the largest Texas program that directly distributes food to low-income working families.
He has earned a Master of Science in Studies in Mindfulness from the University of Aberdeen (UofA) in Aberdeen, Scotland. His dissertation was titled: Theorizing on the Mechanisms of Mindfulness from a Dynamic Systems Theory Perspective. He also holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Rice University in Houston, Texas, and a Bachelors in Business Administration – Accounting (BBA) from Texas A&M University.
He is a Senior Fellow of the American Leadership Forum – Houston/Gulf Coast, a member of the Adaptive Leadership Network and the International Mindfulness Teacher Association.
JD is an outdoor person who often meditates outside, hikes, snow skis and practices Qigong. He has traveled extensively, writes poetry, is a visual artist and is a trained representational sculptor. He and his wife, Kay, live in Houston Texas, with their two rescue dogs, Bode and Parker.