Turning toward the Dharma by reflecting on the refuge of the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha and the possibility of a kind of happiness and well-being born of mindfulness that is free and open.

The right attitude for meditation is one that is free of greed, aversion and delusion. The talk also explores the functions of mindfulness, attention and wisdom.

Because we don't understand what brings us true happiness, we often find ourselves trying to control or resist our experience, in a futile attempt to find relief. Seeing more clearly and working skillfully with our difficulties brings us true peace and calm.

Why and how mindfulness of the body reveals so much so clearly as we untangle the knots.

The Buddha said that our path of awakening is like swimming upstream - in relationship to the habits of society and the habits of our own minds. So our deep motivation needs to be supported by accurate information. The 4 Noble Truths is a basic context/description of life, suffering and freedom that serves to support and inform all our various methods of practice.

The talk explores the story of Prince Siddartha's encounters with the Four Heavenly Messengers - old age, sickness, death and those who have 'gone forth' in search of the highest happiness. Woven with personal stories and the examples of contemporary masters, the talk also offers practical advice on how to use the experience of the Four Messengers as our teachers and inspiration in practice.

Our thinking mind, when unnoticed, spreads out into imaginary worlds about an imaginary version of ourselves. How mindfulness helps us recognize the various trances our mind spins.

Many of us have internalized the message that we are not ok. To begin to be free of this distorted view, we need to understand how it became formed and why it no longer serves us. It is important to bring humor and kindness to this practice.

What obstructs us and what helps us on our journey to awakening. How these two clearly explained aspects of our experience alternatively trap us and free us over and over again, as we invite their interplay.

Seclusion - viveka in Pali - is a theme the Buddha was asked about: "Teach me...release, emancipation, seclusion for beings." This talk explores various aspects of this word viveka: seclusion of body, seclusion of mind, seclusion from suffering - and how these are manifest in the retreat setting and mindfulness practice.

Metta practice makes the heart more sensitive. This tenderness becomes the avenue for us to discover our deep connectedness to all of life and end a sense of isolation.

Exploring the concept of time and the way our reality is colored by the views of time that obscure the inexhaustible resource of the present moment.

By welcoming joy we become content, so we relax, thus letting go of the need to do something - anything about it - thus calming down. Inner and/or outer joy facilitates the shift from doing to being - from trying to letting go - crucial steps on the path to awakening.

The distortion of delusion operates in many ways, including when we are disconnected from our direct experience, or only allow in information that doesn't challenge our deluded state of mind. Learning how to recognize when delusion is distorting our experience allows us to wake up out of its spell and discover clarity and peacefulness.

The culmination of the Brahma Viharas, the ten paramis, and the factors of awakening. Equanimity allows us, like the Buddha, to 'sit in the middle'. Moment to moment mindfulness brings balance and openness to meet our joys and sorrows.

How this truth-telling practice is a process which reveals ever deeper levels of what really is so. In this way, what we mistook for real is seen through and released, over and over again, leaving - what?

We have the opportunity to make something of this precious life, that has such fortunate conditions that can also quickly change. The seeds we plant have results. Orienting ourselves toward the Dharma can free us from the samsaric loop.

A version of Joseph Goldstein's Big Mind meditation using bells and reminders to allow your mind to be like a clear empty sky and allow the different experiences to arise and pass without interference.

Two of the five Spiritual Faculties. Exploring: -What we actually believe in, rely on, value. -The difference and sometimes distance between knowledge, ideas, beliefs and wisdom - the integrated absorbed and deeply understood truths.

It is the direct realization of the unconditioned, or nibbana, that is considered enlightenment in the Buddha's teachings. This talk explores how consciousness and awareness can be understood as links in practice to the flavor of the unconditioned.

Many of the Buddha's teachings are counter intuitive - we sit still to find freedom, we let go to receive. Opening to suffering and working skillfully with the kilesas - greed, aversion and delusion - actually bring us greater freedom and happiness. This talk is on the beautiful qualities called the Paramis that directly counter the force of the kilesas.

This talk describes how the journey of our life and practice is to mingle our hearts and minds fully with the Dharma. The eight-fold path is the descriptive template we can use; this talk focuses particularly on wise view and wise intention, the first two steps.