February 2025
Community Work Party, Fairfax, CA
Come enjoy community and help work on the beautiful land in Fairfax that was purchased by Open Circle co-founder Rob Schwartz a few years before his death. Help us in continuing to realize Rob's dream of using this special property as a place to gather together in satsang. The emphasis of the day will be on clearing trails and creating space around the outdoor meeting sites on the property. We will start at 10:00am with a brief meditation. We will then work until noon, enjoy a potluck lunch until 1:30, then go back to work, ending around 4:00 pm with another brief meditation. You are free to come and go as your schedule allows. Heavy rain will cancel. RSVP/Registration is requested (though not required) to give us a sense of how many people are coming. We will also then provide the address and directions.......
Find out more »Ishita Sharma ~ Embodiment Lab – Experiments in Embodying Presence
We are not thinking beings who sense; we are sensing beings who think. And re-setting that balance is key to joy, to vibrance, and true liberation!
Join us for Embodiment Lab, an experiential exploration of the body as a doorway to presence and aliveness, returning to the ground of being through our own direct experience.
Ishita Sharma serves as a spiritual teacher, healing mirror, embodiment partner, and Core Energetics Practitioner. Teaching Universal principles of healing and mysticism, she is devoted to supporting healing and awakening in all those committed to living a bright and connected life, sharing their gifts for the good of the Whole.
Find out more »Amoda Maa ~ An Inquiry into the Living Truth of Freedom (In-Person & Livestream)
Open Circle is hosting a series of in-person SATSANGS & a DAYLONG with Amoda Maa in California in late February and early March:
Berkeley, CA, February 27th (7-9 pm);
Mill Valley, CA, February 28th (7-9 pm);
Fairfax, CA, March 1st Daylong (11:00am - 5:00pm);
and Sebastopol, CA, March 2nd (2-4 pm, PT).
Livestream is also available for the Feb. 27th to March 1st events.
Amoda Maa invites an open-hearted honesty to the exploration of what it means to live as freedom in all circumstances. She offers profound pointers to how this freedom reveals itself if we are willing to surrender all resistance to “what is,” and how the light of our essential nature shines through all experience when the “veil of self" comes undone. She supports the recognition of that which is beyond the duality of perception, thought and feeling, and takes us to the experience of the ever-present and unchanging reality of awareness. This unbounded awareness is the eternal ground of Being, the source of true peace and freedom. The luminous truth in Amoda’s teachings is the same nondual understanding at the core of many spiritual traditions.
Find out more »March 2025
Lisa Schumacher ~ Choose Love: Self-Inquiry Meeting
A meeting with Lisa is an encounter in openness and silence, where you are invited just as you are, and where you will find clear and loving support for your awakening. In your search for freedom, you can rest in stopping. You can find stillness in Satsang.
Lisa offers guidance for your awakening, and would love to hear what you are discovering in yourself. This is an embrace of inclusion and an inquiry into the heart of the truth, as it transmits through your life.
During our meeting together, Lisa will support you with deep stillness and skillful self-inquiry to open to your true nature, leaving behind the illusion of a separate self.
Find out more »Stephan Bodian ~ Waking Up Through the Metacrisis: Finding Deeper Ground in Challenging Times
The Buddha said it succinctly 2500 years ago: human existence is, and always has been, marked by constant change and uncertainty. Yet we find ourselves today in uniquely challenging and uncertain times. Perhaps our civilization is on the verge of collapse, like so many before it. But since it covers the globe, this raises the unprecedented prospect that the future of human life on Earth may be threatened as well.
We can always seek refuge in the simplicity and innate perfection of right now. But what about all the painful consequences at a very human level? How do we find peace in a deeper ground while acknowledging and welcoming our fear, outrage, or grief?
Stephan Bodian is a teacher in the non-dual wisdom tradition of Zen, Dzogchen, and Advaita Vedanta. He studied for many years with Advaita master Jean Klein and received Dharma transmission from Adyashanti in 2001.
Find out more »John Prendergast ~ Your Deepest Ground: A Guide to Embodied Spirituality ~ Bay Area Daylong Retreat
Join us for a daylong introduction to John’s new book, Your Deepest Ground: A Guide to Embodied Spirituality. In this meeting we will explore different dimensions of the ground - individual, archetypal, and universal - and experience how to recognize and effectively welcome resistance to opening to our deepest ground. There will be silent and guided meditations, a talk, a group or dyadic inquiry, and experiential conversations.
John Prendergast is a spiritual teacher, retired psychotherapist, and retired Psychology Professor, well known for his pioneering work in integrating non-dual wisdom and psychotherapy. He studied with the European sage Jean Klein for many years, as well as with Adyashanti, who gave him dharma transmission in 2023.
Find out more »Lisa Schumacher ~ Let Love Lead You: Return to what is Sacred ~ (In-Person Satsangs & Livestream)
Open Circle is hosting a series of SATSANGS & a DAYLONG with Lisa Schumacher in California,.
* March 13th (7-9 pm, PT) ~ CORTE MADERA
* March 14th (7-9 pm, PT) ~ BERKELEY,
* March 15th Daylong (11:00am - 5:00pm, PT) ~ FAIRFAX
* March 16th (2-4 pm, PT) ~ SEBASTOPOL
All events are In-Person ~Livestream is also available for March 13th to 15th *
A meeting with Lisa is an opportunity to step away from your day to day life and devote time for inquiry into the source of who you are.
In Lisa’s meetings, she invites you to rest in stillness. Your discoveries and questions about awakening, deepening, and the unfolding truth are welcome. The teaching is in the tradition of Gangaji, who is a student of Papaji, who had his awakening at the feet of Ramana Maharshi.
Find out more »Gail Brenner ~ Deep Healing of Trauma-Based Patterns: Tending the Fertile Ground for Awakened Living ~ 4-Part Online Course
Do you still get taken over by conditioned patterns—even after all the work you’ve done? Do you long to heal your sense of separation from your divine nature? We hear about freedom as a possibility—or we’ve had a taste of our true nature—but somehow these patterns continue in our minds, emotions, relationships, and choices in life.
Gail Brenner, Ph.D. is our guide on this 4-part course as we create a safe and supportive healing community to do the deeper work that unfolds on the path of awakening. Gail is a psychologist, author, and teacher with a devotion to the nondual teaching and embodied conscious living.
Find out more »Lynn Marie Lumiere, MFT ~ Finding Balance in a World out of Balance
We are now subject to ever-increasing amounts of stress in the world we live in. The number of issues we are facing globally, and the fast pace in which these issues are increasing, can overwhelm our current ability to stay in balance.
This webinar offers somatic support for staying regulated, as well as spiritual inspiration and guidance for remaining awake in the midst of it all.
Lynn Marie has decades of experience helping people with awakening and embodiment on all levels. She will offer her skills as a somatically trained and nondual psychotherapist to support you with experiential exercises as well as inspired talks and group discussion.
Find out more »Pamela Wilson ~ Standing Tall as Truth ~ 4 Part Online Retreat
"Standing Tall as Truth, Our Roots in Silence and Substratum.
Love and Wisdom Streaming From Our Heart and Being to All, for All.
Balance is our Blessing, Rekindling Love worldwide our Longing."
Please join Pamela and your fellow sages for this four part retreat on Standing Tall as Truth.
Pamela Wilson evokes through dialogue, inquiry and her very presence the qualities of unconditional love and radical acceptance. She is celebrated for her ability to open the heart and create a space in which long-cherished struggles and notions about one’s identity relax.
Find out more »