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Saturday, January 23, 2010, 9am to 5pm and Sunday, January 24, 1 to 5pm
How do we bring our spiritual practice into situations of conflict, whether inner conflict (“Should I stay in this job or relationship?”), interpersonal conflict, or conflict within an organization or community or society? By conflict, we mean a tension or contradiction between goals, intentions, or styles, which may or may not be connected with hostility. For most of us, conflicts are difficult and we often tend to the extremes of either avoiding conflicts or “acting out” when conflicts arise. This occurs particularly because in conflicts we typically have difficult emotions, and thoughts involving blaming and harsh judging of others (or ourselves).
In this two-day training, we will offer perspectives and tools to take home, brought together from Buddhist teachings and the work of mediators and peacemakers, that will help us to understand the nature of conflict; to see conflicts as opportunities for reconciliation, learning, and deepening relationships; to be more skillful when there are difficult emotions and polarizing thoughts; and to cultivate mindfulness and skillful speech in the midst of conflict. We will explore all of this through meditation, short talks, discussion, interactive exercises, and practicing conflict scenarios drawn from our own life experiences and from simulations.
Lawrence Ellis has been meditating since 1975, has practiced extensively in the communities around Thich Nhat Hanh for years, and is mentored by both Jack Kornfield and Joanna Macy. He did his master’s thesis at Oxford University on Gandhian Satyagraha and received extensive professional training in conflict management as a senior associate and later director with one of the nation’s oldest firms, focusing on managing organizational and community changewhere conflict management is a core competency. He has delivered or taught conflict transformation services in spiritual, interpersonal, organizational, community, and movement-building settings for many years, and draws on systems and complexity theory, Buddhist traditions, and his ancestral African and Native American traditions.
Donald Rothberg, Ph.D., a member of the Spirit Rock Teachers Council, has practiced Insight Meditation since 1976 and has also received training in Dzogchen and the Hakomi approach to body-based psychotherapy. A former teacher at the University of Kentucky, Kenyon College, and Saybrook Graduate School, he currently writes and teaches classes, groups, and retreats on meditation, daily life practice, spirituality and psychology, and socially engaged Buddhism, in the San Francisco Bay Area and nationally. An organizer, teacher, and former board member for the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, he is the guiding teacher for the two-year Spirit Rock program, “Path of Engagement.” He is the author of The Engaged Spiritual Life: A Buddhist Approach to Transforming Ourselves and the World and the co-editor of Ken Wilber in Dialogue: Conversations with Leading Transpersonal Thinkers.
Saturday, Oct. 24, 2009
6:00 to 6:30 — Hungry Ghost Ceremony.
6:30 to 9 PM — Halloween party.
ATTIRE
Come dressed as one of your hungry ghosts (or a generic demon): a costume representing a personal character trait which haunts you. For example, we have had ghosts representing: fear of ending up a bag lady, craving for recognition or attention, indecision, and constant vigilance.
BRING
Food to feed our hungry ghosts which after the ceremony, we (dressed as our hungry ghosts, you see) will enjoy.
WHAT
Come join us for a ceremony to acknowledge a shadow-side of ourselves, in a playful costume party Halloween context. Hungry Ghosts are vividly described in Buddhist psychology as phantomlike creatures with enormous constantly hungry bellies. They face never-ending thirst and hunger because their necks are so thin and throats so narrow and raw that swallowing produces unbearable pain. Thus, they roam desperately hungry and perpetually unsatisfied, not unlike their human counterparts who find it impossible to be happy with what they have, always comparing it to their fantasy of what they should have or once had. In our Hungry Ghost ceremony we will welcome these miserable spirits of craving to assemble. With compassion we will offer them nourishment so that they may be at ease and cease to roam the earth in suffering. Our ceremony will be derived from Zen ceremonies I have gathered from several places.
RSVP for DIRECTIONS
Home of Anne Foster and Mike Kupfer, San Carlos. For directions, RSVP Anne Foster, afoster@rawbw.com.
Saturday, May 1, 2010, 9am to 12:30pm
In this mini-retreat, we will awaken our bodies, minds and hearts to the present moment. We will integrate yoga, breathwork, meditation, metta (loving kindness), and relaxation and let these practices inform and deepen one another. The morning is appropriate for beginners and those with more experience. Our aim is not perfect poses or perfect meditation, but to connect deeply with ourselves and allow the emergence of our innate wisdom, capabilities, joy, tranquility and compassion.
Terry has been teaching yoga at the Insight Meditation Center (IMC) for over ten years. She trained in Iyengar style yoga and is a graduate of the Spirit Rock Community Dharma Leader Program. She also teaches yoga and meditation at the California Yoga Center in Palo Alto. Her teaching is gentle, supportive, and sensitive to individual students’ abilities.
Please bring a large towel and yoga sticky mat and sitting cushion if you have them. If you don’t, mats and cushions will be available for you to use.
Friday, December 31, 7:30pm to 12:15am, January 1, 2011
Bring poetry or reading and treats to share. Sitting and walking meditation, time to share, refreshments about 9pm, ritual to bring in the new year. See Newsletter for contact information.
Saturday, December 12, 9am to 4:30pm
This is a daylong retreat with alternating periods of sitting and walking meditation, instruction in mindfulness practice and a dharma talk. It is recommended for both beginners and experienced practitioners. No interviews.
Monday Evening Sitting, November 9, 7:30 to 9pm
Stephen Batchelor is a contemporary Buddhist teacher and writer, best known for his secular or agnostic approach to Buddhism. Stephen considers Buddhism to be a constantly evolving culture of awakening rather than a religious system based on immutable dogmas and beliefs. IMC is fortunate to have Stephen spend an evening with us.
Stephen Batchelor, a former Buddhist monk, studied under the guidance of Tibetan lamas and completed a three-year Zen training in Korea. He is the noted author of Alone With Others, The Faith to Doubt, The Awakening of the West, Buddhism Without Beliefs and Verses from the Center, and his new book Living with the Devil: A Meditation on Good and Evil. He is a member of the teacher council at Gaia House in England and is co-founder of Sharpham College. He teaches worldwide and lives in southwest France.
Website: www.stephenbatchelor.org
Saturday, January 9, 2010, 9:30am to 12:30pm
In Buddhism, Joy is both a Factor of Enlightenment and one of the four Divine Abodes. Today, as we are bombarded with messages that heighten our fear and sadness about the world, more than ever it is vital to understand the importance of joy as a central aspect of spiritual practice. True happiness is not about acquiring anything but rather opening to the natural joy and aliveness right inside you. This workshop is based on the popular 10-month Awakening Joy course that thousands have taken since 2003 to develop our natural capacity for well-being and happiness. We will learn basic principles and experiential exercises for developing and increasing wholesome states (two of the four Wise Efforts) drawn from Buddhist philosophy and presented in a user-friendly way.
James Baraz is a founding teacher of Spirit Rock Meditation Center where he started the Family Program, Community Dharma Leader Program and Kalyana Mitta Network. He leads retreats, workshops and classes in the U.S. and abroad and has been teaching the Awakening Joy course (www.awakeningjoy.info) since 2003. James is co-author with Shoshana Alexander of Awakening Joy due in 2010 (Bantam) which is based on the course. In addition, he is on the International Advisory Board of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship.
Sunday, November 22, 11am.
Gil and the board will share current information about IMC’s programs and finances, as well as ideas for the future. All are welcome to attend!
Sunday, November 15, 9:25am to 2:30pm
IMC is hosting a benefit for the Saranaloka Foundation. All dana for this Sunday will be donated to the Foundation.
Regular sitting: Ajahn Anandabodhi and Ajahn Metta will be guest speakers
11 am: Meal offering to the monastics
12:30-2:30 pm: Saranaloka supporters’ meeting
Saranaloka Foundation was established in 2004 to support nuns from Chithurst and Amaravati monasteries in England to come to the United States to teach. Since that time, and numerous visits later, enthusiasm for the presence of women monastics has been tremendous and is the driving force behind an invitation to the nuns’ community to set up a permanent monastery here in the United States.
With the blessing of the Forest Sangha monastic communities in Europe, an intention to establish a branch monastery for training women in the United States has been set. Three nuns, Ajahn Anandabodhi, Ajahn Metta and Ajahn Santacitta will return to the vihara this December with the intention of establishing a monastery in a more rural nearby setting in the coming years.
Ajahn Metta was born in 1953 in Germany. She has been practising meditation since 1984 and has experience of living in other spiritual communities in Europe and Thailand (Wat Suan Mokkh). She became an Anagārikā in 1993 at Amaravati and took higher ordination as a Sīladhāra in 1996. She is one of the group of senior nuns leading the Sīladhārā community. For the past few years she has been teaching meditation workshops and retreats.
Ajahn Anandabodhi was born in Wales in 1968. She trained in catering and also worked in environmental conservation, all the while looking for spiritual direction. Visiting Amaravati in 1990, she experienced a sense of ‘coming home’ and in 1992 joined the community, taking ordination in 1995. She particularly enjoys ‘tudong’ – walking on faith and taking the sign of the samana out into the world.
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