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Donald Rothberg's Dharma Talks
Donald Rothberg
Donald Rothberg, PhD, has practiced Insight Meditation since 1976, and has also received training in Tibetan Dzogchen and Mahamudra practice and the Hakomi approach to body-based psychotherapy. Formerly on the faculties of the University of Kentucky, Kenyon College, and Saybrook Graduate School, he currently writes and teaches classes, groups and retreats on meditation, daily life practice, spirituality and psychology, and socially engaged Buddhism. An organizer, teacher, and former board member for the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, Donald has helped to guide three six-month to two-year training programs in socially engaged spirituality through Buddhist Peace Fellowship (the BASE Program), Saybrook (the Socially Engaged Spirituality Program), and Spirit Rock (the Path of Engagement Program). He is the author of The Engaged Spiritual Life: A Buddhist Approach to Transforming Ourselves and the World and the co-editor of Ken Wilber in Dialogue: Conversations with Leading Transpersonal Thinkers.
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2023-02-01 Cultivating Metta (Lovingkindness, Love, Friendliness) 1 63:18
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The aim of our practice is to develop wisdom, love, and skillful action in our lives. We commonly cultivate these capacities separately and then integrate them. In this session, we first explore the nature of Metta, its etymology in words suggesting "friendliness" and "friendship," and the ancient vocation, found in multiple spiritual traditions of cultivating Metta or love or kindness. We then look at the multiple ways of developing Metta, both in formal practice and in daily life, and examine briefly some of the challenges in cultivating Metta. Then we have a guided meditation the last 15 minutes exploring "Radiating Metta," a way of practicing likely closer to how the Buddha taught Metta. We follow this with discussion.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2023-02-01 Guided Meditation: Metta (Lovingkindness) Practice 40:15
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We start with a short introduction to Metta (Lovingkindness) Practice, working with phrases that tend to evoke Metta, kindness, good will, etc. Then there's a 10-minute period of settling (with mindfulness practice), followed by about 20 minutes of Metta Practice, with beings with whom Metta flows well.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2023-01-15 Day 5 Evening Talk: Metta Practice and the Life and Work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 63:28
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On Dr. King's birthday, we explore three broad areas connecting metta practice, Buddhist wisdom teachings, and other heart practices, with the life and approach of Dr. King: (1) the deep resonance between metta practice and the grounding in love and the beloved community that is central for King; (2) the close parallels between the development of non-reactivity aiming at the end of dukkha in Buddhist practice and the teachings and practices of nonviolent action; and (3) the other aspects of the awakened heart central for Dr. King, including empathy, compassion, forgiveness, joy, and equanimity. Included is the playing of three short recordings of Dr. King speaking.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Metta Retreat: Cultivating the Wise, Awakened, and Responsive Heart
2023-01-11 Day 1 Evening Talk: An Overview of Metta Practice: How Practicing Metta Transforms Us 61:38
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Metta practice offers a radical and yet simple approach and training: To bring kind and wise presence and response to every situation. We incline toward an expansive friendliness, and see what gets in the way of metta. This is an approach centering on kindness and love which finds many echoes in many other spiritual traditions. And yet it can be a very challenging training; we look at a number of the common difficulties of metta practice and how to work with them, particularly distraction and lack of stability of attention, sleepiness and restless energy, difficulty in accessing the kind heart, and the arising of difficult emotions, thoughts, and body-states. As we practice, we integrate mind, heart, and body, increasingly touch our depths and learn how to manifest metta in the world.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Metta Retreat: Cultivating the Wise, Awakened, and Responsive Heart
2022-12-21 Talk: Practicing with Views and Beliefs 2 64:27
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We begin with an acknowledgment of the Winter Solstice, and the importance, in a time that is often very busy, of slowing down, like the earth in the Northern Hemisphere, of being relatively still and opening to the generative dimensions of darkness. We then review the main elements of what we explored last week, pointing to the main aspects of the Buddha's teaching on "views" (including belief, positions, etc.), explored through four core texts, and three ways of practicing with views. We then bring some further ways of practicing with views. One is opened up by working with the model, from Chris Argyris, of the "Ladder of Inference," in noticing tendencies to go from direct experience to generalizations (obviously very useful at times), and how sometimes reactivity drives us "up the Ladder" to generalizations. A second is in working with relatively unconscious or half-conscious views, whether about oneself, others, or the nature of things. We close with discussion, intentions, and the dedication of merit.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2022-12-14 Talk: Practicing with Views and Beliefs 1 67:26
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Practicing with views, beliefs, opinions, and narratives is a central part of our practice (in relationship to ourselves, to others, and in the larger society and world) and was strongly emphasized in the teachings of the Buddha. In this talk, we explore how the Buddha taught on views, emphasizing four core teachings. We then inquire into what is particularly problematic in our relationship to views is the way that we potentially are reactive in relation to views--habitually grasping and pushing away with our views. We then suggest three foundational practices for working with views and beliefs. There is finally about a twenty-minute discussion period.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
Attached Files:
  • The Buddha on “Views: Four Texts by Donald Rothberg (PDF)
2022-12-14 Lightly Guided Meditation: Practicing with Views and Beliefs 35:59
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After some foundational mindfulness instructions, there's an invitation to track for views and beliefs when they appear, whether just for a few moments or in a more sustained way, linked perhaps with reviewing an interaction with someone or something that happened. Near the end, there's guidance to bring to mind a situation in the last few days in which there was a strong sense of a view taken and then explore the experience of holding a strong view.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2022-11-23 Talk: Taking Everything As An Opportunity for Learning 2 66:18
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We explore how to practice with the intention to take everything as the opportunity for learning--an approach which is named in different ways in Buddhist and other traditions, including the Zen saying, "The obstacle is the path," and the Tibetan Lojong teaching, "Turn all obstacles into the path of practice." How do we follow this intention as individuals, groups or communities, or whole societies? We look particularly at ways to take everything as practice as individuals and some of the challenges of such an approach. A key is opening to challenging or difficult experiences when they are in the "workable" range and not overwhelming, with mindfulness, wisdom, and compassion. Out of such a process may come gifts and the "cleaning up" of our residues of compulsive greed, aversion, and delusion!
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2022-11-23 Guided Meditation: Taking Everything As An Opportunity for Learning 37:28
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After foundational mindfulness instructions, there is guidance, just after the core instructions and then briefly twice more during the session, on approaching the silent sitting in the spirit of our talk theme, taking every moment as practice, as an opportunity for learning.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2022-11-16 Taking All Experiences as Opportunities for Learning 63:16
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One of the central intentions of our practice is to learn from all experiences. This is not easy, both with difficult experiences or with wonderful experiences; we might in both cases revert to habitual forms of consciousness and behavior. We explore ways that we might "turn all obstacles into the path of practice" (as is said in the Tibetan Lojong teachings), or see "the obstacle as the path" (as in Zen). Central is our practice particularly with unpleasant or difficult experiences, studying and transforming our reactivity. We also see how sometimes there are important gifts that come from painful and/or difficult experiences; we share together in the group some of these kinds of experiences. We end with an invitation to practice with this basic intention to learn from everything in the next week!
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks

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