SIM is sponsoring a six week class, instructed by Sabitre Rodriguez. This Tai Chi class is for beginning and experienced students covering the Yang Foundation 8 form. It meets at the Sacramento Dharma Center Tuesday evenings from 6:30 PM to 7:45 PM starting May 9th. For details and to register to the class, visit SIM’s calendar page.
NEWS
SIM recognizes that financial dana via credit card or PayPal does not suit everyone and the option to donate to SIM via direct deposit may be of interest to some people. If this describes you, please submit your contact information below and we’ll follow-up with details on how to set up your donation using direct deposit.
Did you know that many of SIM’s dharma talks are recorded so if you can’t attend the weekly Thursday night meditation and talk you can listen to it later? All talks are posted as mp3 files under the Resources menu, under Audio Dharma: https://sactoinsight.org/category/audio-dharma/. You can optionally be notified via email each time a new audio file is posted to our website.
Note that we’ve also tagged the audio dharma posts so you can readily access previous dharma talks by the presenter’s name. You can view the tag list on the bottom right side of most web pages in the side bar. These tags are also listed below and we hope you’ll enjoy this new feature.
Thank you all who have stepped up to support SIM through our monthly donor program! As of March 31st, we have 13 people providing a total of $1092 monthly, so we’re a third of the way to reaching our goal of $3,000 per month. If you haven’t contributed yet and feel moved to, we encourage you to sign up online this month to help support SIM’s monthly expenses and ongoing activities!
The first several months in our beautiful new home at the Sacramento Dharma Center have been a time of great excitement and satisfaction as we expand SIM’s ability to be a resource for vipassana/insight practitioners like you. We offer regular meditation instruction, teachings, retreats, and opportunities to develop a deeper sense of community.
Along with that excitement comes the practical need to meet our ongoing financial obligations. SIM’s operating expenses, primarily rent that we now pay to the SDC, have increased dramatically. Annual fixed, recurring expenses are estimated at $36,000, or $3,000 per month. At the current rate of giving, SIM is only covering 50% of our monthly expenses.
To support our SIM community, we are asking you and other SIM members to enroll in a monthly donation program to help stabilize our financial future. Donations directly to SIM are crucial, as contributions to the SDC do not reduce SIM’s ongoing expenses. Monthly donations to SIM will help cover our fixed, recurring costs, such as rent and insurance, as well as provide funds for program development. If 60 people give $50 per month we will meet our $3,000 per month goal. Contributions of any size are welcome; we hope that you will be as generous as possible.
Support for our teachers, mentors and visiting presenters will continue to be provided through dana received during teaching events.
It is now easy to make a recurring or one-time donation on SIM’s website using PayPal or a credit card by following the link labeled “dana” at https://sactoinsight.org/what-is-dana/. If you have questions about SIM’s financial situation or about donating, please contact Dennis Warren.
We appreciate your generosity and the generosity of everyone who contributes to SIM financially or through volunteer efforts. Both forms of generosity make SIM’s operations and future possible. We look forward to working and practicing together to create SIM’s future in the months and years ahead.
Sincerely,
SIM Board of Directors
James Barnes Barbara Briscoe Barbara Colton Sara Denzler Renee Kunz Catherine Vigran Dennis Warren
Beginning Wednesday, March 15, SIM will be offering a Wednesday morning sitting at the SDC building at 7:00 AM. It will be an open sitting for anyone interested in starting their morning out by sitting with others. Each session will involve a 40-45 minute sitting, a limited about of meditation guidance, and a few comments at the end of the sitting to set a theme for moving into the world and our daily activities.
SIM’s regular faculty – Founding Teacher Dennis Warren, Mentors Diane Wilde and Rich Howard, and Community Member Laura Rosenthal – will take turns leading the hour long session minute.
Announcing a new category of the Audio Dharma posts – Guided Meditations. Our first sharing comes from Kamala Masters offering a meditation on “Loving Kindness”. Over time we expect the collection to grow; to see a listing of all guided mediations, click here. Enjoy.
Occasionally, volunteers are needed for two related activities:
- Audio Collector: Attend a Thursday Night Dharma talk. Get the .MP3 file recording and upload to a shared folder in the cloud. (No file editing is needed.)
- Audio Editor: Edit the .MP3 dharma talk file and upload to SIM’s website.
These activities allow for a flexible schedule as they won’t require you to attend every Thursday night dharma talk but for the times that you do attend, it will give the usual volunteer an appreciated respite for the evening. For questions and more information, please contact Sabitre Rodriguez or click here to submit your contact information for follow-up.
Set-Up Volunteers Needed
Some of our long-time set-up volunteers would like to move on to other opportunities, so SIM is seeking sangha members who would be interested in embracing this rewarding way to serve the sangha. We would also like to expand our existing teams from two to three to lighten the workload and shorten the time it takes to do the work.
If you become part of a set-up team, you commit to coming one Thursday per month an hour before the meeting, 6 p.m. the first three weeks of the month, or 5 p.m in the fourth week (that week the beginning meditation instruction starts at 6 pm). Closing down after the meeting takes between 30-45 minutes, depending on how much extra help other members can provide.
If you’d prefer to be part of a general pool that assists on an as-needed, as-available basis, that would also be very welcome.
This work of transforming the Dharma Center space into a welcoming place for sangha members to gather is rewarding work. It’s an opportunity to get to know our new place intimately and to get to known fellow sangha members you might otherwise never interact with. If you are interested in becoming either part of a volunteer-team or part of a volunteer-pool, please email Margaret Buss.
Volunteers Needed for One-Day Retreat January 28th
If you plan to attend the one-day retreat on January 28th with Amma Thanasanti, would you consider helping with either set-up or take-down of the Dharma Hall? Tasks include bringing flowers, setting up the tea service and/or cleaning up kitchen and break room afterwards, setting out name tags, setting up the sound equipment, and arranging chairs and cushions — you won’t have to do them all; you would be part of a team and would be guided in the tasks.
The daylong start at 10 a.m. The set-up team will meet at 8:45 a.m. to ensure the Dharma Hall is ready by then.
If you are interested in this special act of dana to the community, or if you are able to bring flowers, email Margaret Buss.
Flower Yogis Wanted
If you have a green thumb and a colorful garden (or other source) and would be willing to bring flowers to sangha meetings or one-day retreats, on either a one-time or regular basis, please email the Set-Up Coordinator Margaret Buss.
SIM’s NEW ON-LINE DONATION SYSTEM WILL BE OPERATIONAL NEXT WEEK – FOR NOW, WE NEED TO RELY ON SNAIL MAIL!
We are disappointed to report that SIM’s new on-line donation system will not be operational until the middle of next week. Until then, we need to rely on USPS “snail mail.” Once the system is operational, you will receive notification via this email.
If you are in a position to make a year-end contribution, please make out a check to “SIM” and date it before the end of the year. By mail, send to:
- Sacramento Insight Meditation Sacramento Dharma Center 3111 Wissemann Drive Sacramento, California, 96826
Or, you may bring the check (dated no later than December 31) to the first Thursday evening sitting of 2017, on January 5, 2017.
The SIM Board of Directors encourages you to sign up for our new Monthly Contribution Program when the new on-line donation system goes live during the middle of next week. The Monthly Contribution Program is designed to cover our fixed, recurring operational expenses. You’ll be able to go to SIM’s home page at sactoinsight.org, where you will see the “Donate” button in the lower right hand corner. A click on that button will take you to our new donation page.
The Monthly Contribution Program will not cover dana for our presenters. The Dana program for Thursday evenings and One Day presenters—a dana bowl for contributions by cash or check— will remain the same.
We would like to provide new practice programs and opportunities; to identify and cultivate new presenters; and to subsidize our scholarship fund and work exchange opportunities. Without the generosity of all our members, however, we will be unable to meet our current anticipated deficit for 2017 of $17,000, or to develop new programming.
Thank you for your generosity. We hope you and your family have a safe and happy holidays.
SIM Board of Directors
- Dennis Warren
- James Barnes
- Barbara Colton
- Renee Kunz
- Cathy Vigran