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The greatest gift is the
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Dharma Talks
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2025-01-16
Metta Practice and the Larger World (Retreat at Spirit Rock)
42:17
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Donald Rothberg
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In this session, Donald gives about a 25-minute talk, followed by 15 minutes of discussion. How do we move from a week of metta practice into a time of turmoil and uncertainty in the U.S. and in the world? A number of guidelines and suggestions are given, including keeping the vision of practicing in all parts of one’s life, and keeping close the visions of awakening and of what Dr. King called the “beloved community.” In this time, staying connected with community is also crucial, as are, among many skillful intentions, practicing skillfully with difficult emotions, grounding in the body, cultivating cycles of engagement and withdrawal, and being careful about the amount of information one takes in. The talk ends by pointing to Joanna Macy’s model of three areas of transformation, and the invitation to respond to the call that each of us may hear. Discussion follows.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Mettā Retreat: Teachings and Practices to Cultivate a Wise, Awakened, and Responsive Heart
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2025-01-15
Metta Practice and the Life and Work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (Retreat at Spirit Rock)
55:59
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Donald Rothberg
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On the birthday of Dr. King, we explore some of the remarkable and powerful parallels between Metta practice and Buddhist teachings, on the one hand, and the life, teachings, and work of Dr. King, on the other. We explore in particular three areas: (1) the connection between Metta and the Christian tradition of acting from love that is central for King; (2) the wisdom perspective of seeing greed, hatred, and delusion, and developing understanding and manifesting non-reactivity through ethical grounding and nonviolence; and (3) the other qualities of the awakened heart--the Brahmavihara for the Buddha, and Dr. King’s way of manifesting qualities in addition to love, such as compassion, empathy, joy, and equanimity.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Mettā Retreat: Teachings and Practices to Cultivate a Wise, Awakened, and Responsive Heart
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2025-01-13
Understanding Impermanence - Week 1 of 6 - Meditation
23:03
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Mark Nunberg
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UNDERSTANDING IMPERMANENCE with Mark Nunberg
This six-week course will explore the Buddha’s teachings on impermanence, the first of the three characteristics that are said to mark all of existence. Sensing deeply the changing and insubstantial nature of all conditioned experience liberates the heart from its entrenched habits of attachment. Participants will be expected to use the teachings as a focus of their daily practice. This ongoing program is designed to deepen our understanding through the study and application of the teachings of the Buddha.
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Common Ground Meditation Center
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Buddhist Studies: Understanding Impermanence
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2025-01-13
Understanding Impermanence - Week 1 of 6 - Talk
54:43
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Mark Nunberg
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UNDERSTANDING IMPERMANENCE with Mark Nunberg
This six-week course will explore the Buddha’s teachings on impermanence, the first of the three characteristics that are said to mark all of existence. Sensing deeply the changing and insubstantial nature of all conditioned experience liberates the heart from its entrenched habits of attachment. Participants will be expected to use the teachings as a focus of their daily practice. This ongoing program is designed to deepen our understanding through the study and application of the teachings of the Buddha.
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Common Ground Meditation Center
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Buddhist Studies: Understanding Impermanence
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2025-01-12
Return to and Strengthen the Heart
40:40
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Aim to clarify, and strengthen the heart. This is through gathering energy in the heart – that is ‘samadhi’ (concentration). Letting go in the flood of life requires this strength and the relinquishment that support, and are supported by, samadhi. In the presence of a balanced and strengthened citta, we see and respond to the irritations of life in a full-hearted way; The aggregates are cooled. (refers to M64 and S47.42)
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Cittaviveka
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2025-01-11
Making Our Home in Dana
29:10
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Devon Hase
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This talk explores dāna (generosity) as both a foundational practice and natural expression of awakening. Devon describes how generosity creates conditions for happiness while requiring wisdom about our boundaries and capacities. Using personal examples about balancing family obligations with self-care, she illustrates how true generosity requires knowing ourselves well. The talk emphasizes that generosity is already present in awareness itself—in our natural capacity to receive and release each moment. It concludes that belonging and interconnection are our true nature, and that letting go paradoxically requires feeling held in the refuge of community.
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Refuge of Belonging
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2025-01-11
Generosity Is the Answer
29:10
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Devon Hase
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A talk focused on Dana Parami and its role in recognizing Nibbana. The discussion highlighted the importance of removing obscurations to reveal awareness, wisdom, and love. Devon explained how Paramis helped clear the way and emphasized the interdependence of giving and receiving. Practical aspects of generosity were addressed, including maintaining healthy boundaries and understanding motivations. Personal stories and reflections were shared to illustrate different types of giving and the long-term benefits of a generous mindset. Devon encouraged participants to practice generosity in daily life and highlighted the profound impact of living with an open heart.
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Spirit Rock - Rainbow Sangha
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2025-01-11
Entering the undifferentiated
50:09
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Progressive cultivation of mindfulness to maintain presence through the range of states, so that one allows then to pass. Attention is less snagged on different qualities. It opens to simple awareness. Familiar reactions, and with them, identification,subside. Undifferentiated awareness remains. (refers to S.47:42)
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Cittaviveka
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2025-01-10
Wisdom – which mountain and how to climb
48:45
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Practice is about fostering growth based on wisdom, effort and view. Wisdom is conditioned by a faith that leads on to motivation/desire, energy, heart and discriminative attention (iddhipada). Effort should be wisely moderated - to sustain, restrain, persevere, uplift, calm. Application of citta is fundamental to the Path; but make it relevant to uplifting the heart. Details on application to mindfulness of breathing.
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Cittaviveka
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2025-01-09
The Welcome Vihara
46:25
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Ajahn Sucitto
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Basis of healthy human life is goodwill. Our practice is to welcome, to allow and encompass differences. Speech and action based on Dhamma values establishes skilful common ground. We contemplate the effects of deluded reactions and release them - and the citta dwells in a beautiful place and grows beyond self towards measurelessness.
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Cittaviveka
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