The communicative loop of listening and speaking forms a powerful karmic workshop. Language taps into our karmic archive, sankhara. It reaches other people and, if they are listening, there is mind-to-mind contact. Relational contact is intrinsically powerful because humans are intrinsically relational: when we engage together, our mutual responsiveness amplifies our efforts. Speaking and listening together empowers us to do good works, or drives us towards anger and fear. Sila. It empowers our development of mindfulness and calm concentration, or it is a channel for distraction. Samadhi. It carries wisdom and deep inquiry or driveling trivia. Panna. All of these are enfolded in meditation in which the doorway to speech is opened.
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Martin Aylward – Week of June 15
We’re fortunate that Martin Aylward has generously offered to lead our daily meditation sessions for Europe and the UK this week. To find out more about Martin, and view his other recordings on the platform, click here. Due to temporary circumstances there may be slight delays in uploading this week’s recordings. Thank you for your…
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Pathways to Happiness
Recorded :
November 10, 2019 Being human includes feeling great and feeling pain; given the changing nature of experience what kind of happiness is possible for us? Can we cultivate freedom, happiness and contentment that are less reliant on things ‘going our way’? The attitudes of goodwill, care and friendliness are some of our greatest allies in practice, and also…
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Embracing the Radical Act of Rest
Recorded :
June 15, 2025 Global challenges, economic uncertainty, and information overload can trigger fear and anxiety, leading us to overactivity and survival mode driven by guilt or inadequacy. The simple act of resting offers a powerful path to liberation: connecting deeply with the body, trusting gravity, and finding the ease that naturally supports an awakened mind. What holds us…
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Ulla Koenig – Week of October 4, 2021
This week’s theme is: Meeting the Bodily Companion
Mindfulness of the body is a key aspect of practice. When we’re in contact with our bodies, we root ourselves in the present moment and find refuge from obsessive thinking. These sessions serve a renewal of our relationship with our lifelong companion: the body. Movement, breathing, skilfully applied imagination, etc. will provide creative ways to deepen an embodied way of life. Everybody will be able to join in these gentle but powerful practices. Make sure you have enough space to comfortably stretch your arms to all sides and consider practicing standing or lying down during these sessions, depending on your level of energy.
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Getting Real with Spiritual Bypass
Recorded :
November 14, 2021 Spiritual bypassing is a superficial way of glossing over problems in a way that might make us feel better in the short term, but ultimately solves nothing and just leaves the problem to linger on. This session is an opportunity to begin to understand the concept of Spiritual Bypass (as coined by John Welwood in his book “Toward a Psychology of Awakening”) and how to practice with it.
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Befriending the emotions.
Recorded :
October 16, 2016 So often we struggle because we’re resisting, fixing, changing, or even “transcending” our experiences. What shifts when instead of pushing our emotions away, we invite them closer in? What changes when we learn to relate to our emotions like a welcoming friend? And, what changes when we are able to access the place in which…
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Zohar Lavie – Week of July 12, 2021
This week’s theme is: Equally Close to All Things: Explorations in Equanimity.
Life includes both pleasant and unpleasant experiences, ups and down, joys and sorrows. Equanimity invites us to meet all of these with tenderness and poise and to nurture the capacity to be equally close to all things. Can we cultivate more spaciousness, intimacy and calm in the midst of life? This week we will explore finding a deeper, more stable wellbeing, a wellbeing that is not dependant on the external circumstances of our lives.
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From Mindfulness to Dharma: The Fourth Foundation
Recorded :
October 28, 2018 The huge popularity of mindfulness is accompanied by a lot of confusion in relation to mindfulness in and of itself and how much it embodies the wider teachings of the Buddha. What is dharma? When, if and how is mindfulness the same as or different from dharma? This topic will be discussed in relation to…
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