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Retreat Dharma Talks
at Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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Monday and Wednesday Talks
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| Regular weekly talks given at the lower Spirit Rock meditation hall |
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Spirit Rock Meditation Center
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2019-12-04
From the Ordinary Habitual Mind to the Buddha-Mind 10: Time
68:36
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Donald Rothberg
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In this initial inquiry into our experience of time, we explore (1) the nature of the ordinary conditioning related to the experience of time, including how we relate to past, present, and future, how we take time to be objectively “real,” and how we learn as children to use the construction of time; (2) how the Buddha and other sages seem to experience and teach about time, including about the “timeless”; and (3) how to practice to explore and transform our conditioning related to time.
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2019-12-11
From the Ordinary Habitual Mind to the Buddha-Mind 11: Time 2
63:00
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Donald Rothberg
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Following last week’s initial inquiry into our experience of time, and, for many, a week of practice related to time, we explore (1) further aspects of the nature of the ordinary conditioning related to the experience of time, bringing some of our own findings as well as material from philosophy, physics, and psychology; (2) some further material on how the Buddha and other awakened beings teach about time and the timeless; and (3) several main practices that help us to explore and transform our conditioning related to time, including developing mindfulness in the moment, opening to “flow” states, and exploring impermanence.
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2019-12-23
Practicing at the Winter Solstice & Holiday Time: Embracing the Dark, Inviting the Light
1:13:36
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Donald Rothberg
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At an often frenetic time in our society, it can be important to find a time to stop and dis-engage from our busy-ness, for a few hours, a half-day, a day, or longer. This can help us in many ways, including knowing more deeply and intuitively what our next steps might be, in alignment with our integrity. This is crucial both individually and for those engaged in responding to the crises of our world. We explore five key ways to be with such a process—to embrace the darkness of this time, and to come to know how being with the darkness is generative and brings light.
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2020-01-22
From the Ordinary Habitual Mind to the Buddha Mind 12: Exploring Our Experience of Time 3
62:51
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Donald Rothberg
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We continue to investigate our experience of time, focusing first more extensively on common patterns of experiencing time in a conditioned way. We then point to three main ways that our sense of time is transformed as we awaken, related to a deepened sense of impermanence as well as a greater sense of presence, and, finally, a movement, so to speak, into timeless awareness. Relatedly, we point to four main ways of practicing to investigate our experience of time, related first to examining our various conditioned constructions of time, and then to opening further to impermanence, presence, and timeless awareness, which can then also, to speak, hold time.
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2020-01-29
A Guided Meditation Exploring Our Experience of Time through Three Practices
41:06
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Donald Rothberg
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After starting with the foundational mindfulness instructions for settling, becoming less distracted, and then seeing clearly whatever is predominant in experience, we explore three ways of practicing that help us to transform our conditioning in relationship to time: (1) opening to the present moment; (2) exploring impermanence, particularly the arising, staying, changing, and passing away of experiential phenomena; and (3) accessing, at least briefly, a timeless awareness.
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2020-01-29
From the Ordinary Habitual Mind to the Buddha Mind 13: Exploring Our Experience of Time 4
64:24
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Donald Rothberg
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We focus in this session on four ways of practicing that help us to transform our conditioning in relationship to time: (1) opening to the present moment, as in our core practice of mindfulness; (2) exploring impermanence reflectively and experientially in several ways; (3) accessing, at least briefly, a timeless awareness, and learning to live from this awareness more and more; and (4) noticing and examining our various forms of conditioning around time. The first three ways of practicing correspond to the guided practices in the earlier guided meditation. For the fourth, we look especially in this session at the powerful ways that our cultural and social conditioning operates, comparing some of the main aspects of conditioning in the mainstream U.S., with its emphasis on future planning, productivity, and busyness, among other orientations to time, with how some other cultures experience time.
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