Teaching Engagements
This yearlong program comprises five 6-week online courses, suitable for students of all experience levels.
Designed to be highly practical (and occasionally geeky), this program provides a comprehensive overview of the Buddhist path, with an emphasis on the psychological, metaphysical, and socially engaged elements, and helps you establish or reestablish a commitment to regular meditation practice through a variety of Buddhist techniques.
This is a live, online program that engages students in interactive learning and community.
Mindfulness @ Union County Libraries
This course covers the all-important transition from a view of awakening that is internal and personal to one that is shared and interpersonal. Our daily meditation practice will focus on the technique of Metta, or loving-kindness meditation, to begin to build a bridge.
On the philosophical/psychological level, we dive into the teachings of Karma and The Twelve Nidanas, which describes how consciousness functions and falls prey to habitual beliefs, patterns, and stuck behaviors. Why do we keep doing the same things again and again, and how can we break the habitual chains
Becoming Bodhisattvas – The Path of Confidence with Ethan Nichtern @ Garrison Institute
Start off your new year mindfully, with these workshops introducing the basics of mindfulness meditation practice:
Saturday, January 11 at 1pm @ Union County Main Library in Monroe, NC
Saturday, February 1 at 10am @ Union West Regional Library in Indian Trail, NC
A silent meditation retreat with Ethan Nichtern, Maho Kawachi and Lou Sharma
Many of us are longing for an in-depth, in-person meditation retreat. This is a great opportunity to do so. Like last year, this retreat will focus on practices and teachings related to the path of the Bodhisattva, a body of teachings all about a compassionate and wise way of being in world in turmoil. This year we will focus on the theme of Confidence. This retreat will include three full days of silence practice so that we can go much deeper into our own experience and support each other’s practice in a way we almost never get to do when we’re in our daily grinds. On the last full day of retreat, we take more time to process the teachings interpersonally.
The retreat will conclude with the opportunity to formally take either the Refuge or Bodhisattva Vow, or reaffirm your vows if you have already taken them, on Saturday afternoon. As we will be approaching the vow from the structure of the Tantric Buddhist system, it is required that a student has already taken the Refuge vows if they want to formally enter the Bodhisattva Path.