Scheduled Retreats
Joining in a Guided Retreat
Longer retreats are usually suitable for more experienced practitioners. For beginners we recommend starting with a weekend. Unless otherwise stipulated guided retreats at Dharmagiri are held in complete silence which we ask retreatants to agree to and respect. During each retreat there are times for meeting individually with the teachers, group sharing circles and some discussion. Before applying to attend one of these guided retreats please check the criteria below.
Our longer retreats are best suited for those who:
- Have had some experience of meditation and are able to hold a sustained sitting up to and beyond 40 minutes per sitting.
- Have psychological well being. Although the practice and context is a healing one, we are unable to offer rehabilitative or therapeutic care.
- Are willing to enter into the communal life of the hermitage.
- Are willing to engage in simple duties that enable the smooth daily running of the hermitage.
- Are satisfied with simple, healthy food and accommodation
- Are comfortable practicing in a Buddhist context. Respect for Buddhist precepts, (though not adherence to the Buddhist religion), is a requirement. This includes the observance of the 5 ethical precepts:
- To refrain from harming and the taking of life – to maintain respect for life.
- To refrain from taking what is not offered – to practice generosity.
- To refrain from misuse of the senses & sexuality – to practice renunciation.
- To refrain from harmful, deceptive and harsh speech – to practice speech that promotes truth, accord and clarity.
- To refrain from intoxicating drugs & alcohol – to respect the instrument of awakening which is consciousness
Retreat Schedule & Teacher Biographies.
Please note: All retreats begin at 5pm (supper) on the start day and finish at 12 noon on the finish day.2010
April 3 - 17th
Dharma & Service – Mindfulness Retreat Focused around Service at the Khuphuka Project
Chris Cullen & Kirsten Kratz & all at The Khuphuka Project
Following the successful and heart opening retreat in 2008 with Woza Moya Project, the Sangha Seva team are delighted to return for a second work and service retreat. This time with The Khuphuka Project. This retreat will provide practical support to the project which offers community care and support programmes serving those affected by the HIV/ AIDS pandemic. We will spend 2 weeks with the rural communities who are facing huge difficulties from high HIV infection rates as well as high levels of unemployment. Each day of the work retreat will be framed with meditations and include time to process and discuss our experience.
For those resident in South Africa –please book through the Dharmagiri office.
For overseas participants – go directly to: http://www.sanghaseva.org/comingup.htm
April 30th - May 4th
The Island – An exploration of Nibbana and Presence – Drawing from The Buddha, Echart Tolle and Non-dual perspectives
Sister Chandasara
This retreat will combine a modern approach with ancient teachings on nibbana. It will include perspectives from Echart Tolle, Adyashanti and Unmani's teachings with readings from her book 'I am Life Itself'. It will also draw from the book 'The Island', a collection of the Buddha's teachings on nibbana with commentaries by Ajahns Passano and Amaro. Chandasara would like to include direct experience exercise for example like drawing or active imagination and writing to get a more direct feel for the borderline between immanent/ transcendent or form/ formless.
May 14th – 18th
Sangha Gathering with Mountain Walking & Mindful Work
An opportunity to spend a relaxed time with friends while helping with those odd jobs needed to keep Dharmagiri 'spruced up'. This is also a perfect time to walk in the mountains and meditate together in the cool evening with a wood fire and to share discussion, good food and inquiry into the Dharma.
May 25th - 30th
SMS2 Study-Practice Program Module 2
June 4th - 9th
Dharma & Art
JP
Joseph Beuys was a very influential twentieth century artist and he wouldn’t lie. He said: “ Everyone is an artist and living itself is the most creative art form of all.” This means that the only obstacle between you and your innate creativity, and it is a big one, is your view or your belief that you are not creative!
This retreat invites you to explore your unique potential and to hopefully come to a fresh understanding of what art, talent and creativity is. Over the few days we will do a little of a lot of things. Together we will think, scribble, talk, cut, paste, write, draw and smudge. Periods of meditation will be a great opportunity to get to know and maybe even befriend the inner (art) critic which prohibits your creative expression. I think you will be inspired. Please contact JP at jpjourney@gmail.com for a short list of materials to bring along. p.s. No art or meditation experience necessary.
June 18th – 26th
Return to Original Brightness, Discovering What Never Dies
Kittisaro
The Buddha revealed three supreme sources of inspiration for those beings interested in the pathway out of suffering. Measureless in their transformative power, the triple refuge offers a trustworthy way home. Have we explored where we place our trust? This retreat will investigate these themes, and is suitable for anyone who is willing to work with an intensification of their inner process. Drawing from classical Buddhist teachings and practices, Kittisaro will encourage the retreatants to cultivate skill in presence, mindfulness and insight which enable the realization of the Original Brightness, that timeless ‘suchness’ that is always here and now. The retreat, held in Noble Silence, will include meditation, chanting, instruction, and an early morning bowing practice.
July - Closed
August 13th – 15th
The Buddha’s Women – The Place of Women & the Feminine in Buddhism and Spiritual life
Sister Chandasara
This retreat will explore different images of women in Buddhist scriptures. We will look at how the Buddha saw women with potential for enlightenment and as strong practitioners, while the conservative forces at the time also sought to control the ‘new religion’ by undermining the status the Buddha conferred on his female disciples. The consequences are still felt today. Women have been sidelined in all institutional religious forms. For centuries we have been trying to fit ourselves into the masculine conceptions of religious form. But are we different? Do we need different forms and structures to support our spiritual path? What might these look like? What could an appropriate placement of the feminine look like spiritually, psychologically and in religious forms and how would that be for both women and men. All genders are invited to participate in this inquiry!
August 20th – 28th
The Way of the Heart - The Kuan Yin Dharmas
Kittisaro, Ian Rees, Thanissara
This silent retreat focuses on an integrated approach of meditation teachings and practices which deepen the embodiment of wisdom and compassion. While including calm and insight meditation, the retreat will be taught in reference to the practices around Kwan Yin Bodhisattva, the holding of Kwan Yin’s name and the use of ceremony and mantra. This generates a strong field of the Brahma Viharas, (compassion, kindness, joy and equanimity); tapping the mysterious connection with the Bodhisattvas heart intention. It will also explore gently releasing from painful self structures, allowing an easeful flow of positive energy to access the inquiry into ‘emptiness as wonderful existence'. This is a silent retreat.
September 3rd - 8th
SMS3 Study-Practice Program Module 3
September 28th – October 3rd
The Road Home, Via Negatvia, Via Positivia
A Silent Meditation Retreat
Sister Chandasara / Peter Woods
A Christian-Buddhist exploration of these two currents in our approach to the transcendent: expanding inclusion and union with more and more of the manifest world (Everything, Fullness, the All) and progressive withdrawal from and emptying out of all identification and attachment with the manifest world (Nothing, Emptiness, the Void). With some readings from the mystics.
October 15th - 17th
Cultivating a Steady Heart
Marlene
This retreat offers an introduction to the practice of Mindfulness and looks at how we can integrate this practice into daily life, cultivating a steadiness of heart as we engage with the up's and down's of daily living. While this retreat is supportive for everyone interested in the cultivation of mindfulness and meditation, it will be of particular interest for beginners.
October 29th - 31st
Coaching from a Buddhist Perspective
Moyra Keane
Coaching is a process of being with someone so as to deepen their self-understanding, gain clarity on life's challenges, progress to living one's values and fulfilling one's life purpose. This all sounds grand and maybe 'faddy', yet coaching has sound principles of being with what is, finding freedom in knowing this, and being able to move on for the sake of a bigger picture. In this retreat we will explore how our meditation and mindfulness practice aligns with interactive coaching practice.
November - Closed
December 16th - 19th
Silent Meditation Retreat
Ajahn Sucitto
(Write up pending)
December 23rd - January 15th
Silent Meditation Retreat
Kittisaro & Thanissara
(Write up pending)
Teachers
Ajahn Sucitto
Ajahn Sucitto was born in London in 1949, and has a B.A. in English and American Literature and ordained as a Buddhist monk in Thailand in 1975. Ajahn Sucitto helped found 3 monasteries in the UK, helped train monks and guided the early years of the development of the nuns order. Currently he is abbot of Chithurst monastery and is held in high regard as an international meditation teacher and writer. Ajahn Sucitto has undertaken regular teaching visits to South Africa since 1987.
Sister Chandasara
Sister Chandasara (Louise Stack) was born in 1954 in Johannesburg, South Africa, and grew up in a Christian family. She was involved in revolutionary politics in exile in her twenties and later worked as a political researcher and analyst at the Centre for Policy Studies in Johannesburg for 14 years before coming to Amaravati in 2002, and ordaining as a siladhara in 2006. She has a BA (Hons) in African Politics and an MA in Linguistics (Semantics). Her lifelong quest has been, and continues to be, liberation and learning how to love unconditionally.
Chris Cullen
Chris has been practising Insight Meditation since 1996, and has been teaching at Gaia House and in London since 2007. He is a graduate of the Community Dharma Leader Program at Spirit Rock Meditation Centre in the US, and trained as a Dharma teacher with Christina Feldman. He teaches and runs the counselling service at a secondary school in London, and is involved in the running of London Insight Meditation. He is co-founder of the Mindfulness in Schools Project, and is a former Buddhist Prison Chaplain
Ian Rees
Ian originally trained in the contemplative tradition of the Kabbalah in 1970 and has been working with Buddhist tradition for the last 15 years. He is a Psychotherapist and founder member of the Isthmus project which is dedicated to working with the healing and creative energies of the imagination. He runs groups in UK and Israel and draws from Shammanic practice and insight.
JP Meyer
JP is an artist and director of Dharmagiri. Shortly after his first meditation retreat in 1994 he swapped the corporate life for that of a full-time art student, graduating with distinction in 1999, since then he has been widely exhibited and travelled. JP spent many months in the ashrams, meditation centres and monasteries of India, Sri Lanka and the U.S. and was Dharmagiri manager for three years.
Kirsten Kratz
Kirsten has been practising Insight Meditation since 1993, and has been facilitating and co-leading Dharma events in England and in Europe since 2000. She has also been assistant-teaching retreats at Gaia House since 2008. One of her particular areas of interest is the exploration of the nourishing and expression of our Dharma understanding outside of a retreat environment.
Kittisaro
Kittisaro is from Tennessee was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford before going to Thailand to ordain with Ajahn Chah in 1976. He was a monk for 15 years and during that time helped found Chithurst Monastery and Devon Vihara in the UK. He also taught extensively during this time and was involved in the training of monks. He disrobed in 1991 and since then has taught internationally. He has studied and practised Chan and Pure Land for 20 years informed by the Chinese school of Master Hua. Kittisaro has completed two one year long silent self retreats.
Marlene
Marlene is manager and director of Dharmagiri and has also spent some years working & living at the Buddhist Retreat Centre in Ixopo. She has been a Buddhist practitioner since the early 1990's and spent time as a novice Theravada nun in the Forest School of Ajahn Chah. She has studied Counselling and Communication through the College of Applied Psychology in Cape Town.
Moyra Keane
Moyra Keane and has been practicing meditation for many years and has taught courses in meditation, mindfulness, and Tai Chi at various centres in the past 15 years. She works as an academic advisor in the Science Faculty at Wits University where she also coaches staff and students using the Co-active Life Coaching model. Life Coaching is one way of integrating care, awareness and intention into skilful activity.
Rev Peter Woods
Peter has been a Methodist Minister for 29 years. For five years he taught Christian Spirituality at the John Wesley Seminary (Phase1). He is also a registered Conflict Mediator at the Unit for the Study and Resolution of Conflict at the Nelson Mandela Metropole University in Port Elizabeth, where he was heavily involved in South Africa's transition to Democracy in the 1990's. A mystic at heart, Peter is fed from the wells of John of the Cross, Thomas Merton, Julian of Norwich and the Cloud of Unknowing. He is also nourished by Buddhist and Hindu teachings and experiences of practice.
Peter is a regular retreatant and friend of Dharmagiri. He currently serves in Port Alfred, Eastern Cape.
Thanissara
Thanissara, originally from London ordained in 1979 and spent 12 years as a Buddhist nun. She helped found dharma retreats for families and children at Amaravati Monastery which later led to the establishment of the Dharma School in Brighton. Thanissara has an MA in Buddhist Psychotherapy from Middlesex University & the Karuna Institute, UK and has written a book of poetry, ‘Garden of the Midnight Rosary'. She is co-facilitator of the Community Dharma Leader Program at Spirit Rock Meditation Centre CA, USA which starts 2010.
