…sound. Other common mental notes are ‘seeing’, ‘touching’, ‘feeling’, and ‘thinking’. Some experiences may be given more descriptive labels. For example, sensations may be noted as ‘warmth’, ‘coolness’, ‘pressure’, ‘tightness’, and so on. Emotions may be named: ‘happiness’, ‘sadness’, ‘excitement’,…

…this inner trust. In the Theravada tradition, these are represented by the Three Treasures: the Buddha; the Dharma, or teachings; and the Sangha, or the community of practitioners. One of the most common rituals for lay practitioners in Theravada Buddhism…

…East Bay Meditation Center (Oakland) Insight Community of the Desert (Palm Springs / Coachella Valley) Insight LA (Los Angeles) Insight Meditation Community of Charlottesville, Virginia Insight Meditation Community of Washington, D.C. Insight Meditation Society (IMS Barre, MA) Insight Meditation South…

…is made up of two main components: what is happening and how we react to what is happening. Through spiritual maturity, we become wise to the latter. For example, if you are meditating and someone slams a door, you may…

…wrongs done by others, one perfects the abiding in lovingkindness… Equanimity is accompanied by compassion and compassion by equanimity. (Someone may ask:) “How can the bodhisattvas, the great compassionate ones, look upon living beings with equanimity? Some teachers say: “Sometimes…

…aware of how things are arising and passing, of how things are passing through the impermanence of it all. Perhaps that will add depth and freedom to your experience of the life you are living this week Thank you for…

…practice is to help us distinguish between these. And differentiating helps support the beautiful aspiration for liberation and compassion. Any desire, healthy or unhealthy, can easily manifest as a compulsion. Wherever there is compulsion, we are not free. In the…

…at that start of any of the three programs. Pre-requisite: Four to five years of committed insight meditation practice, 4 seven-day (or longer) silent insight meditation retreats and completion of the IMC Eightfold Path Program or its equivalent. Dharma Mentor…

…is not given? How careful can we become in not doing so? The fact that sales people happily offer to sell us cell phones and computers does not mean that all the components of these devices come to us from…

…respond in one of two ways: we either do something useful or we do something not useful. Changing channels or constantly going from one thing to another on the Internet are examples of the unuseful. Another unuseful thing people do…

…protect our peace. And while various factors contribute to remaining peaceful, the commitment to the fourth precept can be particularly useful when it comes to our social life. The care and ongoing attention needed to “avoid false speech” develops our…

Transcribed and Edited from a Talk by Andrea Fella 08/31/10 http://www.audiodharma.org/teacher/2/talk/2017/20100831-Andrea_Fella-IMC-concentration.mp3 Download Audio Andrea: Good morning. For the last few weeks I’ve been talking about various qualities that support meditation – they’re the qualities of meditation that come together to…

…he was somewhat non-committal in his response. But then around the summer of 2001 he came back and explained he had made a website called AudioDharma.org which could host the Dharma talks given in our community. This new website was…

…over again it is the male monastics who have recorded its history, doctrines and practices. The voices of the women practitioners have largely been lost. Now the strong female practitioners and teachers in the West (Sharon Salzberg, Michele McDonald-Smith, Christina…

…compass. This image of a four-faced heart is borrowed from the Buddhist myth of the god Brahma, who had four faces, one for each of the four kinds of unselfish love championed in Buddhism. In the language of the Buddha,…

…a respectful and ecologically sensitive way. We will be honest in dealing with money and not misappropriate money committed to Dharma projects. We will offer teachings and Dharma support freely. 3) We undertake the precept of refraining from sexual misconduct….

…pleasure. To be mindful of our sexuality is to begin to unpack all the complexity it comes with. As the different aspects of this complex stew are seen clearly, we can learn where our freedom is found in relationship to…