About

Ryan’s creative endeavors include poetry, articles, and multimedia collaborations with friends old and new. He’s driven to create art as a spiritual practice of discovering, clarifying, and celebrating his own experience, and evoking a shared feeling in others.

Though he couldn’t read a lick of music at the time, his sheer passion and heart landed him in a renowned music performance program at Missouri Western State University where he majored in percussion performance, sound engineering, and Spanish. His true artistic awakening came years later while producing Stuart Davis’ wildly creative national television show, Sex, God, Rock ‘n Roll. This unique project integrated many of Ryan’s cherished and disparate talents and qualities: spiritual debauchery, irreverent humor, creative abandon, and technological geekery. The show’s long-awaited second season, costarring Kandyse McClure, airs on HDNet this fall. Ryan’s also written and produced two short films, including Love’s Initiation, which won the award for best screenplay at the 2009 Boulder Shootout Festival.

You can follow Ryan’s poetry, his musings on art, see his work on Sex, God, Rock ‘n Roll, view his short films, and read his articles on Live the Questions.

Ryan’s entrepreneurial adventures have ranged from pioneering successes to spectacular failures. His professional offerings currently include intimate business consulting and website and branding design through his company, PowerUp Productions. Ryan’s artistic spark and spiritual depth color his entrepreneurial passion, which he sees as an exhilarating vehicle for creativity, innovation, and service.

In 2007, inspired by a shared dream to host conversations about the emerging face of Western Buddhism, Ryan co-founded Buddhist Geeks with his good friend Vincent Horn. The podcast garnered praise both for its innovative format and pragmatic inquiries into modern Buddhist practice. It became an instant hit among tech-savvy Buddhist practitioners, and has since developed a widespread and loyal following. Its offerings now include a successful digital magazine and the second BGeeks conference will take place in Boulder in 2012.

In 2007, Ryan also co-founded Falling Fruit: a podcasting network for integral, evolutionary, and spiritually-inspired thought leaders. In addition to reveling in his dream work as a creative, Ryan had the opportunity to train in Holacracy (an innovative system for organizational governance and operations) and other forward-thinking efficiency and business practices. Falling Fruit’s rockstar team and brilliant vision were rivaled only by its phenomenal failure. Before its demise, however, Ryan had learned from world-class consultants and earned an MBA in the school of hard knocks.

Ryan arose from the ashes of Falling Fruit and founded his own venture, PowerUp Productions. What began as a podcasting consultation business evolved into a web-based branding and design team and is now an agile collaborative providing comprehensive brand development and artistry. Ryan’s distinguishing entrepreneurial skills include his innovative vision, keen sense of strategy, and ability to assemble, orchestrate, and elicit the greatest strengths of masterful collaborators. Struck by the overwhelming praise his off-the-cuff consulting and guidance have evoked over the years, Ryan’s begun offering intimate consulting and coaching for other courageous entrepreneurs.

Ryan’s spiritual practice and appreciation of contemplative depth are at the heart of his being in the world. He offers spiritual guidance for other passionate wayfarers informed by his experience and expertise in counseling, and over a decade of practice in the Vajrayana Buddhist tradition, and work at the interface of nonduality and personal growth.

Intrigued by subjective subtleties and drawn to helping others, Ryan completed an MSEd in Counseling Psychology at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. This study deepened the interior work he’d begun a few years prior when he discovered Buddhism. Ryan began his contemplative studies at a non-sectarian center in Kansas City where he had the opportunity to learn from teachers from all lineages of Tibetan Buddhism. Everything about Tibetan Buddhism, from the rich colors to the hope of liberation from suffering felt as familiar as falling in love.

After several years, Ryan’s path took a sharp turn when, one silent retreat, someone shoved The Essential Ken Wilber under his nose. He was blown away to discover a portrait of spirituality that contained such practicality, optimism, and groundedness while celebrating all its beauty and wonder. Taking cues from Ken’s work, Ryan began a study of Dzogchen with Nomkai Norbu, including a profoundly transformative month-long solitary retreat. Soon thereafter, Ryan completed 3 years of a Master’s in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism at Naropa University in Boulder. His study there deepened his conceptual understanding and practical embodiment of spiritual truth. His collaboration with Vincent Horn on Buddhist Geeks blurred the boundaries between spiritual inquiry and entrepreneurial execution, forever integrating and enriching them both.

Ryan’s current practice continues to deepen and unfold. He’s immensely grateful for his ongoing and intimate work with Shingon teacher Hokai Sobol and with Afra Moenter, a gifted mystic who combines nondual spiritual guidance with deep psychological work. Ryan’s boundless fascination with the dance between spiritual awakening and personal growth within daily life informs his spiritual guidance, an integrated, fluid form of support for practitioners interested in living with more clarity, authenticity, and depth.

Ryan Oelke, MSEd