Thai Forest Tradition teachers offer two full-day meditation daylongs:
- Meditation: Integrating Calm and Inquiry
Aug. 30, 2017, 9:00 AM – 4:30 PM, Underwood, WA - Peace is in Every Breath
Sep. 2, 2017, 9 :00 AM – 4:30 PM, Portland, OR
Meditation instruction, Dhamma reflections, and questions and answers included. All levels of experience are welcome. The teachings are freely offered. Retreat descriptions are below. Contact Carole Melkonian for more information.
The Teachers: Willa Thaniya and Jitindriya
Willa Thaniya Reid (formerly Ajahn Thaniya), has been practicing formal Buddhist meditation since the 1980s. Her primary training has been through the Thai Forest Tradition of Luang Por Chah. The Forest Tradition is in harmony with her affinity for the natural world and for reflective teachings. For 18 years she was part of the monastic community of this tradition based in England. As the senior nun of Cittaviveka for eight years, she offered support to the lay and monastic community and taught retreats in the UK, USA, Europe and Australia. She brings to her teaching a love for the original suttas of the Buddha. Since leaving the monastic order, Willa has gained a Master’s degree in relationship counselling, as well as clinical pastoral training, and has worked in the community in Melbourne, Australia offering spiritual support to the dying and their families. In 2015 she returned to her native country, New Zealand, to develop a meditation community with her partner.
Jitindriya (Loraine Keats, formerly Ajahn Jitindriya), has practiced Buddhist meditation and spiritual inquiry for over 30 years, 17 of which as a Buddhist nun in the Thai Forest Tradition of Ajahn Chah and Ajahn Sumedho. During that time Jitindriya offered teachings to the monastic and lay communities in the UK, USA, Australia, and elsewhere. After leaving the monastic order, Jitindriya gained a Master’s degree in Buddhist Psychotherapy with the Karuna Institute in the UK. She since returned to live in her native country, Australia, where she continues to teach the Dhamma and has a private practice in Mindfulness Based Psychotherapy. In both personal practice and teaching Dhamma Jitindriya draws inspiration primarily from the early Buddhist suttas and the Forest Masters of the Theravadan tradition, as well as from pertinent Dzogchen teachings from the Vajrayana tradition. The interface of Dhamma with psychospiritual work is also an area of interest for Jitindriya.
The Daylongs
Meditation: Integrating Calm and Inquiry (Aug. 30, 2017)
9:00 AM – 4:30 PM, Underwood Community Center
951 Schoolhouse Rd, Underwood WA 98651
Practicing meditation on the natural breath is a way of cultivating a sustainable place of ease and well-being. It can give us the resources to both meet and free ourselves from the anxiety and complexity we can often experience in the world. The Buddha gave detailed instructions on this practice, mindfulness of breathing, which explore the processes of calming and settling the body-mind (samadhi), and developing our capacity for inquiry and clear seeing (vipassana). These two factors of calm and inquiry are mutually supportive in meditation, and work together as a pair in the process of releasing the heart-mind from all stress and confusion.
Peace is in Every Breath (Sep. 2, 2017)
9 :00 AM – 4:30 PM, Friends Mtg. House
4312 SE Stark St, Portland, OR 97215
Enhancing awareness of the breath and body is a primary way to establish mindfulness in the present moment. It helps us come out of the stress of mental proliferation and we develop the capacity to meet our presently arising experience. As we do this, we begin to recognize how we can either struggle with ‘the way it is’ or be in wise relationship with ‘the way it is’. Seeing and understanding this process directly leads to ‘insight into the Noble Truths’, and brings deep peace in its wake. This is more than just the peace of relaxation or tranquility, which is also a benefit of breath meditation – it is the peace of insight into ‘Dhamma’, reality. This is the possibility with every breath.