Use code SUMMERPRACTICE for a 25% discount on all On Demand Courses through August 31.

Daily Meditation Recordings, with Nirmala Werner – Week of Nov 1, 2021

Nirmala Werner

Nirmala Werner

We’re fortunate that Nirmala Werner has generously offered to lead our daily meditation sessions for Europe and the UK. To find out more about Nirmala, and to view her other contributions to Sangha Live, click here. Recordings are posted 24 – 36 hours after the live session runs.

 

This week’s topic is Embodied Metta – The Body as a Pathway to Freedom.

 

The Buddha’s teachings invite us to be with things as they are. This week, we’ll learn embodiment practices to help us cultivate true love, compassion and care for ourselves and for others. We’ll practice staying intimate with our body, mind and heart in daily life, in sexuality, and with (often unwanted) thoughts, feelings and emotions.

Coming home to our body

November 1, 2021

Links to poems:

Mary Oliver – Wild Geese

Hafiz – If God Invited You to a Party 

Appreciation of the body

November 2, 2021

Links and quotes:

Quote from Rumi: “I have come to drag you out of yourself and take you into my heart. I have come to bring out the beauty you never knew you had and lift you like a prayer to the sky.”

Hafiz: Why Abstain from Love? Available in this collection of poems

Meeting difficult emotions with body, breath and voice

November 3, 2021

Links

A gentle embrace of sexuality

November 4, 2021

Links and quotes:

Galway Kinnell: Saint Francis and the Sow

Quote from Sri Ramakrishna: Oh longing mind, dwell within the depth of your own pure nature, do not seek your home elsewhere…your naked awareness alone, o mind, is the inexhaustible abundance for which you long so desperately. 

Heart connection and reaching out

November 5, 2021

Links:

Antonio Machado: Last Night As I Was Sleeping

 

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • The Power of Relational Awareness

    In this session, Oren Jay Sofer shares reflections on the basics of Mindful Communication, with particular focus on the internal foundations of successful communication. The talk explores some of the ways our silent contemplative practice can support our interpersonal relationships, while the Q&A delves into more specific issues of conversation and relationships.

    Read More

  • photo of Martin Aylward smiling

    Aditthana: The art of commitment

    New year’s resolutions are often unrealistically ambitious and doomed to failure. In this first Sangha Live class of the year, our founding teacher Martin Aylward explores the art of wise commitment; how to refine what one is committing to in a way that is useful, precise, realistic and time-boundaried; elements that allow us to align…

    Read More

  • Dave Smith

    Liberation through the Heart (Citta Vimmuti)

    Most people associate Dharma practice with the concept of Wisdom. Here, the idea is that we need to “know” something that we don’t already know. For English thinking minds this can become very problematic and can turn our practice into a cognitive or intellectual endeavor. With the earliest teachings of the Dharma we see that…

    Read More

  • The Nonduality of Good and Evil? Buddhist Reflections on War

    Ukraine…Gaza…Iran… Can Buddhist teachings help us understand and respond to these modern conflicts? Quotation: If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere, insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil…

    Read More

  • Trudy Goodman

    Presence as an Act of Compassion and Love

    Mindful presence is the necessary ground of compassion and care. With presence, we courageously enter an intimacy that connects us with ourselves, each other and the world, body, heart and spirit. The beautiful truth is that presence and love can grow and blossom through the practices of meditation and mindful loving awareness. Let’s join together…

    Read More

  • Nikki-Mirghafori

    Equanimity: Crown Jewel of Buddhist Practice

    What is equanimity, and how does it differ from indifference? What different forms and subtleties of equanimity are presented in various Buddhist teachings, often occupying the prestigious last spot on the lists? How does equanimity relate to love and compassion? For what reasons should one pursue the development of equanimity for one’s own benefit, the…

    Read More

  • Nathan Glyde

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Nathan Glyde – Week of April 4, 2022

    This week’s topic is A Sense of Essence. In his teachings the Buddha utilised the liberating yet frequently misunderstood concept of karma. Karma refers to how an action is carried out rather than the outcome of that action. This helps shift us away from a fixed self-view, on which we frequently pass judgment, and toward a freeing examination of activities. Asking us to inquire, “What, when I do it, will lead to my long-term well-being and happiness?”

    Read More

  • Moving Beyond the Myth of Loneliness

    What changes as we consciously turn toward our suffering, rather than away? We are conditioned to experience ourselves as separate from life, but in that outward gaze, we often overlook an experience of belonging that is inherent. How does our habit of seeking shift when we recognize that what we long for can never actually…

    Read More