Newsletter 19

Summer 2004/05

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NEWS FROM THE STEERING GROUP

Greetings,
A chorus of bellbirds surrounds me on a gentle nor’west spring day. I feel at peace with life and to sit and be with what presents seems the simplest thing to do. But what about at 3 am with your crying baby, and when every waking moment is full of the needs of your newborn and the intensity of your emotions that seem to have been born with her.

In this newsletter there are some hints at what form meditation practice may take amidst the intensity of parenting, from Sarah Napthali’s book “Buddhism for Mothers” and some observations from a new father in our sangha.

We also have some pieces by Christopher Titmuss, on liberation, dana and reviews of a couple of his favourite books, as well as some poems, prayers, insights and another yummy retreat recipe.

Our next retreat is in November with Russell and Hugh (see sechedule), which is offered both as a weekend and week retreat. Yanai is back in New Zealand in March to lead a retreat at Staveley. There are also retreats in the North Island coming up with Stephen and Martine Batchelor and Sharda Rogell.

*We will not be holding our usual retreat in January due to Sharda’s visit to Te Moata at that time (see front page).  We encourage anyone who wishes to sit a retreat in January to make the trip to sit with this wonderful teacher. *Many new books are arriving in the library. *The process towards becoming a charitable trust is well underway and we will be putting in our application soon.

Happy reading and may you enjoy the warmth and light of spring.

Spirituality without irreverence is religion.
~Anon

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BUDDHISM FOR MOTHERS

For the first few weeks of my son Skye’s life, he would only sleep if he could hear my heartbeat.  From midnight to dawn he lay on my chest, his head tucked into the hollow of my throat, awakening every two hours to nurse.  In the day, he’d nap in my arms as I rocked, a slideshow of emotions – joy, exasperation, amusement, angst, astonishment – flickering across his dreaming face, as if he were rehearsing every _expression he would need for the rest of his life.  If I dared to set him in his bassinet, he’d wake up with a roar of outrage, red-faced and flailing.  He cried if I tried to put him in a baby sling, frontpack, stroller, or car seat.  He cried whenever I changed his diaper.  And every evening from seven to nine, he cried for no apparent reason at all.

When Skye was two weeks old, I ate black bean tacos for dinner and he screamed until sunrise, his body stiff and his fists clenched.  While I sobbed along with him, my husband actually called the emergency room, where the nurse on duty told us, kindly, that it sounded like gas.  The next morning, a nutritionist friend assured my that everything would be fine so long as I stopped eating dairy, wheat, yeast, soy, corn, legumes, garlic, onions, tomatoes, sugar, peppers, broccoli and citrus fruit (and considered dropping fish, mushrooms and eggs).  As Skye finally fell asleep in the crook of my right arm, I collapsed on the sofa in my bathrobe, eating cold brown rice with my left hand and spilling it in his hair.

It was about that time that I decided that what I had embarked on was an intensive meditation retreat.  It had all the elements, I told myself: the long hours of silent sitting; the walking back and forth, going nowhere; the gruelling schedule and sleep deprivation; the hypnotic enigmatic chants (‘…and if that looking glass gets broke/Mama’s gonna buy you a billy goat…’); the slowly dawning realisation that there is nothing to look forward to but more of the same. And at the centre of it, of course, was the crazy wisdom teacher in diapers, who assigned more demanding practices than I had encountered in all my travels in India – like ‘Tonight you will circumnambulate the living room for two hours with the master in your arms, doing a deep-knee bend at every other step and chanting ‘Dooty-dooty- doot-doot-doo, dooty-dooty-doot-doot-doo’. Or ‘at midnight you will carry the sleeping master with you to the bathroom and answer this koan: How do you lower your pyjama bottoms without using your hands?’

Like all great spiritual practices, these were exquisitely designed to rattle the cage of my ego.  They smashed through my concepts about how things should be (rocking in the garden swing by the lavender bush, watching the hummingbirds, while my newborn slept in a bassinet by my feet) and pried open my heart to the way things actually were (standing by the diaper table, flexing one tiny knee after another into Skye’s colicky tummy, and cheering when a mustard yellow fountain erupted from his behind).  And with every breath of my ‘baby sesshin’, I was offered the opportunity to cradle my child in my arms like the baby Buddha and be present for a mystery unfolding…

As a new mother, I’ve found myself wondering: How are other women negotiating the dance between the practice and parenting?  How does their practice affect their mothering?  How does being a mother affect their practice?  Are mothers changing the forms of Buddhism in America?

And – the most compelling question of all for me – can mothering really be a path of practice every bit as valid as the monastic path?  Can suctioning the snot from a sick baby’s nose have the simplicity and purity of a nun’s prostrations?  Can wiping out a diaper pail lead to ‘the awakening of the Buddha and the ancestors’?

On one level, this question seems absurd.  Nothing could be further from the regimented march of a formal retreat than the dishevelled dance of motherhood.  The books on my bedside table used to be about pursuing Awakening in the Himalayas.  Now they’re about preventing awakening in the middle of the night.

There’s a diaper-changing table where my altar used to be; my zafus and zabutons have been requisitioned to cushion Skye’s play area.  Forget about chewing a single raisin for five minutes and admonitions to ‘when you eat, just eat’ – I’m on the phone with Skye on my hip, ordering baby-proof plates for the electrical outlets as I eat cold veggie potsticks with my fingers straight from the cardboard box and rub fresh spit-up into the floor with one socked foot.  It’s hard to find the moment even to tell myself that this is a spiritual path – I’m too busy looking for Skye’s other mitten…

Could there be any better way to get my nose rubbed in the truth of impermanence than to love a child in a jagged, careless world?  Napping with Skye in my king-sized bed – his head on my breast, my nose pressed against the dark silk of his hair – I watch the heartbeat fluttering in the soft spot on his skull. Forget about freeways, and plutonium, and stealth bombers – I’ve been sternly warned that even a teddy bear could suffocate him in his crib. At night, when he’s been silent for hours, I creep into his room and stand in the dark, not moving for fear of creaking a floorboard, until I hear him sigh. And if everything goes absolutely perfectly, I know that this particular Skye – the one who warbles and passionately sucks on the bill of his rubber duck as he splashes with me in the tub – is going to dissolve like bubble bath.  Yesterday he was a kicking bulge in my belly as I swam laps in the July sun; tomorrow he’ll be a middle-aged man, weeping and scattering my ashes in a mountain lake.  Watching Skye rub strained carrots into his eyelashes, my husband says “It’s so beautiful that it hurts”.

I feel plugged into the world now, in a way that I never have been before.  As I feed my child out of my own body, I see how I am fed by the body of the earth.  I’m crocheted to a chain of mothers before me, and a chain of unborn children who will inherit a world that I can’t even imagine. I want Skye’s grandchildren to be able to swim in the Pacific, and hike the granite ridges of the Sierra, and gasp at the blue herons standing on one leg in Bolinas Lagoon.

Is this attachment? Or connectedness? I don’t mean to be grandiose. I know these insights aren’t the pristine diamond of samadhi.  They’re a sloppier, stickier kind of realisation, covered in drool and Cheerio crumbs.  But maybe this is the gift of mothering as practice – a kind of inclusiveness that embraces chaos and grit and imperfection.  It’s not based on control or keeping things tidy.  It makes room in its heart for a plastic dump truck in the middle of the living room floor, and rap music leaking under a bedroom door at midnight.  it doesn’t slip away in the middle of the night to search for enlightenment.  It stays home with Rahula the Fetter, and finds it there.

As mothers, what can we make of that story of the Buddha leaving his family in the middle of the night?  I asked Fu Schroeder.  “Oh, but he wasn’t the Buddha when he left his child.  He was a young prince, in terrible pain”, she answered.  “If you’re awake, you don’t leave your child.  Where would you go?”

from the book ‘Buddhism for Mothers’ by Sarah Napthali.

The Emperor asked Master Gudo, "What happens to a man of enlightenment after death?"
"How should I know?" replied Gudo.
"Because you are a master," answered the Emperor. 
"Yes sir," said Gudo, "but not a dead one."

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WALKING MEDITATION WITH BABY

by Guy Wilson

Leah is seven weeks old. She smiles, she screams, and almost everything in between. My emotions, also, are ranging broadly across the spectrum.   The more that I can be aware of how this continuous changing is occurring in my emotional landscape, the less likely it is that will become swamped by it.  When I am grumpy, or frazzled, I am less likely to become lost in it, or to despair; similarly, when I am delighted, or feeling satisfied with life, I am less likely to make benchmarks of these feelings, thereby making anything less pleasant seem like an aberration.    I lay a great charge of gratitude for these skills at the door of formal meditation practice (and at the doors of those who taught and encouraged me).

Today, time is lapped up by baby Leah – almost as if she is stealing time, and storing it up for later – but I never try to underrate the power of what one might call “piecemeal” meditation. Done anywhere, for a moment, or for many minutes, it is surprising just how many situations give room for a noticed breath, a mindful footfall, an itch, a twitch, curving lips – all chances to enter that space where nothing is important but what is occurring in this moment.

The drawbacks to this very informal practice seem to be: a) it is so much easier for me to forget that I am meditating, to ‘drift off’; b) because I ‘drift off’ so easily, it is harder for me to believe the practice is worthwhile; and therefore it is harder for me to dedicate myself to this way of practicing.

One of the things most similar to my formal meditation practice is walking up and down, up and down with Leah. Walking meditation with baby.

When I walk on the beach and enjoy the sunset I do not call out “a little more orange over the right, please” or “would you mind giving us a bit less purple in the back”.  No.  I enjoy the always different sunsets, as they are.  We do well to do the same with the people we love.

Carl Rogers

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AN INTERVIEW WITH CHRISTOPHER TITMUSS:

Eliezer Sobel writes : Last spring I sat for an eight-day vipassana meditation retreat at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, USA, conducted by Christopher Titmuss. Although we were in silence, every few days Christopher would invite people to engage in a dialogue with him in the meditation hall, as the rest of us sat and listened.

On one such occasion, he was responding to an inquiry about the nature of liberation, and I could barely contain myself. At the next opportunity my hand shot up: "In listening to you speak of liberation," I began, "I became aware that that is not at all the reason I came here. I gave up believing that liberation, or enlightenment, was possible for us ordinary folks years ago. I decided that liberation was only for the extremely rare individual and I wrote off my quest for enlightenment as mere youthful naivete; and in fact, I consider my new position healthier and more mature."

"And how would you describe your new position?" Christopher asked.

"That I only came here to slow down, get a bit more centered, perhaps feel a little better. And I've watched hundreds of other people over the past twenty years, and what I see is that we're all just trudging along, opening and growing in very small and slow ways. I don't see anybody getting liberated."

"Would you consider for a moment," he replied, "the possibility of completely letting go of all your mind's beliefs and viewpoints about what liberation is and what it isn't, and all your notions and comparisons about where other people are, and simply be receptive to the very ordinary liberation that is always available in the here and now, when you step aside from the voice of 'I'?"

It sounds so simple, yet the power of that moment, coming as it did after some days of silence and sitting, was such that my mind simply stopped, and for the next two hours or so, I found myself in a thoughtless realm of simplicity, calm, and a quiet, surprising joy. It was a potent reminder of my original spiritual impulse, a long-buried passion to awaken that had been unwittingly replaced by a rather grim determination to merely survive.

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DECORATING THE PATH OF THE ELDERS

by Alta Maven

After years of hearing complaints from their students, such as “why can’t we have exciting rituals like the Tibetans,” or “Zen is way cool, but the Theravada is so dull and straight”, a group of vipassana teachers has decided to enliven the Path of the Elders.  As one teacher put it, “The Theravada needs a few more bells and whistles if we are going to remain viable in the crowded Buddhist market here in the West”.

To inaugurate their campaign, the teachers are hoping to arrange a United States tour for the famous Sri Lankan tooth relic of the Buddha.  The Tibetans recently held a tour of their holy relics – little balls of bone or some such material traces left behind by high lamas – an awe-inspiring display that reportedly prompted some vipassana students to defect to the Mahayana.  Meanwhile, the plan to tour the Sri Lankan tooth relic has raised a millennium-old debate about the authenticity of this artifact, which some Buddhist scholars say is really a ‘false tooth’.  Whatever the case, in each city where the relic appears, senior vipassana teachers will conduct a ritual tooth-cleaning ceremony, which will include the chanting of a little-known discourse of the Buddha, the ‘Incisor Sutra’ (authenticity in dispute).

A few other ideas to enliven the Theravada are also under consideration. One would require that at regular intervals during intensive retreats all yogis be asked to take part in a circle dance symbolizing the endless round of rebirths.  Another new ritual under consideration requires that whenever mentioning one of the numbered lists (the Four Noble Truths, the Three Characteristics etc), that teacher or student must hold up the requisite number of fingers while singing the complete list in Pali.  Those teachers who can’t hold a tune do not support this idea, however, since it may render many of their popular dharma talks too discordant for further use.

Another plan inaugurated by the teachers group to enliven the Theravada is to hold a ceremony every few years to declare certain Western vipassana teachers as official “elders”.  This suggestion has also not received final approval due to the teachers’ difficulty in agreeing whom to name as elders.  Their deliberations have been delayed, as those who consider themselves candidates have filled all available time at teacher meetings reciting their litanies of bodily complaints in an attempt to demonstrate their true elder status.  One criteria the group has been able to agree on is the ability to fall asleep while leading meditation sittings and not to look guilty upon awakening.  As soon as the first group of elders is chosen, the initiation ceremony will include a presentation of gifts: a pillbox in the shape of an almsbowl, an “elder” zafu equipped with adjustable seat and optional wheels, and a pair of mirrored sunglasses.

In fashioning the remainder of the elders ceremony, a number of students have requested that no dharma talks be allowed.

The teachers group welcomes suggestions from the sangha for any additional ideas to enliven the Theravada tradition, but they wish to let people know that uniform-coloured clothing or special hats are not options.

From ‘Perspiring Mind’. Please don’t think we’re serious!

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COOKERY CORNER

This season’s mouth-watering recipe is Tofu Satay.  Makes enough for ten people.

SATAY SAUCE WITH TOFU

  1. Cut tofu into bite sized pieces.  Fry in oil until crisp, drip lemon juice over while cooking.Set aside.
  2. Fry onion, garlic, ginger, cumin, anise, honey, curry paste and coconut in oil briefly – do not burn.
  3. Add peanut butter and mix well.
  4. Add Coconut Milk and Soy Sauce. Cook slowly until thick.
  5. Add tofu to sauce just before serving.
  6. Serve with steamed veges and rice.

“We can ask what being fearless might mean.  And we can discover a fearlessness within us that will be available when we are in real danger. To be present with our fear, to meet it with compassionate attention, is to find this fearlessness.” “The open heart sees that there is nothing to protect itself against, that safety is an illusion.  In this seeing lies true fearlessness.”

Philip Martin, from ‘The Zen Path Through Depression’

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PERSPECTIVES ON WONDER

A mature sense of wonder does not need the constant titillation of the sensational to keep it alive. It is most often called forth by a confrontation with the mysterious depth of meaning at the heart of the familiar and the quotidian.

— Sam Keen in Apology for Wonder

At the back of our brains, so to speak, there is a forgotten blaze or burst of astonishment at our own existence. The object of the artistic and spirited life is to dig for this submerged sunrise of wonder.

— G. K. Chesterton in Chaucer

May you experience each day as a sacred gift woven around the heart of wonder.

— John O'Donohue in Eternal Echoes

I think we all have a core that's ecstatic, that knows and that looks up to wonder. We all know that there are marvelous moments of eternity that just happen. We know them.

— Coleman Barks

Wonder encourages us to stand humbly before the unfathomable mysteries of human life, trusting that, in them, we encounter God.

— Melanie Svoboda in Traits of a Healthy Spirituality

But if we mean to choose the world, we must see God in the people who come under our care. That is, we must see them as at bottom no different from ourselves. No matter our busyness, no matter our own or others' flaws, we need at some point to see every human being as a marvel, a berry held up in sunlight, worthy of wonder.

— Philip Simmons in Learning to Fall

Contemplate the wonders of creation, the Divine dimension of their being, not as a dim configuration that is presented to you from a distance, but as the reality in which you live.

— Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook quoted in The Gift of Kabbalah by Tamar Frankiel

It takes grace in our time to keep our minds open to wonder, to be ready for the tug from God, the push from the Spirit, and the revelation of deep things from the hearts of ordinary people. It takes grace, but it is a great gift.

— Lewis B. Smedes in How Can It Be All Right When Everything Is All Wrong?

I join my hands in thanks
for the many wonders of life;
for having twenty-four brand-new hours before me.

— Thich Nhat Hanh in Call Me by My True Names

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DANA

The Buddha encouraged a lifestyle of easy maintenance for the Sangha and dharmasalas (dharma centres) to keep such environments simple and sustainable. He advocated dana to serve as an antidote to desire. In the 45 years that the Buddha walked the length and breadth of the Sakya kingdom and neighbouring countries, his students were often referred to as ‘savakas’ – meaning ‘the one’s who listen’ (to the Dharma).

Upasaka is the Pali word for householders who follow the Dharma. - upa – up close’ ‘as’ – ‘to sit’) Upasakas are men and women who sit up close and listen to the Dharma teachings..

Through the act of listening, men and women explored the Dharma. The insights that emerged from the act of listening found __expression in dana, including the understanding of the importance of acts of giving between from the donor to the donee (receiver). The teachers gave the teachings as a dana and the listeners gave as a dana various forms of practical support for the teachings.

Dana  belongs to the Buddha’s practical strategy to encourage letting go, loving kindness and compassion thus ensuring giving and service a pre-eminent place in the Dharma.

The Buddha spoke of saddaya danam deti – to give with confidence. He made it abundantly clear that the Sangha of noble men and women of practice are truly worthy of acts of support, hospitality and generosity while the giver of dana makes merit – meaning there are personal beneficial result through acts of giving. ‘A deed of merit brings one happiness’ said the Buddha.

Since dana relates directly to ethics, practice, values and social justice (available for one and all regardless of financial circumstances) then it will demand from one and all in the Sangha both teaches and students, a determination to ensure this tradition sustains itself through commitment, taking risks and a love of unmeasured giving.  The Buddha said:

“Some provide from the little they have Others who are affluent don’t like to give An offering given from what little one has Is worth a thousand times its value (SN 1.107)

In his typical free spirited way, the Buddha urges Upali to give dana to the Jains, since the Buddha regarded the act of giving as so significant, even if it meant to those following a point of religions view that the Buddha did not altogether feel comfortable with (M.1.371) in every aspect. When rumours went around that the Buddha expected only dana to go to him, he told people that they should give dana to those they ‘have confidence in,’ to those of ‘upright character.’

In his encouragement to examine our intentions, since motives can be healthy, unhealthy or mixed, the Buddha explained there are eight ways of giving (A.8)

  1. Spontaneously
  2. Out of fear
  3. S/he has given me a gift so I must give one in return
  4. It feels good to give
  5. I serve but they (spiritual seekers, meditators) don’t
  6. To develop a reputation
  7. To adorn the mind
  8. To ennoble the mind

The Buddha said that dana ranked alongside truth, self-control and patience in terms of its importance for humanity. While praising those who give ‘a dharma residence as giving a great deal’, he said the one who’ teaches the Dharma is the giver of the Deathless.’ (SN.121).

Christopher Titmuss

Only for a short time life has loaned us to each other. Because we take form in life’s act of drawing us, And we live in life’s act of painting us, And we breath in life singing us. But only for a short while. Yes, only for a short while life has loaned us to each other, Because even a drawing cut into crystaline obsidian fades, And even the green feathers, crown feathers of the quetzal bird lose their colour, And even the sounds of the waterfall die out in dry season. So we too. Because only for a short time life has loaned us to each other.
- Aztec Prayer

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Wednesday Evening Dharma Talks

Every third Wednesday of the month teachings are offered on the practice of insight meditation.  These are held at Ferndale school, 104 Merivale Lane, off Papanui Road).  The evening, which includes a guided meditation, starts at 7.30pm and runs until 9.15pm.  Donations are collected for the teacher and the hire of the room. All are welcome.

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BOOK REVIEWS

Christopher Titmuss reviews some of his favorite books.

Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha

I recall first picking up this book in 1970 – an earlier translation by I.B. Horner. Middle Length Discourses consists of 152 discourses of the Buddha and around 1000 pages. Initially, I found it virtually unreadable. Words, words, words. No wonder my Vipassana teacher, Ajahn Dhammadaro, forbade reading in the monastery and only permitted practice. I then met Bhikkhu Vimalo who navigated me through the book. Then I started to find the needles in the haystack. What a thrill!. I read a discourse every night by candlelight in my hut in the monastery. It was also mildly subversive given Ajahn’s dismissal of books. (He never wrote one himself).

How can I make clear the importance of this early text, and other Pali suttas? Well, every Buddhist book ever published is in some way a commentary on these Pali discourses of the Buddha. In the past 30 years, I have probably read this book or sections of it, more than any other book. The book sings of the way to liberation and the understanding of the composite of body, feelings, states of mind and Dharma. It is a profound manual for spiritual teachers, meditators, yogis, seekers, psychotherapists and those inquiring into the nature of things not wishing to be caught up in religion, science or secularism.

Superbly translated, edited and revised by Bhikkhu Bodhi, the Middle Length Discourses will serve in time  in the same way as the Koran for Muslims. Torah for Jews or Bible for Christians – with one major difference.

The reader of Middle Length Discourses has the freedom to explore these discourses and find out for oneself what is insightful and inspirational for daily life and ignore or dismiss what one wishes.

My students in the Dharma Facilitators Programme inquire in depth into a number of the discourses. Initially, you may have the same response as I did, namely that this book is a hard nut to crack. So Insight Meditation teacher, Sharda Rogell, has written an excellent 150-page study guide, a readable and accessible summary of many of the discourses called Pressing out Pure Honey. Available from Barre Centre for Buddhist Studies, Barre, MA, USA.

If was a hermit on a desert island, I would take Middle Length Discourses, if I only had access to a single book.Letters to a Young Poet
- Rainer Maria Rilke

Translated by Stephen Mitchell, these letter of the Rainer Maria Rilke to a 19 year-old military student, named Franz Kappus encouraged the young man to pursue solitude as a vehicle for inner transformation, even when in love with another. His 10 letters remind Franz to dig deep into himself to see if he is really wanting to write and then to write about his desires, thoughts, sorrows with “humble sincerity.”

Rilke says a work of art is good ‘if it is written out of necessity.’ He then goes on to tell Kappus to ‘wait for the hour when a new clarity is born: this alone is what it means to lives an artist: in understanding as in creating. In response to the questions concerning Franz, Rilke wrote that he should ‘try to love the questions themselves. The point is to live everything. Live the questions now.” (page 42).

Rilke writes one of the most memorable and powerful statements about authenticity in human relationships which all lovers, friends and family members can take to heart. ‘The love that consists in this: that two solitudes protect and border and greet each other.’ In other words, true love also protects the solitude of the other. It is as if within the human being there is endless exploration of the lover and the monk within – enjoying the passion and intimacy of togetherness while recognising and not neglecting the passion for aloneness, for experiencing silence, for the intimacy of our existence between sky above and earth below.

In a simple, thoughtful and nourishing way, Rilke’s advice to the young man reached across the generations so that we feel the value of his message in our lives.  To read any biography of Rilke, to dwell on his poems, you realise he walked his talk, never letting fears of the vulnerability of love inhibit him.  Etty Hillesum loved this book of letters and Rilke’s poetry, especially The Hours.

Letters to a Young Poet serves as a source for inner nourishment so that we treat life as an adventure, an inquiry and a challenge to consciousness. You can pick up this little book and open any page and find an invaluable truth revealed in the words. It is a masterpiece of insightful writing.

It is often thought that the Buddha's doctrine teaches us that suffering will disappear if one has meditated long enough, or if one sees everything differently. It is not that at all. Suffering isn't going to go away; the one who suffers is going to go away.
- Ayya Khema, from When the Iron Eagle Flies

When I’m having a hard time I feel so much frustration and rage and self-doubt and worry that it’s like a mini-breakdown.  I feel like my mind becomes a lake full of ugly fish and big clumps of algae and coral, of feelings and unhappy memories and rehearsals for future difficulties and failures.  I paddle around in it like some crazy old dog, and then I remember that there’s a float in the middle of the lake and I can swim out to it and lie down in the sun.  That float is about being loved, by my friends and by God, and even sort of by me.  And so I lie there and get warm and dry off, and I guess I get bored or else it is human nature because after a while I jump into the lake, into all that crap.  I guess the solution is just to keep trying to get back to that float”
Anne Lamott

Nothing exists but momentarily in its present form and colour.
One thing flows into another and cannot be grasped.
Before the rain stops we hear a bird.
Even under the heavy snow we see snowdrops and some new growth.
Let it be clear to you that the peace of green fields
Can always be yours, in this, that, or any other spot,
And that nothing is any different here
from what it would be either up in the hills
Or down by the sea
Or where ever else you will.
-Marcus Aurelius

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Booking procedures

Please phone Paul on 381 0444 for a retreat registration form.  The completed form and a deposit of $50.00 should be sent to 6 Trent Street, Christchurch.

Please make cheques payable to Southern Insight Meditation.  Stamped addressed envelopes are appreciated when booking.  Further information will be sent to you on receipt of your deposit.

Refunds of deposits.

The deposit for retreats is refundable up to the closing date of the retreat booked, less a $5.00 charge for administration costs.  Deposits cannot be refunded after the retreat closing date, and the money will be put into the Top-Up Fund.

Top-Up Fund

The top-up fund is for those who are unable to afford the cost of a retreat.  Southern Insight aims to make retreats as accessible as possible to all, consequently it is possible to pay less than the lower amount in the sliding scale for a retreat.  We encourage people to make use of this fund, which thanks to the generosity of others who attend our retreats, is currently in a healthy state.

Contact Addresses for Southern Insight

E-mail: southern.insight.meditation@xtra.co.nz

Post:16 Ward Street, Christchurch

Website:http://insight.orcon.net.nz

Useful phone numbers:

If you would like to ask about our retreats, sitting days, or would like some general information about the group and insight meditation (including lots of opportunities to help with our work) the following are phone numbers from the Steering group – all of whom would be happy to talk with you:

 

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