Archive of Talks

Margaret led our reflections, using part of a talk by Rodney Smith titled “Mirroring Meditation” <http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/148/talk/17881/&gt; along with a reading by Guy Armstrong of the Lump of Foam Sutta <http://suttareadings.net/audio/index-readers.html#garm&gt; Both stressed the possibilities of seeing, in meditation, the relative insubstantiality of our experience – and with that, the freedom to shape our experience in… Read more

Michael framed the question for the day’s discussion,and everyone present had something to contribute, as our reflections on our individual motivations for practice were shared and explored.  Among the questions that came up was the matter of how our overall orientation in practice affects our individual sessions of meditating. . . and also whether our… Read more

Payton led our reflections this morning, revisiting the topic of Energy as a Factor of Awakening.  In addition to leading us in two guided meditations employing different styles of energy, Payton framed the discussion with excerpts from a talk by James Baraz on “Energy/Effort (Virya)” http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/86/talk/12355/   Read more

Wendy led our reflections today, on the topic of Energy, the third of the seven Factors of Enlightenment.  Our session focused on the many perspectives raised in Joseph Goldstein’s recent talk: “Virya – Courageous Energy” http://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/96/talk/17252/   Read more

Doubt PDFJoey led our reflections on investigating emotions in a meditative context, as a factor of awakening.  During our time together, she drew on many sources, including playing a recording of the middle portion of a talk on Investigation by Joseph Goldstein http://dharmaseed.org/teacher/96/talk/1966/ and reading/sharing a guided meditation from Tara Brach, Radical Acceptance: Embracing your… Read more

Anne led our reflections on this seasonally appropriate topic, using a talk by Tara Brach. http://dharmaseed.org/talks/audio_player/175/11461.html Among the many sources alluded to in the talk was Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem “Wandering Around in an Albuquerque Airport Terminal” After learning my flight was detained 4 hours, I heard the announcement: If anyone in the vicinity of… Read more