August 2019
Richard Miller ~ Just Say “Yes”
If to say it once, and once only, then still to say: Yes. And say it complete; say it as if the word filled the whole moment with its absolute saying. Later for "but," Later for "if." Now only the single syllable that is the beloved, that is the world. ~ Gregory Orr
The role of the six senses is to divide what is ever indivisible. Awakening reveals our 7th sense that knows only unity: ‘This’ that is always whole, ever present, that knows only love.
Saying, “Yes,” to each moment affirms our life as unitive love in action. “Yes,” acknowledges our ability to embrace radical authenticity and intimacy with ourselves and with every person and situation we encounter.
Join Richard for this Open Circle online inquiry into our unchanging ground of timeless Being, Awareness, and what lies beyond that underlies and pervades all changing states. Richard’s presentation entails guided meditation, a talk, and spirited intimate dialogue.
“Awakening to nondual Being reveals that all seeking is not for intimacy of object to object, but of the Self with Itself, where no separate other exists.” ~ Richard
Richard's teachings are based upon a lifetime of inquiry into the nature of freedom. Following a series of awakenings all sense of separation fell away while working with his spiritual mentor, Jean Klein. Richard experiences this awakening as always fresh and alive, yet forever opening to itself. Author of iRest Meditation: Restorative Practices for Health, Resiliency, and Well-Being, Yoga Nidra: The Meditative Heart of Yoga, and The iRest Program For Healing PTSD, Richard is the founder of the iRest Institute, and co-founder of the International Association of Yoga Therapists and Institute for Spirituality and Psychology. As well as leading spiritual retreats, Richard is researching the effectiveness of the iRest Meditation protocol that he has developed with soldiers, veterans, students, children, the homeless and people experiencing issues such as PTSD, substance abuse, sleep disorders and chronic pain. For information please visit www.iRest.org.
Suggested donation: $15 to $25
Find out more »Prajna Ginty ~ Born to Love
2-4 pm, with refreshments until 5 pm
We will explore how deep love lives within us. Regardless of all that life brings to us once we claim our birth right we set free our most authentic expression empowered by love. Love is all that matters. Tumble into your soft quiet openness and notice how protection and division dissolve.
Prajna Ginty, MA. Mystic, Shamanic Practitioner, Hakomi Therapist, Spiritual Mentor and author Edge of Grace, A Fierce Awakening to Love. Prajna’s journey raising her twin daughters with disabilities continues to illuminate life’s spiritual and deeply human dimensions. She offers a rare fusion of non-dual mysticism, somatic therapy, and plant medicine. Prajna’s popular retreats catalyze the healing and integration of traumatic experiences empowering you to live as love. Prajna was an early student of Adyashanti and lives with her family in Santa Cruz, CA
Prajna's website: www.awakeningprajna.com
Prajna's Youtube channel: www.youtube.com/c/AwakeningPrajna
Location: 8476 Sonoma Ave, Sebastopol, CA.
Park in driveway or on Sonoma Ave. Walk down short driveway to house with carport.
The satsang starts with a short meditation, then comments by the speaker, followed by questions, answers, and discussion. Please arrive 10-15 minutes early for the best seat.
Suggested donation: $10 to $20, no one turned away for lack of funds.
Find out more »Gail Brenner ~ Suffering is Optional
You’ve had a taste of your true nature as nondual awareness, yet you still find yourself recycling conditioned thought patterns, and getting stuck in the emotions that underlie them. You get triggered and feel scared, sad, angry, or resentful. You’re sometimes overcome by behaviors that seem beyond your control.
This evening will be a safe and supportive intimate group gathering where we untangle the ways we feel separate and discover over and over the infinite peace of our true nature. Gail Brenner, Ph.D. is an eternal student of happiness who blends her experience as a psychologist with a loving presence that invites people into harmony with all of life. She is gifted at meeting our humanness with nondual understanding in ways that are practical and loving. Gail has worked with clients and groups for over 20 years, bringing laser-like clarity to the confusion of common problems, such as reactive emotions, compulsive behaviors, feelings of personal inadequacy, and relationship struggles. She is the author of three books, including The End of Self-Help and her latest, Suffering is Optional.
“Here's some very good news: freedom from unhappiness is possible, and nothing needs to change. You don't need to change your thoughts, process your feelings, learn to relax, or become a better person. The invitation is simply to see things clearly. See clearly through to the essence of what makes you unhappy, and you'll realize that, at the core of your being, there's no conflict, resistance, or separation. You now know peace deeper than you could ever imagine. Shine a laser on every experience that makes you suffer, and you'll always find your true nature, pure being that just is."
Suggested Donation: $15-$25 per person
Find out more »Gail Brenner ~ Suffering is Optional
You’ve had a taste of your true nature as nondual awareness, yet you still find yourself recycling conditioned thought patterns, and getting stuck in the emotions that underlie them. You get triggered and feel scared, sad, angry, or resentful. You’re sometimes overcome by behaviors that seem beyond your control.
This evening will be a safe and supportive intimate group gathering where we untangle the ways we feel separate and discover over and over the infinite peace of our true nature. Gail Brenner, Ph.D. is an eternal student of happiness who blends her experience as a psychologist with a loving presence that invites people into harmony with all of life. She is gifted at meeting our humanness with nondual understanding in ways that are practical and loving. Gail has worked with clients and groups for over 20 years, bringing laser-like clarity to the confusion of common problems, such as reactive emotions, compulsive behaviors, feelings of personal inadequacy, and relationship struggles. She is the author of three books, including The End of Self-Help and her latest, Suffering is Optional.
Find out more »September 2019
Atma Nambi ~ Live Life
Please join us for these special events with South Indian spiritual teacher, Atma Nambi.
Atma Nambi is a spiritual teacher from Tamil Nadu, south India. His spiritual journey started at age 10, and later, while following a career in the business world, he underwent years of spiritual practice with several prominent teachers, including the famous Yogi Ramsurat Kumar and Mohan Bharathi. His various practices included bhakti, karma yoga, mantra, and kundalini, culminating in his Self-Realization in 1994.
Since then, he has been sharing what he lives – total Presence 24 hours a day – with an approach that is casual, immediately applicable, and down-to-earth. He inspires people to live a conscious life in line with each one’s individual potential, which brings pure joy and contentment, health and prosperity in all relations, as well as materially. Atma Nambi shares easy, practical and powerful techniques and approaches that can be applied in everyday life for people of all ages in all levels of society. These will enable you to live a life of celebration, while cultivating the recognition of the true Self.
Both the Friday evening and Saturday programs will culminate with optional chakra initiations by Atma Nambi. The initiations are individual but are done in a group context. The whole group enhances the energy in the initiated. During this process, practical tips will be given on how to keep the chakras activated and maintained, as well as keeping in good physical health.
Note that there is an additional sliding-scale charge for these initiations.
Friday, September 6th
An Evening of Wellbeing: 7 – 9:00 pm
Experience the Truth, discuss life-related situations, and enjoy being in inner silence. This is an instant experience of wellbeing and peace.
Suggested donation: $15-25
No one turned away for lack of funds.
Anahata Heart Chakra Initiation: 9 – 9:30 pm
The activation of the heart energy center, the fourth chakra, is a way to open up the heart and to heal heart-related issues; it enables better relationships, abundance of love and compassion, inner peace, and empowers the immune system.
Sliding Scale: $35-50
Please bring a candle to hold.
Saturday: September 7th
Live Life Workshop: 10 – 5:00 pm (Lunch 1 – 2:30 pm)
The Live Life Workshop addresses how to create an atmosphere of ever-rising consciousness, energy and creativity. Atma Nambi will give techniques for raising the internal and external awareness and atmosphere. There will be moment-to-moment techniques, easy to implement in everyday life, as well as powerful techniques for clearing negative energy (karma), and for inner transformation.
When there is an energy coordination brought in to the spot we are in flow. This is a state of consciousness that takes away the blocks from different parts of the body, enhances creativity and the ability to perceive the situation as it is. Flow makes every action joyous and healthy for oneself and others. An atmosphere of flow increases the amount and the quality your work, while addressing the internal atmosphere within one’s Self enhances relationships with family, friends and co-workers, as well as the atmosphere at home, school or at work.
Sliding Scale: $60-120
Kundalini Initiation, 5 – 6 pm
This initiation activates and awakens the mega-energy of kundalini, which dwells at the base of the spine. The rising of kundalini energy acts powerfully, dissolving fear, anxiety and depression. It generates more and more energy through the chakras, and since it is a life-force energy, its awakening enables both mental and physical wellbeing. It can dissolve many karmas and impressions from the past, and a new way of living in joy, peace and harmony can be established. Since this is a powerful initiation, Atma Nambi will select the individuals who he feels are ready.
Sliding Scale: $35-50
Please bring a fragrant flower.
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Additional Services:
While Atma Nambi is in the Bay Area, he is also offering other services to the general community.
Personal Sessions
Atma Nambi provides personalized guidance, spiritual healing, personal techniques and mantras to remove blockages and open up for your inner qualities and powers; he provides individual guidance, with the tools you need to move forward in life, to heal and to open up to the potential in all areas of life, both spiritual and material. He also guides couples and families in how to live a content and joyous family life, and gives guidance to those running centers or doing service for the wellbeing of humanity.
$50
Personal Atma Darshan Sessions: Being in Light
During this private darshan session, Atma Nambi bestows his grace in abundance. He opens up the door of the mind, and the eight spiritual powers that one carries within, enabling the purity of the Self to be experienced.
$50
Kubera TapasKubera Tapas is a fire ceremony performed for cleansing and spiritual and material abundance in private homes, the workplace, and in organizations. Throughout the ages, countless people and places have received great benefit in every aspect of life through Kubera Tapas. The ceremony lasts for approximately 1.5 hours.
$250
To book any of the above services, please email Aradhana at: LIVELIFE.Atma@gmail.com.
www.facebook.com/AtmaNambi.LiveLife/
There are also several videos of Atma Nambi on YouTube.
Find out more »
Atma Nambi ~ Live Life
Please join us for these special events during a rare visit by by South Indian spiritual teacher, Atma Nambi.
Atma Nambi's spiritual journey started at age 10, and later, while following a career in the business world, he underwent years of spiritual practice with several prominent teachers, including the famous Yogi Ramsurat Kumar and Mohan Bharathi. His various practices included bhakti, karma yoga, mantra, and kundalini yoga, culminating in his Self-Realization in 1994.
Since then, he has been sharing what he lives – total Presence 24 hours a day – with an approach that is casual, immediately applicable, and down-to-earth. He inspires people to live a conscious life in line with each one’s individual potential, which brings pure joy and contentment, health and prosperity in all relations, as well as materially. Atma Nambi shares easy, practical and powerful techniques and approaches that can be applied in everyday life for people of all ages in all levels of society. These will enable you to live a life of celebration, while cultivating the recognition of the true Self.
Both the Friday evening satsang and the Saturday daylong event will culminate with optional chakra initiations by Atma Nambi.
Find out more »Mukti ~ Discover Your True Self
What is the most essential you that is present regardless of thought or emotion? Who or what has been present for all of your life experience? How does this spirit of constancy touch your life? Mukti will offer a mediation and then speak on these compelling topics followed by the opportunity for questions and answers pointing directly to the true nature of Self.
Mukti, whose name is translated as "liberation," is a teacher in the lineage of Adyashanti, her husband. Prior to 1996, when she began studying the nondual, Zen-flavored teachings of Adyashanti, Mukti studied the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda for over 20 years. In her own teachings, Mukti points audiences back to their natural state of wholeness or undivided consciousness. Licensed in acupuncture and certified to teach hatha yoga, Mukti has a love of the whole, in form as well as the formless.
No one turned away for lack of funds
Mukti ~ Discover Your True Self
What is the most essential you that is present regardless of thought or emotion? Who or what has been present for all of your life experience? How does this spirit of constancy touch your life? Mukti will offer a mediation and then speak on these compelling topics followed by the opportunity for questions and answers pointing directly to the true nature of Self.
Mukti, whose name is translated as "liberation," is a teacher in the lineage of Adyashanti, her husband. Prior to 1996, when she began studying the nondual, Zen-flavored teachings of Adyashanti, Mukti studied the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda for over 20 years. In her own teachings, Mukti points audiences back to their natural state of wholeness or undivided consciousness. Licensed in acupuncture and certified to teach hatha yoga, Mukti has a love of the whole, in form as well as the formless.
Find out more »Isaac Shapiro ~ Meetings in Truth
Join us for this special series of evening meetings and daylong gatherings with Isaac Shapiro in Berkeley.
Date & Time info is detailed below.
Isaac helps us inquire into how we live our lives moment by moment, and how to better align ourselves with the deepest spiritual truths. He works through direct but good-humored questioning, reflecting back to us, and helping to unravel, the conditioning of the mind and the nervous system, allowing a deeper participation in the moment.
Isaac is an internationally known facilitator and non-dual teacher, fascinated with life lived in alignment with the world's wisdom traditions. He enjoys exploring and assisting those who share this interest. A student of H.W.L. Poonja (Papaji), Isaac draws on a broad spectrum of understanding, from neurophysiology to some of the latest discoveries in quantum physics, which he applies in a light-hearted but direct way.
His approach is to ask questions and make statements, and he asks participants in his meetings to question and see if what he says is true in their own being. This approach points to what is already known, but obscured in the ways our nervous system and our thinking function. Through years of working with people, Isaac has cultivated and refined an ability to track what is happening in the nervous system of participants. Bringing this awareness to people’s attention, allows our natural, innate self-regulating mechanism to be re-established.
The beauty of this invitation is that nothing needs to be changed, fixed, or eliminated. It is a non-dualistic, non-judgmental enquiry into our present being. Everything happens through the agency of awareness. As we bring awareness to our unconscious habits, there is a shift that occurs. In the course of investigation, people spontaneously recognize the true nature of themselves, which many report as the experience of peace, unconditional love, compassion, or simply of being home.
"All we have is the sensory experience of this moment, NOW. This moment is only an experience to us. That’s all we have. The world, time, space, our own bodies and each other are all an experience to us. Through noticing how our cells respond in the experience of now, there is a noticing of the production of not only the sense of reality but also the sense of self that we believe we have."
Evening Meetings
Wed. & Thur. Sept 11th & 12th
and Sun.- Fri. Sept 15th to 20th in Berkeley
7:00 - 8:45 pm
Chochmat HaLev, 2215 Prince Street, Berkeley
Suggested Donation for evenings: $15-$25
No one turned away for lack of funds.
Daylong Intensives
Sat. and Sun., Sept 21st & 22nd, in Berkeley
11:00 am to 5:00 pm
Chochmat HaLev, 2215 Prince Street, Berkeley
No pre-registration required
Sliding Scale: $50 to $100
Lunch Break:
Welcome to bring your lunch, and there are also various places near the Berkeley venue, to go out to eat.
Note: Per venue policy, only vegetarian food is allowed on premises at Chochmat HaLev
Jeannie Zandi ~ Everyday Mystic
At the heart of being human lies the mysterious wedding of Heaven and Earth, spirit and matter, the light of spirit and the humility of flesh.
Jeannie’s gift for inviting people to join her in resting and rooted presence evokes a deep meeting with oneself and reality. Within that, Jeannie’s humor and iconoclasm serve to bring people into an understanding that is beyond the intellectual. Through silent and guided meditation, spontaneous talks and exchange with participants, Jeannie will host a space of clarity and warmth where the richness of relating can be explored safely and your innermost questions met fully. Come join us!
Jeannie is the director of Living as Love, a nonprofit organization dedicated to seeding a culture of the Heart on the planet, inspiring, teaching and supporting people to live from their essence as Love. A year before the birth of her daughter, Jeannie was plunged into a dark night of the soul that culminated in a radical shift of consciousness. She is known for her fearless clarity, tender mercy toward humanness, and a juicy, poetic and often humorous style that draws from Advaita Vedanta, Sufism, Christian mysticism and the ongoing revelation of fully engaged living. Residing in Colorado, she travels widely in the US, bringing a down-to-earth embodied teaching of living as love.
Suggested donation: $15 to $25
Find out more »