Mark Coleman has been engaged in meditation practice since 1981, primarily within the Insight meditation tradition. He has been teaching meditation retreats since 1997. His teaching is also influenced by his studies with Advaita Vedanta and Tibetan teachers in Asia and the West, and through his teacher training with Jack Kornfield. Mark primarily teaches at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California, though he also teaches nationally, in Europe and India.
He leads backpacking retreats, nature-based retreats, and teaches retreats for environmental activists in the wilderness at Vallecitos Mountain Refuge in New Mexico, and at Knoll Farm in Vermont. In the Bay Area, Mark has a counseling practice, where he integrates his studies of psychotherapy and meditative work. He is the author of “Awake in the Wild - Mindfulness in Nature as a path of Self-Discovery." Mark has been an avid hiker, and backpacker for most of his life and spends much of his time in the outdoors. He lives in the woods in Marin County, Northern California.
This talk explores the Buddha's central teaching on the Four Noble Truths - how to understand and work with the reality of suffering, the forces of desire and aversion (the causes of suffering) and how that leads to the possibility of freedom (Third Noble Truth).
How does our meditation practice relate to the natural world? How does nature support our awakening. This talk explores how nature supports us to be more aware & develop awe, wonder, love, appreciation, peace and connectedness.
What is Equanimity? Why is it so difficult to be at ease in difficult circumstances. What supports this beautiful quality of the heart and how does it relate to metta (love), compassion and appreciative joy.
This talk gives a thorough overview of the practice and application of metta (unconditional love). Also explored is the unity of mindfulness and metta, and how when metta is cultivated it becomes a source of wisdom in our lives.
Mindfulness of the body as a vehicle of awakening - this talk explores what's challenging about being in the body - working with physical pain, difficult emotions, and how mindfulness practice helps bring insight and ease.
This talk discusses the Buddha's Teaching and the Enneagram's teaching on suffering; its cause and cessation and how the development of compassion heals and transforms suffering in ourselves and in the world.
