Vicara Satya Mary Connelly is currently a Physician and Medical Director of Bellin Health, Center for Health & Healing, an Integrative Medical Center in Green Bay, WI. She holds AS, BS, MSW and MD degrees. She has received training in Integrative Medicine with Andrew Weil, MD as well as training in Traditional Chinese Acupuncture and naturopathic approaches to women's health. She is Board Certified in Family Medicine and Integrative Holistic medicine (ABFP, ABIHM). In addition, Vicara practiced as a psychotherapist from 1974-1984 and incorporates body-mind approaches in her medical practice.
Vicara has been involved in meditative practice since the early '70s when she studied Bhakti yoga and directed a meditation group in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She started sitting Soto Zen in 1984 under the direction of Zenkai Taiun Michael Elliston Roshi of the Atlanta Soto Zen Center where she received Jukai in 1985. She was one the founding members of the Charleston Soto Zen Center in South Carolina. Vicara began practicing yoga with Ma Dhyana Kathleen Kelly-Hoffman in 1993 and has studied with Jun Po Roshi since 1994. She received Jukai with Jun Po Roshi in 1998, was designated to teach as Sensei in 2002, and received Hollow Bones Priest Ordination in 2003. On December 4, 2015, she received Inka, Dharma Transmission, from Jun Po Roshi.