Preparing the Ground: The Awakening Factors
This 5-week course introduces the Buddha’s wise teachings on how to awaken innate qualities of heart and mind that lead to awakening. It is through the development and balancing of these qualities that we prepare the ground for meditation practice that is both calming and insightful.
The seven factors include three energizing factors of investigation or curiosity, energy and rapture that are balanced by three calming factors of tranquility, concentration, and equanimity. Mindfulness stands in the middle as the factor that brings the other qualities into balance.
During the course, we will use a combination of guided meditation practice, small group inquiry and large group discussion to explore these qualities.
DATES & TIMES:
Tuesday evenings, 6:30 – 8:30 pm
January 11 - Feb 8, 2022
LOCATION: Online
TEACHER: Padmadharini
My own Buddhist journey began in the East End of London, when I chanced upon a meditation center in an old, converted fire station. I was 21, and like many young people, I’d arrived in my adult years struggling to feel accepted and worthy. While meditation did not relieve those feelings immediately, it did provide me with a path to peace. I discovered how little time I spent being fully present to myself and to my own experiences. I also learned that I was a wholly undisciplined and haphazard meditator!
Still, that feeling of peace kept me coming back to the practice and inspired me to learn more about Buddhism. After a 10-year ordination training, in 2004, I was ordained as a Buddhist and began teaching courses, leading retreats, and providing individual spiritual support. In 2013, feeling called to share the gift of mindfulness with a wider audience, I trained with Breathworks UK in Mindfulness Based Pain Management and in 2019 I qualified through UCSD to teach MBSR. .
Over the years I’ve been privileged to work with hundreds of individuals. I continue to educate myself in the latest meditation techniques and practices and offer only those I know to be effective. I’m basically one of life’s great adventurers and guides, and the adventures I facilitate lead inward, to the heart and depth of who we are.