Emptiness can be a loaded word for lay practitioners. It can bring up a sense of isolation and annihilation. The dharma of emptiness, however, is a fundamental part of practice. Even in the most mundane tasks of our ordinary lives, we can access emptiness and feel the freedom that comes with it. It’s not about how long you’ve practiced, it’s more about your level of sincerity in the moment.
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Martin Aylward – Week of March 15, 2021
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.
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Nirmala Werner – Week of Dec 5 – 9, 2022
This week’s theme is “Embodied Meditation Practise & the Transformative Power of the 5 Precepts”.
Many people find themselves from time to time in a spiritual vacuum, trying to fill this emptiness with indulgence through eating, drinking, surfing the internet, shopping, pornography, doing drugs, etc.
This week we will look into the 5 precepts, which the Buddha recommended for anyone who wishes to live a peaceful life. The precepts can act as a training guideline, and can support us to stop, pause and look deeply into ourselves to understand, “What is really going on here?” as a fundamental part on our way to universal love, compassion and liberation.
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Nirmala Werner – Week of Apr 29 – 3 May, 2024
This week’s topic is “Mindfulness of the nervous system: transforming fear, struggle and separation into love and connection”. We humans are social animals and need each other to feel safe and secure, to grow and to nourish ourselves. How can we live with a sense of connection, loving-kindness, and inner family? Our meditation practice allows us to take a break between stimulus and response. When we come into contact with our loved ones, we all too easily lose the inner freedom we think we have achieved and avoid our difficulties, also called spiritual bypassing. This week we explore what supports us to react flexibly to the internal and external world, to relax and to allow closeness and real intimacy. We will look into the first foundation of mindfulness, mindfulness of the body, including harmonizing the body formations and nervous system to meet our difficulties with gentleness.
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Practice as a Way of Remembrance
Recorded :
October 18, 2020 Many are referring to this time as apocalyptic. Fair enough. It can seem as though everywhere we turn a dismantling of some sort is in the works. While we might intellectually feel able to embrace the change upon us, for many it can be easy to fall into overwhelm, hopelessness, even despair. What do the…
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Working with Stress and Fear
Recorded :
July 17, 2022 Not all stress is bad. Yet without mindful awareness, anticipatory stress may spiral into reactivity, paralyzing fear and suffering. How do we meet this stress mindfully, use it skilfully, then let go?
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Compassion is a Political Act
Recorded :
September 20, 2020 This session is invitation for white practitioners and others to join Vimalasara in a discussion on the theme of liberation, the central tenet of Buddhist teachings. No one is liberated until we are all liberated. What if we made explicit that Black Lives Matter was part of the Bodhisattva vow? How would that impact our…
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Daily Meditation Recordings, with Christine Kupfer – Week of September 2, 2024
This week’s topic is “Freeing The Heart-Mind From Doubt”. Doubt is like any other mind state. But it is a tricky one and can be a sticky one. It’s questioning component is a means for liberation, but it can also suck us into a maze. Lets explore doubt and free the heart-mind this week in the light of the Buddha’s teachings, presence and meditation.
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Whole body breathing to regulate your mind and body
Recorded :
April 2, 2023 In this session Vidyamala introduces key areas of body awareness where mindful breathing can help to bring about regulation and calm in the body/heart/mind. She calls these the 5 B’s of the breath: Buttocks, Belly, Back, Back of the throat and Brain. She introduces the physiology of these areas and then leads a guided meditation….
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