We are pleased to announce a new staff member. Amanda Katz recently joined our small team as Customer Service Assistant. This is a new role, as our book production manager, Michelle, was covering these types of queries. As our sales and reach have grown, so has the customer service role.

Amanda brings a wealth of skills to us. Her previous jobs include working for Windhorse Publications and Urthona Journal as a freelance proofreader. She has helped out as a bookshop assistant at the Cambridge Buddhist Centre. In the Customer Service role, she will also draw on her job experiences working at an urban wildlife studies centre, an animal welfare news charity, an RSPB nature education project, a sustainable population campaigning charity and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) - many of these are public-facing and/or team-based roles.

We asked Amanda to describe herself to our readers:

“I became a Buddhist in 2000 during a spot of dreamy roaming when I wandered off for seven years to the Middle East and to New York, working for UNFPA. Finding myself in the midst of an ongoing Intifada in Jerusalem I felt an acute need to seek strength and wisdom in responding to the suffering I saw around me, particularly the endemic animal suffering and neglect. I read, loved and pondered The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying along with several other books of Buddhist ethics and philosophy and found that my heart ‘clicked’ with the essence of the Dharma. For me it answered my deepest question: how to obey my heart’s instinct to try to help protect innocent beings from harm in a world of suffering, without becoming overwhelmed myself by the empathic pain. I tried to practice the Dharma from then on.

After returning to the UK I joined Triratna as a mitra, continued my Dharma-study and practice and spent five years in Cambridge’s Triratna Community helping at the Buddhist Centre and doing proofreading for Windhorse Publications books and Urthona Journal. Currently I live in London where I’ve been working for environmental charities for several years and am now delighted to join Windhorse Publications as Customer Service Assistant. As a Triratna Buddhist myself, I feel a deep understanding of, and identification with, the needs and interests of Windhorse Publications readers, whether ordained or just starting out on their personal Dharmic journey.”

Welcome, Amanda, to our project.

The Windhorse Publications Team (Priyananda, Michelle, Giulietta, Lee and Amanda)