Tag Archive for: On Retreat

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This is a teaching and practice daylong that will include dharma talks alternating with sitting & walking meditation periods. Today’s theme will be the early Buddhist teachings on the aggregates and how they converge with the insights of modern neuroscience. There will be a particular focus on feeling (Vedanā), perception (Sañña), and intention (Saṅkhāra), and on ways of practicing with our experiences of these aggregates in meditation and in daily life.

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Just as life is happening all around us, so is death. Human beings appear to be the only species that are conscious of our mortality. Yet most people ignore this fact of our existence, preferring to put efforts, thoughts and practice on “more pleasant things”. We want to “wake up”, to let go of our endless attachments and experience contentment and ease in our lives. Paradoxically, facing the death of our loved ones and ourselves, is one of the classic Buddhist teachings for accepting the truth of existence and waking up to impermanence. It is also a teaching that can greatly reduce and perhaps even eliminate the biggest delusion of all… that everyone else will die, except me.
This daylong retreat may not be suitable for those with anxiety, trauma or those who have recently experienced the death of a loved one.

What Do We Need Now To Take Us Home To Safety?

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2019 Residential Retreat with Kamala Masters and Vance Pryor.
If you would like to download any of the following dharma talks/meditations, please right click on the date-description link and select “save as”.

Audio file: 20190907-Kamala_METTA Guided Meditation through neutral person


Audio file: (expired) 20190907-Vance_Threefold Training, Wisdom, and Impermanence


Audio file: 20190908_Chanting Three Refuges and Five Precepts

Audio file: 20190908_Chanting in English


Audio file: 20190908-Kamala_METTA Guided Meditation – complete

Audio file: 20190908-Kamala_Seeing the World with Quiet Eyes

Audio file: 20190909-Kamala_Dana as One of the Three Pillars

The Buddha’s advise on what is insanity and how to cultivate a sound mind

Daylong Retreat with Ayya Santacitta and Rev. Diane Wilde; Two audio files:

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If you would like to download this Diane Wilde talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

We human beings, in this human realm, rarely realize that we operating in a state of of delusion.Not only are we operating in a deluded state, we expect this current mind state to provide us a sense of happiness and well-being. Because we really have no idea what we are doing, the goal of happiness is illusive and frustrating. This is also the Buddhist view of mental disease. Delusion is a mental illness that causes all sorts of suffering; mental health can be restored by correcting the flaws in how the mind operates. We will investigate our “mental disease” in both classical terms as well as our contemporary daily life and how we can cultivate “sanity” both for ourselves and the larger world itself.

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Not clinging to Self-identity is the first “marker” on the path to liberation — and could be divided into both exterior and interior ‘processes’. Our exterior self-identity fixates on how we need to be seen by acquaintances and strangers with our predefined narrative. We want our “specialness” to be recognized. Our interior self-identity is a confusing contrivance which is constantly changing, re-evaluating and re-constructing itself. In fact, our mutating interior self-identity causes even more suffering than the outward modality in which we face the world. In contemporary terms, working with self-identity might be defined as, learning how to not take ourselves so seriously. At our daylong we will learn from traditional Buddhist teachings, as well as contemporary teachers, how to start releasing this bag of tricks that ultimately makes no sense at all. We may even begin to see the truth that clinging to self-identity is ultimately the source of our suffering… and begin to let go.

From Effort to Ease

2018 Residential Retreat with John Travis.
If you would like to download any of the following dharma talks, please right click on the filename link and select “save as”.

Audio file 1 of 7: 20180908-travis.mp3

Audio file 2 of 7: 20180909-travis.mp3

Audio file 3 of 7: 20180910-travis.mp3

Audio file 4 of 7: 20180911-travis.mp3

Audio file 5 of 7: 20180912-travis.mp3

Audio file 6 of 7: 20180913am-travis.mp3 (Meditation with Sounds)

Audio file 7 of 7: 20180913pm-travis.mp3

Daylong Retreat with Ayya Santacitta and Rev. Diane Wilde; Four audio files:

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If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

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Grasping is not something done by the self, but rather the self is something created by grasping.
“What” are we letting be? What does it mean when we just let things be? Do we accept without concern the state of the world, cruelty, climate change, misogyny, racism, etc? Perhaps we are more precise when we say “letting it be” means not adding onto the already cumbersome, suffering self-identity that we carry around.
Today’s daylong will address the issues that present themselves when we practice “letting it be”, along with periods of meditation and mindful movement.

Daylong Retreat with Lori Wong; Seven audio files:

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If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

If you would like to download this talk, please right click and select “save as” here.

In this daylong, we will explore blind spots: how to know what we don’t know, see what we don’t see — in the framework of suffering and compassion. We’ll look at personal and collective identity and privilege and their role in how we show up. The day will include meditation, experiential and interactive exercises, and reflection.


Poems/Readings/Quotes referenced:

  • Humility as Nothing to Defend — Jeff Foster
  • Heart Calling: a wake-up call for the real you — Courtney Carver
  • Turning to One Another — Margaret Wheatley
  • Somewhere someone needs help — Carrie Newcomer
  • “Shame is a loaded word for Westerners. Like most things, it can be seen in a positive or negative light. Negative shame is accompanied by guilt and self-denigration. It is pointless and doesn’t help us even slightly. Positive shame, on the other hand, is recognizing when we’ve harmed ourselves or anyone else and feeling sorry for having done so. It allows us to grow wiser from our mistakes. Eventually it dawns on us that we can regret causing harm without becoming weighed down by negative shame. Just seeing the hurt and heartbreak clearly motivates us to move on. By acknowledging what we did, cleanly and compassionately, we go forward.” — Pema Chödron
  • “I know it isn’t cruelty or shame that characterises the human race. It’s forgiveness that makes us what we are.  Without forgiveness, our species would’ve annihilated itself in endless retributions. Without forgiveness, there would be no history. Without that hope, there would be no art, for every work of art is in some way an act of forgiveness. Without that dream, there would be no love, for every act of love is in some way a promise to forgive. We live on because we can love, and we love because we can forgive.” — Gregory David Roberts

Videos Played:

Why Our Bias is Costing Us – Anurag Gupta

Brené Brown on Blame

Forgiveness (https://gratituderevealed.com/portfolio/forgiveness/)

Home by Warsan Shire (read by the poet)

How to Care Deeply Without Burning Out – Sharon Salzberg (https://www.mindful.org/care-deeply-without-burning-out/)

Daylong Retreat with Visiting Senior Teacher Heather Sundberg. Two audio files:

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Tag Archive for: On Retreat

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