What is Rest? Resting in Awareness
Online One-day Meditation Retreat

  • Date: Saturday 9th January 2020
  • Partial attendance is fine – Come and go as you like.  However – best results if you attend the whole day.
  • This retreat is suitable for beginner meditators, but primarily oriented towards intermediate meditators.
  • Cost: Donation-based
  • We’ll meet using Zoom.
  • Email with Zoom link will be sent out day before retreat. 

Event Time

  • In the US:
    • 9am to 7:30pm EST
    • 8am to 7:30pm CST
    • 7am to 5:30pm MST
    • 6am to 4:30pm PST
  • In the South America:
    • 11am to 9:30pm Brasilia & Buenos Aires
  • In Europe:
    • 2pm to 00:30am London
    • 3pm to 1:30am Paris

Overview

We’ll learn to rest into open awareness.  We’ll start with basic concentration practice to settle the mind.  Then we’ll do the “what is rest?” practice.  The “what is rest” inquiry is similar to Shikantaza, “Do Nothing”, Mahamudra, and Dzogchen.  Pointing out type instructions are given through out the meditation sessions.  This will punctuate the restful open awareness practice with moments investigation.

Practice Technique

The suggested practice is the inquiry “What is rest?”.  But other practice options will be given as well. 

Second Lecture plus guided meditation

Lecture on emptiness, and awareness practices.

Walking Meditation

Brief walking meditation instruction will be offered.  Most hours will consist of a 20 minute walking meditation session and a 40 minute seated meditation session. Also self-guided yoga can be done in lieu of walking meditation during those 20 minute periods.  It’s also fine to take a break during the walking periods.

Yoga (optional)

Cedric will guide an hour long Yoga session. The Yoga routine will be made up of two sequences. The first is based on the “how to grow a lotus” sequence which is specifically designed to help with long meditation sitting. The second sequence is Tibetan Sun Moon Yoga.  This Yoga routine is from the Mahamudra lineage.  It supports deep meditative experience.

This retreat is suitable for beginners.

Inquiry can be weird at first. People get it more quickly once they have a background of meditation.  So for that reason it is better suited for intermediate meditators with at least 100 hours of meditation.  

Partial attendance, coming and going, etc.

You can come and go whenever you like based on your availability and interest.  The Europeans likely can’t attend the full retreat.  Full participation will yield the most powerful result, however.

Misc:

The schedule is similar to a Zen retreat schedule.

We’ll chant the Hakuin’s Song of Zazen at the beginning and end of the day. https://www.thezensite.com/ZenTeachings/Translations/Song_of_Zazen.htm

We’ll also do a guided forgiveness meditation at the beginning of the retreat to soften the mind.

At the beginning of each sit we’ll chant the Mantra “gate gate para gate para sam gate bodhi svaha!”. This means “Gone, gone, gone totally gone, enlightenment, svaha!” Chanting is very powerful and strongly recommended.  It’s helps us drop into the subtle mind more quickly.

We have a sliding scale to accommodate people of different means.

Tier 4

$80 I have enough resources and would like to support others.

Tier 3

$40 I have sufficient resources.

Tier 2

$20 I have some resources.

Tier 1

$1 I don’t have the resources – pay whatever you can.

These are the suggested payment tiers for this retreat. You can pay on the next page


Photo by  Aaron Burden

Hourly Schedule

Eastern Time (New York)

9:00
Opening notes & Chanting
9:20
Instruction on What is Rest Inquiry with Q&A
10:20
Guided Inquiry Meditation
11:00
Gentle Guided Yoga
12:00
Seated Meditation
12:40
Brief instruction on Walking Meditation
1:00
Lecture on Emptiness & Practice Q&A
1:40
Walking Meditation
2:00
Lunch Break
3:00
Walking Meditation
3:20
Seated Meditation
4:000
Walking Meditation
4:20
Seated Meditation
5:00
Walking Meditation
5:20
Seated Meditation
6:00
Walking Meditation or Break for a light dinner
6:30
Seated Meditation
7:00
Chanting & friendly discussion about practice
7:30
Finish

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