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The first time I tried to meditate I was nine or ten years old, with my best friend Emily in the basement laundry room of my house. We picked out some cushions, played a Native American flute CD on my boom box, lit some incense and repeated “oommmmmmmm” over and over in unison, hands resting […]
If you are reading this, you likely share this question with those of us who work as part of Shambhala Mountain Center, and the tens of thousands of people who make up our global audience: How are we going to do this? How can we live together, on this planet, in a way that is […]
Intimate relationships are both an opportunity and a challenge to our capacity for love and vulnerability. Once we get past the romantic love stage, we often find ourselves surprised by these challenges. Drawing from the work of Harville Hendrix, PhD, (Imago) Ben Cohen works with couples in exploring the essential principles and practices of conscious relationships […]
Two days ago I heard a long time senator on NPR describe the current presidential election as the wildest he has seen in his 50 years in politics. Obviously something outlandish is happening, but at 28, I don’t have all that much lived history to compare it to. So it was interesting, if unsurprising, to […]
According to Charley Cropley, N.D., bodily sickness, like all suffering, has real, discoverable causes. The cause is not cancer, colitis, weak adrenals, or a lowered immune system. The cause of our health problems is the innocent misuse of our own body and mind. In this interview, Charley discusses his path for connecting with our ability […]
This January, a group of students from Chapman University, a liberal arts school in southern California, visited Shambhala Mountain Center for a course titled: Ancient Wisdom, Modern Madness: Mind, “Self”, and Society in Tibetan Buddhism. This collaboration between Chapman and SMC began in 1992, established by Michele Kiloran, which makes this most recent visit the 24th year. […]
Like trees in the forest or fish in the sea, we have an innate ability to live in greater harmony with our environment. While trying to navigate our busy, high-tech world, we can develop habits of mind that leave us feeling disconnected and unfulfilled. Delving deeply into the practice of mindfulness/awareness in nature, we turn our attention […]
We’re thrilled to have the wonderfully skilled Yogacharya Erica Kaufman returning to DMC this June to lead Lila Yoga® Mindfulness Retreat. And, also very glad to be able to offer you a glimpse into her brilliance as a teacher and the profundity of the practices that she’ll be leading here on the land. Please take […]
I hope that your plates are full today — but not too full — and that you’re enjoying every bite. Does that seem like a tall order? In an age when we often have too much on our plates, and yet are hungry for real nourishment, the aspiration expressed above may be much easier to […]
— By Bez Living as we do in an epoch where the entire span of recorded history is inevitably brought to bear upon the question of whether we will redeem or annihilate human enterprise and the natural order out of which it emerged, it behooves our species to seek out the highest expressions of truth, […]
Last week we celebrated Shambhala Day — a holiday based on Losar (Tibetan New Year/Lunar New Year). It’s a time to purify, make aspirations for the new year, and honor our cultural & spiritual tradition as a community. We welcomed the Year of the Fire Monkey with festivities that began with a 7:30am walk to […]
‘— by Bez Anyone who’s ever done a Zen ‘practice period’, an occasion to intensify engagement with Buddhist principles, knows how tumultuously transformative one can be. At some point during a relatively warm, extremely dry 2015 Northern California winter practice period I awakened from a rare respite of dreaming sleep to a chorus of howling […]