Mindful Passage

Zachary Perlman is a death doula and certified mindfulness teacher whose work draws on more than two decades of contemplative study, monastic formation, and clinical framework development. He practices under the name Mindful Passage, offering non-medical, presence-based end-of-life accompaniment to individuals and families in Long Beach and the surrounding area.

Zach’s background is unusually deep for this field. He became a brahmachari monk of the Ramakrishna Order (Vedanta Society) in 2005 and received initiation into Tibetan Buddhism from the Dalai Lama in 2009. He subsequently served in leadership and program roles at several interfaith nonprofit organizations, including the Council for a Parliament of World Religions, Monks Without Borders, and the Philosophical Research Society. He is the author of Mindful Passage: A Death Doula’s Guide to Conscious Accompaniment at the End of Life, and several other titles.

As a doula, Zach’s role is explicitly non-clinical. He works alongside hospice and palliative care teams — never in place of them — providing the sustained, unhurried presence that medical providers often cannot offer. His approach is grounded in mindfulness and shaped by a lifelong relationship with impermanence. He is comfortable across spiritual traditions and also with those who hold none.

Mindful Passage serves the Long Beach area with in-home and facility-based support, offering hourly, half-day, full-day, and overnight vigil tiers. A sliding scale is available for families facing financial hardship.