Sergio Stern has been a psychoanalyst in private practice since 1989. He studied at the University of California (Berkeley) and did postgraduate studies at the Mexican Psychoanalytic Association, at the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London (UK) and at Duquesne University. (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), where he studied existentialism and phenomenology. Throughout his career he has given numerous conferences on Buddhism and psychoanalysis in different meditation centers and has published various academic and popular articles.

He lives in the city of Xalapa (Veracruz, Mexico) and is the founder of Montaña Despierta, a space for the practice of meditation inspired by Zen Buddhism. Awakened Mountain is a member of Branching Streams, a network of practice centers in the tradition of Master Shunryu Suzuki Roshi and belonging to the San Francisco Zen Center, where Sergio Stern has trained and learned from his exceptional teachers for many years.