Embodied Presence: Practices for Self-Care and Healing

This talk explores how paying attention to your behavior can support you in your life.   You’ll learn how all traditions have guidelines regarding your moral behavior, how morality is often based on a negativity bias and how ultimately, it’s up to you to determine what you really want and define for yourself what it means to be virtuous and in integrity.

This talk explores the power of cultivating an attitude of love and care in your life.   You’ll learn what the Buddha said about giving, how intimately receiving is connected to generosity, the shadow-side of the practice and the power of taking generous actions when you feel called.

This talk explores some practices for cultivating embodied compassion and care.   You’ll explore  what means to ‘heal’ as well as a few ‘deep dives’ - first into a chakra scan then a scan through the body focusing on reflection, gratitude and well-wishing.

This talk explores how to investigate the inner energy centers through the lens of mindfulness.   You’ll learn about the chakras, a bit on the origins of different approaches, the components of each one and how to explore through the lens of non-judging awareness.

This talk explores how to work with challenging energies.   You’ll learn how embodied awareness can open the door to higher degrees of self awareness and how in that recognition of what is arising you can learn to ‘ride the wave’ of resistance and discover what is on the other side.

This talk explores how to open to more subtle felt-sense awareness through mindful breathing. Whole Body Breathing is yet another tool for drawing attention to the play of energy and sensations within and can dramatically heighten awareness of what is arising and how you are relating to it. This talk includes a guided meditation on this technique.

This is an adaptation of the first talk of a five day retreat at the Art of Living Center in Boone North Carolina.   You’ll learn some practical suggestions for embodied meditation and how the body can be an ally in your practice.

This talk explores who you are free from the wanting mind.   You’ll learn about the nature of desire, strategies for working with a greed-filled mind, what can arise as desire lessens and finally, some thoughts on being desire-free and enlightenment itself.

This talk explores who you are in the absence of ignorance and confusion.   You’ll explore the nature of delusion, strategies for overcoming delusion and being more clearly into the nature of reality and what it means to be awake beyond the fluctuations of emotions, thoughts and beliefs.

This talk explores who you are beyond the reach of  aversion.   You’ll learn about how, in our relationship to hatred there can be a rush to premature transcendence and how, by turning toward aversion, what is possible when hatred ceases, namely the arising of inter-connectedness, compassion and love.