While she often contemplated going to a Zen center, she was also wary of potential racial tension she imagined she would face were she to do so.

She then earned two master's degrees: one in early childhood education from New York University, and the other in social work from Hunter College.

[4] Boyd worked as a clinical social worker and therapist in Middletown, New Jersey, primarily with Vietnam War veterans.

[4][5] In the 1980s, Boyd began sitting with a small group led by a teacher named Sr. Janet Richardson, a Dharma heir of Robert Jinsen Kennedy and Tetsugen Bernard Glassman.

According to the Lincroft website, "She received Jukai in 1994 and Priest Ordination in 1996 from Roshi Sandra Jishu Holmes.