This 45-minute course is suitable for beginners or anyone who would like a refresher. It is offered on the fourth Thursday of every month before the regular sitting and dharma talk. There is no fee.
Thursday, September 22, 7-9:15. Sitting and Dharma Talk/Discussion with Dennis Warren, SIM Founding Instructor. Talk Topic: BEING OF SERVICE TO OTHERS & OURSELVES It’s not unusual to think of “service” as something special we do: working at a soup kitchen, homeless shelter, dog shelter, the pediatric unit in a hospital, a clothing donation center. But […]
Saturday, September 24, 8:30-4:30 pm. Daylong Retreat with Dennis Warren, SIM Founding Instructor. THE ROLE OF THE “BRAHMA VIHARAS” IN AN INTEGRATED PATH OF PRACTICE The Brahma Viharas – loving kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy & equanimity – are what we would call the “heart” qualities in Buddhist practice. We frequently understand these as powerful states […]
The Climate Sangha is meeting Tuesday, September 27, at 7 pm., at the Sacramento Dharma Center. The Climate Sangha provides a place for members concerned about the future that climate change will bring us to discuss those issues openly to use Buddhist practice to face the changes and to provide mutual support
Faith and Challenges/Sustaining Practice In the Insight Meditation tradition as practiced at SIM, faith is an experiential quality of engagement rather than doctrinaire adherence to a top-down belief system. And obstacles to practice, however unwelcome they may feel, are the field of practice through which we learn about our own minds and the path away […]
During this workday, SIM community members will do 4-5 hours of light landscaping work (weed pulling and pruning shrubs) on the grounds of the Sacramento Friends Meeting House. This workday is intended as dana (generosity) for the Sacramento Friends for the many years they have allowed our community to rent the Sacramento Friends Meeting House for […]
Depends on What?: An Exploration of Causes and Conditions You may have heard about the importance of "causes and conditions" but what does that mean to our practice in formal meditation and daily life? Can we learn to recognize how causes and conditions work in our lives experientially without making it into an intellectual analysis? […]
Topic: Better than, worse than, the same as... The habit of fault-finding and comparison is part of a larger pattern of insecurity in which we always feel the need to judge ourselves in regards to other people. It is as though we need to convince ourselves that we are okay, which we can only do […]
CHANGE & ADAPTING TO CHANGE While change is inevitable in our lives, the appearance of things remaining the same seems to be the constant focus of our attention. Many, if not most, of our decisions are based on an assumption – the assumption that things will remain as they are. Why do our minds do […]
This 45-minute course is suitable for beginners or anyone who would like a refresher. It is offered on the fourth Thursday of every month before the regular sitting and dharma talk. There is no fee.