Dharma Seed - dharmaseed.org: Thanissara's most recent Dharma talks: Recent Episodes
dharmaseed.org
Thanissara, from London, was a nun for 12 years in the tradition of Ajahn Chah and has taught internationally for over 30 years. She is co-founder of Dharmagiri Sacred Mountain Retreat, South Africa, Sacred Mountain Sangha, California, and Chattanooga Insight, Tennessee. She has an MA in Mindfulness Psychotherapy Practice from the Karuna Institute UK and is co-author of Listening to the Heart, A Contemplative Guide to Engaged Buddhism, author of Time To Stand Up, An Engaged Buddhist Manifesto for Our Earth, and several books of poetry. She is a member of the Teacher Council at Spirit Rock and co-guiding teacher of Sacred Mountain Sangha.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Going beyond the constructs of the mind, trusting the heart, and upholding the Humane in Times of Destruction.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Undoing the engine of samsara through the four noble truths, the peaceful is ever timelessly present - a bow is a perfect approach to life because it allows us to pause and listen to another pulse - the pulse of the living Dharma.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Non-separative consciousness, beyond the walls of the mind, all is resident in one awareness, compassion as depth listening.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Beyond the walls of the mind. Power of clear intention. The unique potential within humanity
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Ever present peace. Entering the stream of the Dharma. Essential potential within obstructions.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) From separative consciousness to participatory beings within the sacred web of life rooted in Bodhicitta.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Anapanasati Sutta, generating wellbeing, subtle energetic healing, ground of insight.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The mutability of karma. An act of beauty in a war zone. Moments of connection with wildlife. Compassion meditation for ancestors, those in our near relational field, future generations and all beings.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The danger and opportunity in the dying of an old world. The curriculum of decolonizing internally & externally. The reclamation of an ensouled world. Dharma practice as essential for navigating the shifts of consciousness needed for radical orientation within a moment of evolutionary potential.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Moving from goal to source. This is how it is now. Contemplation within the frame of the 4 Noble Truths.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The gift of the 4 Noble Truths in meeting the challenge of these times. A transmission of courage from Ajahn Chah. The profound impact of the Buddha's engagement with the world.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The journey of dismemberment and the rising of Earth's immune system through us. A message from Mother Nature through Baba Mandaza Kadenwa
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Whatever the circumstances, the practice remains
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Guided reflection from gathering, emptying, to peace.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Attending on emptiness: Patience with Sankara is a humble practice.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) All is resident in one awareness. Listening at ease
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Releasing old wounds. Directing attention to feeling. Guided Meditation
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Unpacking the mechanism the generates dukkha. Dukkha as a cause of liberation.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Have you had enough yet? A few stories of Ajahn Chah in England.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) The mindful heart that relinquishes, withstands the impact of the world
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The Abstraction and disconnect of Seperative Consciousness The Journey through the Shadow Entering the depth feminine Awareness: the root to the living Dharma
(Vallecitos Mountain Retreat Center) Working with personal and collective wounding and conditioning The Bodhisattva Heart.
(Vallecitos Mountain Retreat Center) Returning the mind home. Contemplating the dissolution of "subject"/ "object"
(Vallecitos Mountain Retreat Center) The heart teaching of the 4 Truths. Ajahn Chah's "have you had enough yet?"
(Vallecitos Mountain Retreat Center) A gathered heart, mindfully contemplating obstruction
(Vallecitos Mountain Retreat Center) The loss of belonging within an ensouled world. The movement toward healing and a deeper refuge.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Evolutionary consciousness, systemic oppression, navigating our political crisis and planetary emergency.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Pathways to success. A metaphor for our times.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Contemplation of dukkha - non-dukkha. Right effort.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Use the mind to know the mind to go beyond the mind.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Supporting factors that enable a gathered centeredness.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) The cultivation of the path of awakening in the midst of intensity.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The power of Chanda (wholesome motivation); Reclamation of Heart in Our Times.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Training of Ethics Dimensions of "knowing" Unshakeable deliverance of Heat
(New York Insight Meditation Center) The recording of the Q+A follows the study of the Mula Sutta which is freely available here: http://nyi.dharmaseed.org/admin/talks/talk/47371/
(New York Insight Meditation Center) The Mula Sutta is a profound teaching that in ten lines condenses the journey from separative consciousness to the non dual heart. Thanissara will explore the process of unfolding this journey as it moves through the dissolution of discordant and isolating narratives to deepening trust in intuitive awareness informed by the living Dharma.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Refuge, reclamation, and response in our times of planetary emergency.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) The Heart Sutra. Beyond division. The intimacy of all things.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Meeting what is. Knowing dukkha, seeing how it is generated. Release from identification. Working with deep sankhara, primary patterning.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Guided meditation on a graduated process of insight. . Hui Neng's awakening gatha, Buddha's teaching to Bahiya
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Balance and samatha (calm) and vipassana (insight). The hindrances and beyond.
(Insight Meditation Society - Forest Refuge) Breath, jhana factors, kaya sankhara, citta sankhara, vaci sankhara, calming body, uplifting heart/mind, stilling thought
(Gaia House) Beyond self obsession. Cultivating heart within the relational field. Supporting a sustainable world. A deadly situation turned around by the power of compassion.
(Gaia House) A teaching for an open mind: The Four Noble Truths. Practice within four domains of experience to free the mind. Realization of the unconditioned, peace, nibbana.
(Gaia House) Calm as ground for insight. Disturbance is the path. What hinders can awaken. Emptying reactivity to painful feeling.
(Gaia House) Cultivating path activity. Samadhi, inner refuge. First Foundation of Mindfulness. Putting down the burden.
(New York Insight Meditation Center) Our environmental crisis is generated by an obsession with ownership and individualism that obscures the truth of our inter-dependence within a web of life. In a world divided by inequity, racism, and wars, Dharma practice shatters the illusion of dualistic consciousness, offering a new paradigm. This mini-retreat explores the process which generates divisiveness: papanca or conceptual proliferation in service of delusion. The ending of papanca reveals the unshakeable depth and the undivided nature of reality at the heart of all circumstances, revolutionizing our way of being and living — both personally and globally.
Copies of Thanissara's book, Time To Stand Up, An Engaged Buddhist Manifesto for Our Earth, will be available for purchase and can be signed by the author.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Forging a diamond like heart through path activity in the midst of an intense world
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Mindfulness of body and feeling. Working the jhana factors as support
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Journey into consciousness and presence through the use of attention and metta
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Balance between samadhi and vipassana; hindrances as cause for liberation; teachings of Ajahn Chah.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) At the core of our climate crisis, is the dualistic mind that continually generates an ‘other’ that is ‘out there,’ distorting the reality of deep inter-being. From economic systems founded in colonialism, slavery, and servitude, the mindset of ‘less important lives’ fuels a process of abuse that is now killing our living planet. How can our practice inform us as we stop the madness, and enter the journey of reclamation, healing, resistance and activism.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Recognizing causes of collective dislocation. Naming colonial devastation. Way of the tender heart.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Guided meditation on loving benevolence. Integration of divine into human dimensions of life.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Living from an authentic human heart through the journey of the shadow
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Noticing peace, Nature of awareness, Knowing the patterns of self
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) A practice that enables the meeting of difficulty
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Relinquishment and trust. Death as an advisor.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) The power of the path activity. Graduated process of mindfulness
(Dharmagiri) An inner attitude of love, compassion, attunement to goodness, and deep acceptance in the face of obstruction.
(Dharmagiri) Explanation (in brief) of Kuan Yin Great Compassion & Renewal Ceremony - Cultivating kindness in relationship to our experience.
(Dharmagiri) Journey through shadow, understanding sankhara - patterning, and the patient and challenging process of compassionate relationship. Mr Mandela's journey into "I love you all"
(Dharmagiri) Journey through shadow, understanding sankhara - patterning, and the patient and challenging process of compassionate relationship. Mr Mandela's journey into "I love you all"
(Dharmagiri) Balance of calm and insight practice, wisdom arising from dukkha, practice of overcoming suffering, Bahiya's (the disciple who understood the teaching quickest) question to the Buddha.
(Dharmagiri) Moving from reliance on sense bases to immediate practice, here and now, of mindfulness of body/breath - Aspects of attention.
(Dharmagiri) The practice of renunciation. Leaving behind & going forth. Contemplation of death. Tolerating uncertainty. Entering the flow of Life as an act of trust. The Great Earth & times of radical shift. Grace. Wisdom of the KoiSan People
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Quickening awakening to meet the urgency of our times. Moving from Love and Equanimity.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Investigation of mind. Patterning of the mind. Going Beyond of the mind.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) "Regardless of time and place, Dharma practice comes to completion at the place of laying down the burden" Ajahn Chah
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Awakening into the Bodhisattva Heart. Be a light unto oneself.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Wisdom informs compassion. Meditation on benevolence and loving kindness
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) A journey into awakening here and now, guided by the essence of the Buddha's teaching
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Balance of samatha and vipassana. Investigation of hindrances.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Knowing your refuge. Cultivating resilience. Alignment with authentic response.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) A cultivated Mind: a cause for happiness. Samadhi - a gathered mind. Entry into the 1st foundation of mindfulness.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Cultivation of presence. It's only this much, burning world, let the silence in.
(New York Insight Meditation Center) Through meditations, Dharma reflections, use of mantra, ceremony and Core Process Inquiry, we will evoke the Heart of Kuan Yin. Entering stillness and silence we listen into Kuan Yin allowing appropriate response to emerge. Kuan Yin is not male or female, Asian or Western or even Buddhist, but a metaphor for the deepest truth of our own unbreakable hearts connection with the universal heart of wisdom and compassion. A wisdom that springs forth from letting go of the known to align with the knowing of our original wakefulness, and merciful compassion that emerges from the truth of our profound intimacy with all things.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Taking the practice into everyday life. Inspiration from contemporary hero's of spiritual activism. Holding life lightly
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Kindness for self, loved one, neutral person, adversary and all beings. Buddha's words on loving kindness.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) A teaching for everyday life. The suffering that ends suffering. Power of awareness to heal. Buddha's own enlightenment.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Buddha's journey to awakening. Entry into Buddha's insight through core teaching of the four Noble Truths
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Investigation of feeling and mind states. Wise reflection, not creating more pain. Guided meditation on feeling.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Introduction to insight meditation. Working with difficulty and the development of wisdom. Seeing into the body - A sky burial.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Mindfulness: an evolutionary skill, moving out of destructive and addictive patterns, samadhi: being "here now"
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Mindfulness - the gate keeper. When the passions hit the heart - A golden idol falls - Building capacity to enable wise response.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Using the retreat form to deepen "here and now" awakening. Paritta (protection and blessing) chants.
(Gaia House) Beyond thought - Prajna Paramita - The Heart Sutra - Mind Set Free - A burning world - Bodhisattva heart.
(Dharmagiri) Skill with guiding attention - working with 3 streams of energy of body, heart & mind - What disturbs?
(Gaia House) Refuge in Dharma - Awakening; both immediate and gradual - simple steps Mula Sutta
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) the value of ethics as a foundation for practice and as a protection of all beings
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) drawing on themes of the 4 brahma viharas - kindness, compassion, joy & equanimity - infused with the divine bodhicitta of Kuan Yin
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) practice as preparation for when the hindrances hit - vitakkasantana sutta - skilful training of thought
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) reflecting on change - the doorway into the changeless - maintaining well being in the face of change through wisdom
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) mindfulness & clear comprehension in tandem with insight & wise reflection - two kinds of peace
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) stopping the momentum of the mind.. a serial killer stops and awakens
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) deepening presence here & now, 5 jhana factors, fruits of samadhi
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) sanity of mindfulness, mindfulness leading to insight into the nature of the body, simplicity, getting back on track
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) training of 'mano-vinnana' attention - withdrawing the mind from its preoccupations, working with the breath, way to one.
(Cloud Mountain Retreat Center) path as both gradual and immediate - succinct teaching of 'refrain from the unwholesome, lift up the good & purify the heart.'
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Working with the material of our life. Withstanding and transforming intensity.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Vinnana, Manas, Citta. Mind reacts to its own projections. Fundamental nature of mind.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) The Buddha's Awakening. The four noble truths
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Balance and samatha, samadhi and vipassana. Full development of mindfulness.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) One who knows the hindrances isn't hindered
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Path activity breaks up that which obstructs peace. Integrating energies of heart, mind, body within awareness
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Practice of renunciation. Freeing the mind from obsessive patterns. Direct knowing
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Recollections of the triple jewel, Metta Sutta, Victories of the Buddha
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The three motivations for practice, and reflections on compassion.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Mindfulness as: training of attention container for transformation, wise discernment way to - the beyond and refuge.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Mindfulness as a healing container for meeting and transforming our deeper wounds.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Practice and dispassion leading to Nibbana. Methods for opening into the "deathless"
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) The Buddha's journey and the four truths. The unknowing of knowing.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Calm and insight as a base for exploration of the five khandas; replacing reactivity with mindfulness.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) The light awareness illuminates the dark. Working with hindrances.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Supports for the cultivation of samadhi; fruits of samadhi.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Practice of the 3rd Noble Truth. Meeting patterns of self.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) A teaching for humans, suffering or its end. Asking the world to give us more than it can. Letting be, a gateway to Nibbana.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Five skills to overcome obsessive and negative thought patterns. Skill in relationship with feelings. Working with "just this much".
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Bowing as inner attitude and as skillful means. A gathered heart and meeting obstruction. Compassion as capacity.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Connecting with the actuality of body. Breath as a basis for samadhi. Cultivating support for stability here and now. Middle ground between pleasure and pain.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) A gradual path. Practice as preparation. An alignment with refuge here and now. Sangha as the relational field. Beyond morality. The chanting of ethics.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Training in samadhi. Samadhi as healing. Gathering the three steams of energy, body, mental and heart into awareness. Gently training attention.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Not being frightened of suffering, daily life, working in relationship and with sickness.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) The Buddha's journey of awakeningspeaks to our lives here and now. Meeting dukka, illuminating nature of desire, a non-grasping mind and cultivation of the way.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Centrality of mindfulness in the contemplative process. Khandas as self structure. Transformation within the womb of awareness.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Meeting Ajahn Chah, All that arises passes. Patience and finding your own voice.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) The five indriyas in their four aspects. The balance of trudst and discernment. Path activity breaks up obstruction, the fruit arises according to its own nature.
(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center) Working with the three steams of energy, being with breath
(Dharmagiri) The mind like a rabbit in the head lights of the Hua T’ou The swoon of the bardo’s and present time effects Not using meditation like a lawyer but understanding what gets us obstructed The story of Hui Neng & the world speaking the Diamond Sutra Jatukanni’s question to the Buddha
(Dharmagiri) Host & the guest and the fundamental confusion between the two Staying at home, the one that hears the sound and the sound merge Allow the world the come to the heart. Before knowledge Original nature & original split Self structure as defence against original pain of separation
(Dharmagiri) Encouragement to ‘bear the reality’ of suffering, to listen beneath the splits The holding of splits within this one heart Empathy rather than judgement The difficult practice of compassion
(Dharmagiri) An abandoned old lady Bearing reality of being human With patience obstruction drop away Like walking into the mist The more the suffering, the more the bliss Indestructible Heart
(Dharmagiri) Using the breath to steady the mind, to reflect on impermanence and to see ‘non ownership’ The boulder is not heavy if you don’t pick it up This is ‘how it is’ – methods to access the third noble truth Replacing reactivity with mindfulness – the flood stopper
(Dharmagiri) The Buddha’s reluctance to teach The first turning of the Dhamma wheel The Four Noble truths and accompanying practices Contemplating desire – resolving dukkha – the primary split.
(Dharmagiri) Replacing reactivity of mind with mindfulness Mindfulness as container & as that which reveals & discerns what is Citta conditioned by perception & sankhara Healing the citta through mindful awareness Finding balanced energy as a support for mindfulness
(Dharmagiri) Path Activity breaks up obstructions Beginners mind, patience, kindness This is how it is Working with how it is rather than how it should be The three streams of karma / energy Samadhi as healing
(Dharmagiri) The challenge of dukkha. Without Mara, no Buddha. Path Activity illuminates the hindrances Without hindrance there’s no path That which knows desire and aversion is not desire & aversion ‘I Know You Mara’
(Dharmagiri) Three supports for present moment attention Withdrawing the mind from longing and disappointment for the world Using the breath to steady attention
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Buddhism + the Dharma is the peel left behind. The immediacy of here and now Dharma. Disenchantment as a doorway is the transcendent. The irritation that rubs to the pearl. The immovable suchness of Being.
(Gaia House) This talk explores how entering the Third Noble Truth opens the mind beyond its habitual addiction to interpret life from a sense of being a personality, needing to 'sort things out'. Opening the mind implies an ability to tolerate the reality of uncertainty. This talk also explores compassion and loving kindness as fearlessness and includes a simple guided meditation on well-being.
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) The journey from the second to third Noble Truth invokes an opening to the unknowing—knowingness. Transformation through awareness while meeting our immediate experience, allows us to "return to the market place with bliss bestowing hands."
(Spirit Rock Meditation Center) Unifying wisdom and compassion, cultivating Bodhisattva Heart, use of prayer.