December 2019
Amoda Maa ~ Standing as Openness in the Face of Brokenness and Loss
Join Amoda in an intimate dialogue that invites you to reject nothing, welcome everything, and surrender into the deepest falling of the open heart. Includes a silent and/or guided meditation, discourse, and ample time for questions and answers.
“Listen to the visitors who knock on your heart … knocking from the inside. Shame, pain, loneliness, grief and more … all these are your allies not your foes. They yearn to come in, to be acknowledged, accepted, loved. For what is broken is the doorway to gold, what is shattered is the entrance to inconceivable love, what brings you to your knees is not a punishment but God’s invitation. Your brokenness is holy.”
Amoda is a contemporary spiritual teacher, offering meetings and retreats to support and deepen the living of an awakened life. She has been sharing her teachings since 2012, initially at small gatherings in the UK. Today, she lives in the US and her teachings are followed by a growing number of seekers world-wide. She is the author of Embodied Enlightenment, as well as Radical Awakening and Change Your Life, Change Your World. While often referred to as a ‘nondual teacher,’ she prefers to emphasize the full embracement of the human experience as a path to liberation. She brings to her teachings a depth and breadth of understanding of the human journey, born out her own immersion in the furnace of personal transformation.
Suggested donation: $15 to $25
Find out more »Isaac Shapiro ~ Authentic Autonomy: Maturing of the Heart ~ Online Retreat
3-day Online Retreat with Isaac Shapiro:
Authentic Autonomy: Maturing of the Heart
December 13, 14, 15, 2019
11:00 am - 1:00 pm Pacific Time
Time Zone Converter
As life lives us, a recognition of our true nature makes it possible for the automatic unconscious patterns that produce a sense of disease and separateness, to come home. This allows living as love - the nectar which benefits all beings.
Join Isaac Shapiro for a three-day immersion into simplicity of being with what is. From the comfort of your home, you will have the opportunity to explore yourself with like-minded community from around the world. Through direct yet playful inquiry into what is, we will be unraveling conditioning of the mind and the nervous system. The format of the meetings is interactive and spontaneous, deeply in tune with what wants to emerge in the moment.
Isaac Shapiro is an internationally known facilitator and non-dual teacher, fascinated with life lived in alignment with the world’s wisdom traditions. A former student of H.W.L. Poonja (Papaji), Isaac draws on a broad spectrum of understanding, from Advaita to neurophysiology to some of the latest discoveries in quantum physics, which he applies in a light-hearted but direct way.
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.
More about Isaac Shapiro: www.isaacshapiro.org
This Three-Day Online Retreat will consist of:
- Three 2-hour Meetings in Truth with Isaac Shapiro (total of 6 hours)
- Video and Audio Recordings of Meetings with Isaac
We meet via Zoom, an online platform allowing for live video conversations. You will have the opportunity to see/hear and be seen/heard by Isaac and other participants. You will also have the option to switch your camera off and remain invisible. You may also join by phone.
To proceed to Registration, please affirm that you have read and agree to these terms:
click here to READ TERMS.
Registration: $60 - $100
Please register early if you can.
For practical questions please contact Sara at sara@opencirclecenter.org.
January 2020
Neelam ~ The Power of Self Inquiry, and the Role of Nervous Systems in Awakening, Embodiment and Freedom ~ 3-hour TeleSatsang
This call is an invitation to Presence and to Neelam’s teaching, and a practical exploration of the role of the nervous system in Awakening and Freedom. The nervous system and its capacity to Be Here are essential elements for Awakening, Embodiment and for Freedom.
When unmet, un-experienced tendencies from the past arise, and we so often believe them and identify ourselves with them, so that they affect and manifest in our physiology and show up as thoughts, feelings, emotions and sensations.
When Ramana Maharshi was first asked by a devotee, deeply attracted by His Presence, to impart some direction on how to reach that state, he has written the simple instructions of who am I? Inquiry. This very direct approach - when done in the right way 🙂- immediately appraises us of the fact that Who we really are is Emptiness or Presence.
My personal path to Awakening was more through Devotion, Silence and "meeting of what is" rather than formal Inquiry; however, since I started teaching in 1996, I realized the value of Inquiry in my own Embodiment process, and for Awakening, Embodiment and Freedom. And in addition to Ramana’s Inquiry, I have developed several Inquiry processes with very practical and effective steps.
Inquiry, especially when combined with a practical knowledge of the Nervous System and the Brain, and of the role of the Nervous System's capacity to Be Here, in Awakening Embodiment and Freedom, is a very powerful way to identify, address, and end suffering in the moment.
I want to invite you all to join me in this very direct and practical exploration.
Topics that may be covered during this program:
- Elements necessary for Awakening Embodiment and Freedom
- Everything arises in Presence And Everything is Ok just the way it is
- Embodied Okayness and what does it mean to Be Here
- The Cause of Suffering
- Introducing the Inquiry process and the Role of the Nervous Systems capacity in Being Here
Neelam is a direct disciple of HWL Poonja (affectionately known as Papaji), whose own teacher was Ramana Maharshi. Neelam’s unequivocal commitment to Truth helps us turn inward and release underlying patterns of conditioning which block the recognition of our True Nature. With the utmost tenderness, she invites us into the same recognition of Truth that her teacher, Papaji, transmitted to her, while helping us to address all aspects of daily living, including past conditioning and trauma.
“Awakening is a shift from identifying yourself as this body to knowing yourself as Presence. Freedom means a true independence from the past, where our ability to Be Here and the action in the moment are not guided by our attachment to the arising past. To truly be Free we need to embody our recognition of Presence, and that requires growing of the capacity of our nervous system to Be Here. It is in the meeting of what arises that we find true and lasting freedom.”
3-Hour Experiential Intensive
Sliding Scale: $20 to $45
Tilicho ~ Setting the Foundations: Weekend Online Retreat
2-day Online Retreat with Tilicho:
Setting the Foundations
January 11th & 12th, 2020
10:00 am - 1:00 pm Pacific Time
To be yourself is both very simple and complicated. Simple, as you already are what you're looking for: CONSCIOUSNESS (the light at the core of all beings and all things). Complicated, because to REALIZE who you are, you need to BE CONSCIOUS not only of your inner light, but also of your ego, as it often prevents us from putting the light on here and now, and embracing the present moment as it is.
This workshop sets the foundation for deeper exploration of consciousness and meeting with 'here and now'.
Saturday:
10.00 -11.30: Self-inquiry
11.30-11.45 tea-break
11.45-13.00: “Leaving the past behind” - session on forgiveness.
Sunday:
10.00 -11.30: ”Living in Trust" - session on fears
11.30-11.45 tea-break
11.45-13.00: "How to BE in daily life?"
About Tilicho
Tilicho spontaneously realized the Self in 1998 without following any teaching or practice. The absence of spiritual conditioning allowed her to see through the veils of spiritual idealism and illusions. She ended up spending thirteen years in Tiruvannamalai in south India, the seat of Ramana Maharshi and the sacred mountain, Arunachala. While recognizing the beauty of the Advaita teachings, she also observed that they can easily be misunderstood and distorted. Although the Self is eternally free from the world, it is not separate from it. Clarity does not exclude openness. Her teaching stresses the need to combine Masculine and Feminine qualities and approaches. It is an invitation to find unity within and without.
“May all beings realize who they truly are! Om Sat Chit Ananda.”
This Two-Day Online Retreat will consist of:
- Two 3-hour Meetings with Tilicho (total of 6 hours)
- Video and Audio Recordings of the Meetings
We meet via Zoom, an online platform allowing for live video conversations. You will have the opportunity to see/hear and be seen/heard by Tilicho and other participants. You will also have the option to switch your camera off and remain invisible. You may also join by phone.
To proceed to Registration, please affirm that you have read and agree to these terms:
click here to READ TERMS.
Registration: $40 - $80
Please register early if you can.
For practical questions please contact Sara at sara@opencirclecenter.org.
Stephan Bodian ~ Working with Trauma on the Path of Awakening
When I asked my first Zen teacher about becoming a monk, he said, “Monasteries are places for desperate people.” Many of us are drawn to the spiritual path because of the suffering we experience as the result of early-life trauma, be it childhood abuse or neglect, life-threatening experiences, or repeated situations where our physical or emotional survival or integrity seem to be at stake.
Compared with the ordinary range of painful life experiences, trauma has a unique impact on the psyche and the nervous system that can complicate the awakening process and leave us feeling especially frightened, isolated, or unintegrated.
In this satsang, we’ll explore how to relate to the effect our trauma continues to have on our lives, in the context of awakening. Includes teachings, guided meditation, and dialogue.
Stephan Bodian has been sharing the direct approach to spiritual awakening for more than 40 years. A former Buddhist monk and a longtime student of Advaita master Jean Klein, Stephan received Dharma transmission from Adyashanti in 2001. Since 2007 he has taught the annual months-long School for Awakening, which will begin again, in online form, in January 2020. His books include Wake Up Now and Beyond Mindfulness.
Suggested donation: $15 to $25
Find out more »Pamela Wilson ~ The Love That Does Not Come or Go, Part 2: 4-day Online Retreat
Join Pamela Wilson for a 4-day Online Retreat
The Love That Does Not Come or Go, Part 2
Ongoing Inquiry into The Formless Heart which Holds, and Is Within, Everything
January 21, 23, 28, 30, 2020
10:00 am to 12:00 pm Pacific Time
Time Zone Converter
Please join Pamela Wilson, and the host Sara Kasprowicz of Open Circle, for four online satsangs at the end of January.
It takes a team of sages to explore the vastness and simplicity of Love, so bring your aware noticing, curiosity and insights as we all dive into the heart of the formless, as well as form and function, revealing the radiant constancy within all!
Each satsang will last two hours, beginning with a ten minute silent sit together, followed by a wide-ranging exploration into whatever you and we all are being with. Respectful inquiry within invites ancient defended contractions to unfurl and then root, supporting our embodiment in a felt sense of Oneness.
Pamela 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. Featured in the book Ordinary Women, Extraordinary Wisdom, Pamela is at her best in heart-felt dialogue, so please bring your questions!
More about Pamela: www.pamelasatsang.com
This Retreat consists of:
- 4 live and interactive 2-hour Satsangs with Pamela in Zoom (a total of 8 hours)
- audio and video recordings of all meetings (we only record Pamela's video and Questioner's audio)
We meet via Zoom - a platform allowing for live video conversations, which means you will have the opportunity to see/hear and be seen/heard by Pamela and other participants. You will also have the option to switch your camera off and remain invisible.
To proceed to Registration, please affirm that you have read and agree to these terms:
click here to READ TERMS.
Registration: $70 - $110
PLEASE REGISTER EARLY if you can.
For practical questions please contact Sara at sara@opencirclecenter.org.
Tom Kurzka ~ Meeting Difficult Energies — Integrating Presence with Fully Living Here
Every time we stop, we taste a gap in the experience, spacious awareness, that which is always here as the background and holding for the life experience, much like the blank white screen in the movie theater upon which the images of the movie appear. We know this simple truth intellectually and also to a certain extent in our Heart. But then the challenges of life sweep us away from this simple knowing, usually in the form of difficult energies that overwhelm us. We want to run and hide, we feel abandoned and lost. We overeat, we abuse substances, we distract, we try to escape, but the difficult energies continue to chase us. And yet, we’re told to just meet the difficult energies directly and they will dissolve back into spacious awareness. Easier said than done, because the difficult energies are our worse nightmare.
In this event we will gently explore ways in which we can get more comfortable in our own human skin, including the parts that we can’t stand. We will cover:
- Four common ways of dealing with difficult energies: suppression, pushing away, spacious embrace, and wisdom action guided by spacious embrace.
- How to use the breath and the intensity of the difficult energies as an ally, an anchor to the present moment, to overcome the habitual tendency of the reactive mind to run and hide or to fight back.
- Acknowledging and soothing our distrust in life as a means of establishing trust in the living Presence of Life itself to hold the vulnerability of our humanness.
About Tom
After being asked to teach, Tom has been sharing this work for over 19 years. His sessions give attendees a taste of what he exudes, a patient tender Love that is our true interconnected nature. His focus on connection to the immediacy of felt sensation enables potent transformations to readily manifest. His work and presence is an acknowledgement that our beautiful imperfect human condition is completely embraced by the wide openness of Life itself, even when the most uncomfortable aspects of ourselves appear.
Suggested donation: $15 to $25
Find out more »February 2020
Tilicho ~ “On Truth”
What is Truth? What do we mean by "Awakening", "Enlightenment", "Self-realisation", "Samadhi", "The Natural State"? What are the spiritual traps? You are invited to explore what is it that you are really looking for.
About Tilicho:
Tilicho spontaneously realized the Self in 1998 without following any teaching or practice. The absence of spiritual conditioning allowed her to see through the veils of spiritual idealism and illusions. She ended up spending thirteen years in Tiruvannamalai in south India, the seat of Ramana Maharshi and the sacred mountain, Arunachala. While recognizing the beauty of the Advaita teachings, she also observed that they can easily be misunderstood and distorted. Although the Self is eternally free from the world, it is not separate from it. Clarity does not exclude openness. Her teaching stresses the need to combine Masculine and Feminine qualities and approaches. It is an invitation to find unity within and without.
“May all beings realize who they truly are! Om Sat Chit Ananda.”
If you wish to follow the initiation with the help of the book The Source, satsangs will also be the place to provide support, help, healing and clarity.
Suggested donation: $15 to $25
Find out more »Jeannie Zandi ~ The Sacrament of Love
10 am to 12 noon (Pacific Time - San Francisco, CA, USA) Time Zone Converter
Realization allows us to know ourselves as a force of love and the embodiment of that realization results in living love in our daily lives. Join Jeannie for an exploration of realization, love and the joys and challenges of living that knowing.
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
PLEASE REGISTER EARLY if you can. Review in advance info for joining event.
To proceed to Registration, please affirm that you have read and agree to these terms:
click here to READ TERMS.
NOTE: All event are shown in PACIFIC TIME, as in San Francisco, CA, USA (more details on time conversion below)
TIME CONVERSION for your location (see link to Time Zone Converter near top of this page)
All event are shown in PACIFIC TIME, as in San Francisco, CA, USA:
MORE INFO ABOUT TIME ZONE CONVERSION...
UTC (Coordinated Universal Time), same as GMT (Greenwich Mean Time), is the international basis for other time zones.
10 am PDT (Pacific Daylight Time - San Francisco, CA, USA) is 5 pm UTC
10 am PST (Pacific Standard Time - San Francisco, CA, USA) is 6 pm UTC
Pacific Daylight Time (PDT) March into November and Pacific Standard Time (PST) November into March
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Lynn Marie Lumiere, MFT ~ If the Buddha had Trauma: Being Present with Stress Activation
Throughout the history of spirituality, very little has been taught about how to be present with stress activation in our nervous system. In Buddha’s day that was not even considered. In fact, it is only in recent decades that this has been understood at all. At this time, life on planet Earth is stressful for everyone, and most of us have experienced trauma in greater or lesser degrees. This can make both our meditation practice and our awakening/embodiment process more challenging.
Nondual wisdom teaches us that awakening involves being present with “what is.” However, when it comes to stress and trauma that may require additional, skillful support, which will be discussed and demonstrated. This webinar is also an introduction to a 4 week course, “Awakening with Trauma,” that Lynn Marie is teaching beginning February 24th. The course will go into more depth about trauma and how to be with that as we awaken. This webinar will be primarily focused on working with the participants experientially.
Lynn Marie Lumiere, MFT is a nondual psychotherapist, Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, and author. She is the co-author of The Awakening West and is a contributing author to The Sacred Mirror, as well as the author of Awakened Relating: A Guide to Embodying Undivided Love in Intimate Relationships. Lynn Marie has been a student of Adyashanti for over 20 years. For more information, please see www.lynnmarielumiere.com
Suggested donation: $15 to $25
PLEASE REGISTER EARLY if you can.
Review in advance info for joining event.