Wednesday Night Open Talks at IDP -Bringing Your Practice To Life
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Bringing Buddhist practice into our lives, into the way we relate to other people and care for ourselves—or don't—is one of the greatest challenges most practitioners grapple with. While the major Buddhist meditative traditions agree on the importance of this goal; the monastic traditions of Buddhism in Asia—the soil from which Buddhism arose and developed—do not provide readily adaptable models for integrating practice into secular lay life, which is a major concern of practitioners outside monasteries. From a monastic point of view, feelings, the body, and relationships are causes of enormous suffering and distraction, and segregating Buddhist practice from these aspects of ordinary lay life makes individual liberation more possible. A remarkable—but largely unremarked upon—phenomenon is that Western Buddhism tends to be a lay practice. While Mahayana Buddhism challenged and broadened classical Buddhism’s individualistic ideal with its focus on compassionate engagement with people and the world, integrating practice into daily life has not been fully delineated even within this tradition.
In this workshop we will explore what gets in the way and what facilitates bringing practice into daily life. After exploring three of the major obstacles and hindrances to bringing practice to life: [1] segregating sitting practice from the rest of your life; [2] Buddhism’s ambivalent view of emotional life and interpersonal relationships; and [3] Buddhism’s conscious —as oppose to unconscious—approach to hindrances to practice, we’ll explore two different ways to bring practice to life. We’ll consider specific ways to bring new life into your practice, including how to use meditation to illuminate formerly neglected areas such as interior emotional life and interpersonal relationships, and how to handle unconscious obstacles to your meditative practice. Then we’ll examine what it might mean to engage the world in an unalienated and fully liberated way. Participants can expect to gain an increased understanding of how to integrate their practice into their lives and how to work with hindrances to their practice.
Dr. Jeffrey Rubin is widely regarded as one of the leading authorities on the integration of meditation and psychotherapy. In his recently published and critically acclaimed Art of Flourishing: An East/West Approach to Staying Sane and Finding Love in an Insane World, Dr. Rubin forges his own unique synthesis of psychotherapy, meditation and yogic practices to help people thrive and live well in challenging and precarious times. A psychotherapist with over thirty years experience, Dr. Rubin is also prolific author, clinical supervisor and long time practitioner of Zen Buddhism and Hatha yoga.
Wednesday Night Open Talks are a great introduction to Buddhist teachings and an opportunity to meditate in a supportive group setting. Drop by and discover how the principles of meditation can be applied to everyday life while uniting with other practitioners in a receptive and welcoming environment.
Every Wednesday 7-8:30pm
No Previous Meditation Experience Required.
Bring your friends and hang out for tea afterwards!
$10 -$15 Suggested Donation
(No one will be turned away for lack of funds.)
RSVP to caroline@theidproject.org
Please Read our Security Policy and Refund Policy
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