The teachings of the Buddha (Dharma) and the practices of Insight Meditation (Vipassana) and loving-kindness meditation (metta) are at the heart of all the programs we offer at Spirit Rock. Practicing Insight Meditation develops mindfulness, the capacity to pay attention to each moment of life and to see clearly the truth of our experience. Studying the Dharma provides insights into the conditions that define and limit our experience of life. And cultivating an attitude of loving-kindness allows us to stay present to what's true and what's difficult in our lives with compassion for ourselves and others. Ultimately, our relationship to life is transformed as we learn to live more wisely and kindly.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) We review the importance of giving attention to ethical practice, and how it has often been marginalized in Western Buddhism, with meditation typically being at the center (as is evident in speaking of “meditation centers” and “meditation groups”). Wise Speech, as one of the three aspects of ethical practice named in the Noble Eightfold Path, is particularly important in contemporary Western practice; we can have an opportunity for many hours a day of spiritual practice if we bring Wise Speech practice into our lives! The Buddha's four guidelines for Wise Speech were truthfulness, helpfulness, care and kindness, and appropriateness (especially good timing). We focus, in this second talk on the first guideline of truthfulness, on how we understand and practice being truthful in our relational and social lives, with reference also to how truthfulness is understood in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions. We see how truthfulness is crucial in communities and societies, what the consequences are of a lack of truthfulness, and how one dimension of our Wise Speech practice is helping to develop more truthfulness in our communities and societies. The talk is followed by discussion.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) First, there are basic instructions in developing concentration offered, including the optional "three-part breath" technique which can help with avoiding controlling the breath and with developing more continuity. Then basic mindfulness instructions are given. The last minutes bring in reflection and inquiry questions related to our practice of wise speech, including the guideline of truthfulness, related to the talk that follows the guided practice. This is followed by discussion about different aspects of our practice.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) A talk on muditā, the joy that isn't ours alone. After days steadying the heart through warmth, tenderness, and spaciousness, we turn toward the brahma vihara most easily overlooked: the capacity to feel glad simply because someone else is. Through stories of borrowed delight, dancing tigers, and the quiet gladness of showing up to practice, we look at what gets in the way (envy, and its louder cousin, toxic cheer) and what it might mean to let another's happiness warm us too.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Reflections on compassion, 20 minute guided meditation exploring various methods of compassion, followed by Q&A
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Pain is unavoidable; suffering is what we add by resisting it. This talk traces that distinction through a rage-filled retreat, an ongoing war with invasive shrubs, and the near enemies — pity, overwhelm, "fierce compassion" — that masquerade as care while keeping suffering at arm's length.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Teachings and Guided Practice on practicing loving-kindness for oneself.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) An introduction to the Brahma Vihāras and to metta as the atmosphere of practice — exploring how kindness gathers us, heals the places where the heart has closed, and liberates.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The Buddha taught four guidelines for Wise Speech (as a core aspect of ethical practice): truthfulness, helpfulness, care and kindness, and appropriateness (especially good timing). We explore the first guideline, partly in connection with the other three guidelines, in four dimensions of practice. First and most basically, we explore how we practice with truthfulness in our individual practice with others. Secondly, we look at how truthfulness is also a central ethical guideline in our communities, organizations, and societies, making possible trust and safety; yet often this guideline is not followed. Thirdly, we look at our contemporary society in terms of truthfulness and the lack of truthfulness. Fourthly, we ask how we might respond, as part of our ethical practice, to develop more truthfulness in the society: What can help? The talk is followed by discussion.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Teachings and guided practice on settling, integrating, arriving.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The Buddha said as much as possible the one reflection to keep in mind is impermanence which leads to letting go, equanimity and liberation. This talk explores the gift of opening and embracing impermanence.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Anicca and Its Implications
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) You are the richest person on earth while the version of you that plays in your mind is a story of lack. Learn to see the difference between your actual experience and you mind's stories. Believe what's actually happening.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Use the RAIN acronym for emotions (not just unpleasant ones) and thoughts as a way to be with their direct or somatic experience.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) An exploration of the five hindrances (desire, aversion, sloth & torpor, restlessness, and doubt). This talk draws on classical teachings, personal stories, and the Buddha's water similes to ask what happens when we get curious about these states instead of fighting them.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Instructions on working with the breath and body.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Wise Effort as an important issue in practice. This talk explores finding the balance between too much and too little as well as understanding the four classical Wise Efforts described in the teachings.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Begins with a meditation and ends with a Dharma talk. (Group discussion has been omitted).
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Bringing together awareness with body and breath so that contusions for calming and stilling can occur naturally, making it easier to notice all sense experience.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) In this talk, Diana weaves together stories from her own spiritual journey with what she sees as universal aspects of the spiritual path. She talks about obstacles that arise on the path, what insight is, learning to love ourselves more deeply, and the journey to resting in Natural Awareness. She also covers how the spiritual life manifests off the cushion throughout a lifetime, including in the face of a turbulent world.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) This guided session teaches the basics of self-compassion: mindfulness for judgmental thoughts, kindness towards self, and recognition of shared humanity. The guided meditation focuses on sending kindness to self.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) This short talk and longer guided meditation offers a clear introduction to how to practice mindfulness with an emphasis on finding and anchor and gathering your wild mind.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Begins with a 30m meditation and is followed by a Dharma Talk
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Begins with a 30m meditation and is followed by a Dharma Talk. All group discussion is removed save for 1 share.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) What is the mind like right now? Contracted? Distracted? Collected? Liberated?
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Instructions on the First Foundation of Mindfulness; Settling the Body, Accessing the Breath as an anchor, Practicing with the awareness of what is arising, including moment to moment sensations.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) An intro to the awakening factors and the exchange of support between each factor.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Begins with a 30m meditation and is followed by a Dharma Talk
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) In this second part of a two-part set of talks, we first review briefly last week's talk, including the three traditional areas of training--in wisdom, meditation (including the development of concentration, mindfulness and insight, and the heart practices), and ethical practice. We then identify two further contemporary areas of practice: Psychological work of different kinds (including psychotherapy, various forms of "shadow" work, examination of one's social conditioning) and social engagement that extends ethical practice. We also identify some of the deeper dimensions of traditional practice, including the deepening of concentration practice in the jhanas, the three modes of liberating insight--seeing impermanence, reactivity (or dukkha), and not-self, the opening to non-dual awakened awareness, practices transforming the body (as in tummo practice), and the resting in non-doing. The talk is followed by discussion.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Connected with the later talk giving a contemporary map of our practices, we review four foundational practices: (1) developing concentration (samadhi); (2) cultivating general mindfulness, (3) cultivating mindfulness of impermanence; and (4) a heart practice developing kindness, compassion, or other heart qualities. This is followed by two brief reflections on one's practice.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Starting with a meditation connecting us to the natural world around us, and the many kinds of conscious beings that may be there, we explore bringing back animist understandings of the world and the Dharma that have been lost in our modern psychological, individualistic practice.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Starting with a meditation connecting us to the natural world around us, and the many kinds of conscious beings that may be there, we explore bringing back animist understandings of the world and the Dharma that have been lost in our modern psychological, individualistic practice.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Begins with a 20m meditation & is followed by a dharma talk. (Group discussion has been omitted.)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center)
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) In the first part of a two-part talk, we first identify the value of having a comprehensive map of our practice, and how a contemporary map builds on traditional maps but includes dimensions of practice not identified traditionally. We then explore the three traditional areas of training--in wisdom, meditation (including the development of concentration, mindfulness and insight, and the heart practices), and ethical practice--while briefly mentioning (more next time) two further contemporary areas of practice: Psychological learning of different kinds and social engagement that extends ethical practice. The talk is followed by discussion.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) In the first part of a two-part talk, we first identify the value of having a comprehensive map of our practice, and how a contemporary map builds on traditional maps but includes dimensions of practice not identified traditionally. We then explore the three traditional areas of training--in wisdom, meditation (including the development of concentration, mindfulness and insight, and the heart practices), and ethical practice--while briefly mentioning (more next time) two further contemporary areas of practice: Psychological learning of different kinds and social engagement that extends ethical practice. The talk is followed by discussion.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Connected with the talk giving a contemporary map of our practices, we review four foundational practices: (1) developing concentration (samadhi); (2) cultivating general mindfulness, (3) cultivating mindfulness of pleasant or unpleasant feeling-tones, and being mindful of any ensuing reactivity (grasping after the pleasant and pushing away the unpleasant in relatively unconscious, automatic, and habitual ways); and (4) a heart practice developing kindness, compassion, or other heart qualities. The guided meditation is followed by a brief period of discussion.
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