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Retreat Dharma Talks
Transforming Fear into Fearlessness
A six-week study and practice course The Four Noble Truths that form the heart of the Buddha’s teaching invite us to examine our relationship to dukkha: stress, distress, unsatisfactoriness, suffering. Most of us though, have an instinctive resistance to suffering, so we need to practice working skilfully with the different levels of fear that often show up along the path to freedom. As we learn how to release ourselves from the confines of these fears, we’re able to live with greater ease, happiness, and peace, and to connect with the wisdom and compassion that are our true nature.
2019-06-22 (37 days)
Blue Mountains Insight Meditation Centre
Exploring the common tendency of the mind to get caught in comparing, and how the practice of mudita or appreciative joy can be both an antidote and an ally, that helps stop mana from arising in the first place
How seeing the three universal characteristics of anicca-dukkha-anatta (impermanent, imperfect, impersonal) can support the releasing of anxiety and fear
Working together in pairs, taking turns to describe a time of feeling ease, calm, confidence, courage, and noticing the effect this has on the body, heart, and mind
Acknowledging that change itself can cause anxiety; exploring some different definitions of Nibbana; and a few suggestions for navigating fear if/when it arises in meditation practice
