MEDITATION PRACTICES
Meditation sessions are held the first 3 Tuesdays of the month. Practice is from 6:00pm-7:30pm
We alternate between Loving Kindness (Tonglen/Bodhichitta), Calm-Abiding (Shamatha) Meditation and the Heart Sutra.
Anyone is welcome to attend. No previous experience is required.
Please email katogewamling@gmail.com or call Karin at 907-209-3645 for more information.
LOVING KINDNESS MEDITATION
Tuesday 6:00-7:30 pm
Loving-Kindness (Tonglen) meditation has a special emphasis in cultivating greater love and compassion. It is a guided practice.
We start by generating a feeling of compassion for someone we deeply love, and then slowly expand that natural compassion to include other people close to us, then to those who are suffering, to people we feel neutral towards, and even those who we might consider our enemies. This “giving and receiving” as we follow the breath, helps loosen our attachment to our own disturbing emotions. And by training in this perspective, we can completely change our outlook and transform our lives from the inside out.
This meditation practice is open for anyone interested to attend.
SHAMATHA MEDITATION
Tuesday 6:00-7:30 pm
Calm-abiding (Shamatha) meditation, which develops a calm and clear mind, is a method for pacifying the coarse or perceptible forms of disturbing emotions.
This is open to people who have never meditated before and are curious, as well as experienced practitioners. This meditation is called “calm abiding, or shamatha, and uses the breath as a focal point. As we sit in silence, thoughts begin to subside and a sense of well being arises.
This meditation practice is open for anyone interested to attend.
HEART SUTRA
Tuesday 6:00-7:30 pm
In this meditation practice, we recite the Heart Sutra and meditate on its meaning. This classic, short sutra contains key Buddhist concepts regarding the true nature of phenomena, including the Four Noble Truths, the skandhas (senses), the cycle of interdependence, and the concept of emptiness: “Form is empty, emptiness is form; emptiness is not other than form, and form is not other than emptiness.”
This meditation practice is open for anyone interested to attend.