The greatest gift is the
gift of the teachings
 
Donald Rothberg's Dharma Talks at Spirit Rock Meditation Center
Donald Rothberg
Donald Rothberg, PhD, has practiced Insight Meditation since 1976, and has also received training in Tibetan Dzogchen and Mahamudra practice and the Hakomi approach to body-based psychotherapy. Formerly on the faculties of the University of Kentucky, Kenyon College, and Saybrook Graduate School, he currently writes and teaches classes, groups and retreats on meditation, daily life practice, spirituality and psychology, and socially engaged Buddhism. An organizer, teacher, and former board member for the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, Donald has helped to guide three six-month to two-year training programs in socially engaged spirituality through Buddhist Peace Fellowship (the BASE Program), Saybrook (the Socially Engaged Spirituality Program), and Spirit Rock (the Path of Engagement Program). He is the author of The Engaged Spiritual Life: A Buddhist Approach to Transforming Ourselves and the World and the co-editor of Ken Wilber in Dialogue: Conversations with Leading Transpersonal Thinkers.
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2020-02-19 From the Ordinary Habitual Mind to the Buddha Mind 14: Working with Our Psychological Conditioning (Talk Begins at 57:07) 2:00:51
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In this session, we explore first in a more general way the complex relationship between transforming our psychological conditioning (including any residues of trauma) and meditative training, pointing to a kind of emerging contemporary map of how these practices come together (and how this map relates to more traditional maps). Near the end of the talk are inquiry questions to help us explore our own unresolved issues of a more psychological nature.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
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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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.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2020-01-29 A Guided Meditation Exploring Our Experience of Time through Three Practices 41:06
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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.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
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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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.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2020-01-19 Metta (Lovingkindness), Equanimity, and Daily Life Practice (Retreat at Spirit Rock) 66:05
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We explore two dimensions of integration in metta practice: (1) connecting metta and the awakened heart with wisdom, especially through the connection between metta and equanimity; and (2) pointing to ways to continue our metta practice in several dimensions of daily life—in individual practice, in being with others, and in our participation in the wider social world.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  January Metta Retreat
2020-01-15 Brahmavihara Practice 46:28
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Instructions for "radiating metta" and guided practice.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  January Metta Retreat
2020-01-14 The Transformative Power of Metta Practice (Retreat at Spirit Rock) 56:21
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Guided by a recent translation of a poem about metta practice by an early Buddhist nun, from The First Free Women, we contemplate the simple yet radical and profound spirit of metta practice. The author tells us: "I have followed this Path of friendship to its end. And I can say with absolute certainty—it will lead you home.” We look at how metta cuts through fear, how it deepens concentration, how we work with the challenges of metta practice, how we navigate the “purification process” linked with metta practice, and how we integrate the kind heart, mindfulness, wisdom, and skillful action.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  January Metta Retreat
2019-12-23 Practicing at the Winter Solstice & Holiday Time: Embracing the Dark, Inviting the Light 1:13:36
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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.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2019-12-11 From the Ordinary Habitual Mind to the Buddha-Mind 11: Time 2 63:00
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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.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks
2019-12-11 Title: Guided Meditation Exploring Our Experience of Time 39:06
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Guidance generally on mindfulness practice, followed by guidance on several ways to explore time, including being in the present moment, noticing patterns to time, and opening in different ways to the impermanence of experience.
Spirit Rock Meditation Center :  Monday and Wednesday Talks

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