Understanding the teachings, learning from my body, and cultivating the heart are core parts of my Dhamma practice. Several years of training as an Anagarika in the Thai Forest monasteries broadened my understanding of the Buddha's teachings and instilled a profound respect for the Buddhist lineage. As a husband and father, I find endless opportunities to deepen my practice through letting go, patience, and humility. All along the way, I've been particularly interested in how other modalities like Nonviolent Communication and somatic approaches to healing can support our growth and deepen the process of awakening.
Joy is not a break from meeting the world's pain — it's what makes it possible to keep meeting it. An exploration of mudita, appreciative joy, and the many ways the heart can learn to rejoice.
How do we meet suffering—our own and the world’s—without being overwhelmed? Compassion invites us to turn toward pain with an open heart and respond, while equanimity offers balance and perspective. The two work together, allowing us to engage wholeheartedly, without attachment to outcomes, responding with wisdom and care in the face of uncertainty, loss, and change.
This talk introduces formal instructions for metta practice in the traditional form of phrases and categories. After sharing about the spirit and principles behind the practice, we engage in a guided meditation first receiving metta from a benefactor, then offering metta to a benefactor, and finally offering metta to oneself.
This talk explores core questions of lovingkindness practice: What is "metta"? What is its relevance in our lives and our world? How does it function to transform our hearts and world? And how do we strengthen metta?
