About
Who writes this, why the pen name, and how to verify the work without trusting the author.
I'm not here to be your guru. Good thing, too - I don't have the wardrobe for it. No mountain retreat. Just a bicycle, a meditation cushion that's seen better days, and nearly thirty years of notes from trying to figure this out.
What I Write About
Everything that makes being human complicated. Relationships. Decisions. The gap between who we think we are and who we actually are. I happen to have nearly thirty years of meditation practice. That's the lens, not the subject.
The Short Version
I spent seven years in my twenties inside what turned out to be a cult-like organization. I didn't know it at the time - I was young, hungry for meaning, and someone seemed to have answers. That experience taught me one thing I couldn't have learned any other way: no one else can be your foundation.
For the next twenty years, I practiced with my eyes open. I found a tradition that encouraged questions. I became an instructor. I sat with hundreds of people in meditation. And through all of it, one thing became clearer than anything else: the answers were never outside me. The practice just helped me get quiet enough to hear what I already knew.
Why the Pen Name
Soren Ross is a pen name. The face stays off the site, and the biography stays deliberately vague.
Part of it is care. Both traditions are full of people I still respect, and these essays are about patterns, not about naming names.
The larger part is the point of the whole site. I spent years watching the messenger matter more than the message, and I'd rather not run that experiment again from the other side. If an essay here only works because you trust the author, it doesn't work; test it instead.
How to Verify Me
An about page usually ends with credentials. I don't have any worth showing you, and inventing some would be doing exactly what this site argues against. So verify the work:
- Read The Seven Years for the story I keep referring back to.
- Run the one-week experiment from The Minimum Viable Spiritual Practice and watch what happens.
- Take the 7 Questions into your own community and see what they surface.
If the material holds, it holds because you tested it. That's the only authority I'm interested in.
How This Site Works
No ads, no sponsors, no affiliate links. The essays and the guide are free. The only thing I ask for is an email address, voluntarily given, so I can send one essay most Tuesdays. I pay for the site myself. Readers are the return. If that ever changes (a book is a real possibility someday), you'll hear it from me plainly.
Frequently asked questions
Who is Soren Ross?
Soren Ross is the pen name of a writer with close to three decades of contemplative practice, including seven years inside a spiritual organization that turned out to be something other than it claimed. The essays cover practice, discernment, and thinking for yourself.
Is Soren Ross a real person?
Yes. The person and the history are real. The name and identifying details are the only inventions, kept that way so the focus stays on patterns rather than personalities.
Why write under a pen name?
Two reasons. Care: both traditions include people I still respect, and the essays are about mechanisms, not scores to settle. And principle: this site argues you should test teachings rather than trust teachers, so the author is deliberately kept from becoming the point.
How can I reach you?
Write to the address on the contact page. I answer these myself; give it a few days.
Start With the Guide
Seven questions I wish someone had handed me at twenty, with the red flags and green flags for each. Free, 13 pages, five minutes.
Get the 7 QuestionsNew here? Start with Start Here. Want to write? Contact.
Last updated: July 2026.