Archive of Talks

  • Living Heartfully

    Jack Kornfield’s A Path with Heart explores the path of living with ‘heartfulness,’ a tender and precise way of relating to our world.  This week, Jessica took up this theme through the personal story of Dipa Ma, known as the Patron Saint of Householders, and a primary teacher of Jack’s. During the discussion, Jessica referenced and read… Read more

  • The four noble truths

    This week Barry brought our attention to the Four Noble Truths. He read selections aloud from Ajahn Sumedo’s book of the same name, with the goal of inviting us to reflect on our practice in the context of this foundational teaching. In his book, Ajahn Sumedo contends that the teaching of and reflection upon the… Read more

  • Anatta: Entry into the Formless

    This past Sunday Bobby focused our Sangha’s thoughts on anatta, the concept of no self. Anatta is the doctrine that there is in humans no permanent, underlying substance, that the stories we tell about ourselves to construct an identity are empty and meaningless. We suffer when we perceive ourselves as separate, instead of embracing our… Read more

  • Compassion as a Practice

    This past Sunday Joey offered the guidance of several teachers to deepen both our questions and our commitment in the practice of compassion. We began with a guided meditation by Tara Brach using the practice of “RAIN” for self-compassion. We then listened to Gil Fronsdal in an excerpt from his thought-provoking dharma talk, “Don’t Give… Read more

  • Expanding our Experience of Sangha

    Jeffrey J led a session on Expanding Our Experience of Sangha this week. Our Sangha operates somewhat on a “drop-in” basis. Where might we take the sense of “community” in Sangha? Other “religions” offer much in terms of interaction and spaghetti dinners. How might we reflect on, and nudge, our understanding of “Sangha”?We will engage with each other to… Read more

  • Ways to engage with political & environmental turmoil

    Lorilee guided our reflections as we continue our sangha’s discussions around how to approach the particular complexities that life presents us with today, given political and environmental turmoil.  We listened to and discussed a talk given by Donald Rothberg at Spirit Rock on “Metta (Lovingkindness), Equanimity, and Daily Life Practice”. The talk is available here: https://www.dharmaseed.org/teacher/55/talk/60427/ Read more