To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.
The main person who gets in the way of allowing us to feel sympathetic joy (mudita in Pali) and gratitude is you know who. Often we compare ourselves to others and find we don’t measure up in some way. Envy and jealousy are the opposites of sympathetic joy. The Buddha encouraged us to challenge our assumptions and to cultivate this capacity to find joy in the good fortune of others. Ajahn Pasanno says, “Cutting through self-view is the Buddha’s unique contribution to spiritual practice. Mudita is antithetical to the self-view that we carry around with us and leads us to a place of boundless and immeasurable joy.”
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.png00Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-02-08 22:00:002024-02-17 19:45:172/08/24 “Cultivating Sympathetic Joy (& Gratitude) Despite Ourselves” with Walt Opie
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.png00Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-02-01 22:00:002024-02-17 19:45:502/01/24 “Balancing Faith and Wisdom” with JD Doyle
The volunteer maximum has been reached. Thank you to everyone for offering your help.
The Sacramento Dharma Center Library committee is looking for two to three new members to help organize, update, and maintain the existing books and resources in the library. We’re hoping for a commitment of approximately 3 to 4 hours a month initially (for 2 to 3 months), until all the books are shelved and catalogued. As we move into the maintenance phase of simply tracking check-out and returning library materials, much less time will be required. If interested, please contact Jody Ansell at 916-716-6593 or Ann Kronser at 608-220-2447.
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.png00Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-01-31 21:34:162024-02-10 11:53:48Seeking Volunteers for SDC Library – Thank You
To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.
We rightly place strong emphasis on mindfulness of the body and mindfulness of mind states in our practice of meditation and everyday awareness. These are the first and third ways of establishing mindfulness as described in the SatipatthanaSutta, one of the core teachings of our Insight tradition. Sometimes overlooked is the Second Foundation of Mindfulness: mindfulness of feeling tone (vedana in Pali). A feeling tone of pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral accompanies every experience, physical or mental. Unnoticed, these feeling tones can escalate to desire, aversion, or delusion and cause us to suffer. When noticed, they can lead us to expand our range of situations where we can feel okay, regardless of outside circumstances. On this evening, we will explore vedana in our guided meditation and in the dharma talk and following discussion. Rich encourages you to practice noticing vedana in the week leading up to this evening, so you can report directly from your experience in the discussion session. If you are unfamiliar with the practice and need instruction, email Rich Howard.
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.png00Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-01-25 22:00:002024-01-30 10:03:521/25/24 “Pleasant, Unpleasant, Neutral, Numb: Exploring the Second Foundation of Mindfulness” with Rich Howard
SIM is grateful for all our donors and we’ve already emailed tax letters to those who’ve donated $250 or more in 2023. If you have not received the tax letter (dated Jan 21 or Jan 22, 2024) and you think you should have, please check your email Inbox, as well as your Spam or Junk folders. If you still don’t find it, please contact GregG@sactoinsight.org.
To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.
Our minds tend to see the world as dualistic. Life – personal, relationship, financial, political choices – seems to be limited to two dimensional competing alternatives, an either/or proposition.
Unless we pause and step back from the drama of the moment, we lose touch with the nuance, beauty, and multi-dimensional nature of life, and life choices. We fail to see and experience the underlying reality that the world operates on a wide continuum of related and inter-dependent events, experiences, and choices.
We lose access to the most important, skillful, and healing life option – collaborating with life as it is, and collaborating with others as they are.
This Thursday evening will explore this field of experiences through common situations in meditation and everyday living.
The subject matter of this evening will be appropriate for all stages of practice.
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.png00Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-01-18 22:00:002024-01-22 21:58:411/18/24 “The Left Wing & The Right Wing Belong to the Same Bird (Inclusion)” with Dennis Warren
Uposatha Observance with SIM Community Teacher Rich Howard
For biographical details about the teacher Rich Howard click here.
* This in-person event is not available via Zoom.
Uposatha Observance: a Full Moon Practice Session Buddhist communities worldwide celebrate the four phases of the moon with special practice sessions. On this full moon night, Rich will lead a practice session after our regular Thursday evening event. We will have periods of sitting meditation and group walking, traditional Buddhist chants, and maybe a Buddhist bedtime story! Feel free to stay for all or part of this special offering.
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/fullmoon-4991825_640.jpg427640Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-01-12 15:12:392024-01-12 15:17:59(Onsite) Uposatha Observance: a Full Moon Practice Session with Rich Howard
Join us to honor and thank beloved sangha member Margaret Buss for her long-term service as the SIM Volunteer Coordinator. As part of the regular evening program, we will take some time to show Margaret our gratitude.
Treats and tea will be offered during the Sit & Dharma talk break. Come and be part of the festivities.
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.png00Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-01-12 11:46:452024-01-12 12:11:42Gratitude for Margaret Buss
To download this talk, right-click and select ‘save audio as’ or select the 3-dot menu to the right of the speaker icon.
The monastic path of meditation and seclusion has been the primary image of awakened life as the west has encountered the Dharma. We will talk about how emerging Buddhist forms may take on more elements of engagement and the brahma viharas than of the monastic style of seclusion and renunciation.
https://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.png00Sabitrehttps://sactoinsight.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/SIM-logo-trans.pngSabitre2024-01-11 22:00:002024-01-22 22:08:281/11/24 “Seclusion and Engagement: Models of the Dharma Path” with Tony Bernhard
Deep gratitude to all those who donated to our yearend fundraising effort. We raised $24,020! This is a fantastic start to covering our budget shortfall. But we still anticipate having a budget/revenue shortfall in 2024 due in large part to our new – and absolutely essential – Operations Manager position which adds $22,000 to our annual expenses.
As we start this new year, we are beginning a campaign for the month of January to get 10 new monthly donors and 10 current donors to increase their monthly contributions. Can you be one? Can you encourage someone you know to be one?
Recurring donations provide reliability and consistency to the organization. This allows us to plan responsibly and make future commitments.
Our current monthly contributions range from $10 to $200 per month. However, this is not enough to cover our anticipated 2024 expenditures.
What does your donation support?
SIM’s core assets: Thursday night sit and dharma talks, Saturday Daylong Retreats, Courses, and the annual retreat;
Our Legacy Teachers and ultimately continues supporting the Dharma in Sacramento;
The new Operations Manager position, which expands our communications & online capacities, facilitates our administrative and registration processes, and provides important operations assistance to the Board and Faculty.
AV/hybrid events- this allows people who cannot come in person to attend to hear the Dhamma and maintain their connection to the sangha.
If you are not currently donating monthly, please consider signing up. If you are currently donating monthly, please consider increasing your donation.
It’s easy to sign up online by going to the Donation page. Put in the amount and choose “Make this donation every month”.
If you want to increase your online donation, email website@sactoinsight.org with the changes you want to make and Sabitre will update your contribution.
And just to have some fun and give a little incentive for folks to sign up, if you become a monthly donor, or change your donation rate, during the month of January, we will be holding a drawing for two lucky winners to go out for a meal with Senior Teacher Rich Howard and another with SIM Founding Teacher Dennis Warren.
With gratitude,
Amy Kovak, on behalf of the SIM Board of Directors and Faculty
2/08/24 “Cultivating Sympathetic Joy (& Gratitude) Despite Ourselves” with Walt Opie
Audio DharmaThe main person who gets in the way of allowing us to feel sympathetic joy (mudita in Pali) and gratitude is you know who. Often we compare ourselves to others and find we don’t measure up in some way. Envy and jealousy are the opposites of sympathetic joy. The Buddha encouraged us to challenge our assumptions and to cultivate this capacity to find joy in the good fortune of others. Ajahn Pasanno says, “Cutting through self-view is the Buddha’s unique contribution to spiritual practice. Mudita is antithetical to the self-view that we carry around with us and leads us to a place of boundless and immeasurable joy.”
2/01/24 “Balancing Faith and Wisdom” with JD Doyle
Audio DharmaSeeking Volunteers for SDC Library – Thank You
VolunteerThe Sacramento Dharma Center Library committee is looking for two to three new members to help organize, update, and maintain the existing books and resources in the library. We’re hoping for a commitment of approximately 3 to 4 hours a month initially (for 2 to 3 months), until all the books are shelved and catalogued. As we move into the maintenance phase of simply tracking check-out and returning library materials, much less time will be required.If interested, please contact Jody Ansell at 916-716-6593 or Ann Kronser at 608-220-2447.
1/25/24 “Pleasant, Unpleasant, Neutral, Numb: Exploring the Second Foundation of Mindfulness” with Rich Howard
Audio DharmaWe rightly place strong emphasis on mindfulness of the body and mindfulness of mind states in our practice of meditation and everyday awareness. These are the first and third ways of establishing mindfulness as described in the Satipatthana Sutta, one of the core teachings of our Insight tradition. Sometimes overlooked is the Second Foundation of Mindfulness: mindfulness of feeling tone (vedana in Pali). A feeling tone of pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral accompanies every experience, physical or mental. Unnoticed, these feeling tones can escalate to desire, aversion, or delusion and cause us to suffer. When noticed, they can lead us to expand our range of situations where we can feel okay, regardless of outside circumstances. On this evening, we will explore vedana in our guided meditation and in the dharma talk and following discussion. Rich encourages you to practice noticing vedana in the week leading up to this evening, so you can report directly from your experience in the discussion session. If you are unfamiliar with the practice and need instruction, email Rich Howard.
Special 2023-Tax Note
NewsSIM is grateful for all our donors and we’ve already emailed tax letters to those who’ve donated $250 or more in 2023. If you have not received the tax letter (dated Jan 21 or Jan 22, 2024) and you think you should have, please check your email Inbox, as well as your Spam or Junk folders. If you still don’t find it, please contact GregG@sactoinsight.org.
1/18/24 “The Left Wing & The Right Wing Belong to the Same Bird (Inclusion)” with Dennis Warren
Audio DharmaOur minds tend to see the world as dualistic. Life – personal, relationship, financial, political choices – seems to be limited to two dimensional competing alternatives, an either/or proposition.
Unless we pause and step back from the drama of the moment, we lose touch with the nuance, beauty, and multi-dimensional nature of life, and life choices. We fail to see and experience the underlying reality that the world operates on a wide continuum of related and inter-dependent events, experiences, and choices.
We lose access to the most important, skillful, and healing life option – collaborating with life as it is, and collaborating with others as they are.
This Thursday evening will explore this field of experiences through common situations in meditation and everyday living.
The subject matter of this evening will be appropriate for all stages of practice.
(Onsite) Uposatha Observance: a Full Moon Practice Session with Rich Howard
Weekly MeditationJanuary 25 @ 9:00 pm – 11:59 pm PST
Uposatha Observance with SIM Community Teacher Rich Howard
For biographical details about the teacher Rich Howard click here.
Uposatha Observance: a Full Moon Practice Session
Buddhist communities worldwide celebrate the four phases of the moon with special practice sessions. On this full moon night, Rich will lead a practice session after our regular Thursday evening event. We will have periods of sitting meditation and group walking, traditional Buddhist chants, and maybe a Buddhist bedtime story! Feel free to stay for all or part of this special offering.
Sacramento Dharma Center Building
Sacramento, CA 95826 United States + Google Map 916-386-9844
View Venue Website
Gratitude for Margaret Buss
Weekly MeditationJanuary 18 @ 7:30 pm – 7:45 pm PST
Join us to honor and thank beloved sangha member Margaret Buss for her long-term service as the SIM Volunteer Coordinator. As part of the regular evening program, we will take some time to show Margaret our gratitude.
Treats and tea will be offered during the Sit & Dharma talk break. Come and be part of the festivities.
Sacramento Dharma Center Building
Sacramento, CA 95826 United States + Google Map 916-386-9844
View Venue Website
1/11/24 “Seclusion and Engagement: Models of the Dharma Path” with Tony Bernhard
Audio DharmaThe monastic path of meditation and seclusion has been the primary image of awakened life as the west has encountered the Dharma. We will talk about how emerging Buddhist forms may take on more elements of engagement and the brahma viharas than of the monastic style of seclusion and renunciation.
Become a SIM Monthly Donor
NewsDear Friends,
Deep gratitude to all those who donated to our yearend fundraising effort. We raised $24,020! This is a fantastic start to covering our budget shortfall. But we still anticipate having a budget/revenue shortfall in 2024 due in large part to our new – and absolutely essential – Operations Manager position which adds $22,000 to our annual expenses.
As we start this new year, we are beginning a campaign for the month of January to get 10 new monthly donors and 10 current donors to increase their monthly contributions. Can you be one? Can you encourage someone you know to be one?
Recurring donations provide reliability and consistency to the organization. This allows us to plan responsibly and make future commitments.
Our current monthly contributions range from $10 to $200 per month. However, this is not enough to cover our anticipated 2024 expenditures.
What does your donation support?
If you are not currently donating monthly, please consider signing up. If you are currently donating monthly, please consider increasing your donation.
It’s easy to sign up online by going to the Donation page. Put in the amount and choose “Make this donation every month”.
If you want to increase your online donation, email website@sactoinsight.org with the changes you want to make and Sabitre will update your contribution.
And just to have some fun and give a little incentive for folks to sign up, if you become a monthly donor, or change your donation rate, during the month of January, we will be holding a drawing for two lucky winners to go out for a meal with Senior Teacher Rich Howard and another with SIM Founding Teacher Dennis Warren.
With gratitude,
Amy Kovak, on behalf of the SIM Board of Directors and Faculty