BUDDHIST HEALING MEDITATION

BUDDHIST HEALING MEDITATION

Everyone's body is impermanent, subject to illness, aging, and death. The most powerful healing blessings come when we recognize that we are not our bodies' owners and are not defined by any ailment.

In this three-day retreat, we will explore Buddhist healing meditations from the traditions of Thailand, Burma and Tibet. Breath and body awareness, use of mantras and simple visualizations will be taught. Together, we will invoke healing blessings for ourselves, others, and the environment. Whether 'sick' or healthy, we will cultivate our natural capacity for compassion, goodwill, and peace as we learn to relax patterns of reactivity and self-obsession. We will create opportunities to experience the truth that the deepest level of well-being does not depend on outer conditions being just right, and that those who dare to align themselves with this understanding often find joy in the most unexpected places.

No cures are promised, for these ancient skills are aimed at reducing internal suffering rather than affecting miraculous physical cures. Both experienced meditators and those new to practice are welcome at this retreat, which will be conducted in Noble Silence outside the meditation hall.

Lila Kate Wheeler started practicing yoga when she was 12 and Buddhist meditation at age 21. She began teaching in the 1980s and has sustained her practice in many Buddhist and Hindu meditative traditions. She traveled to Burma where she was ordained as a nun in 1988, and studied at Dharma centers in the United States, India, Nepal, and Tibet. In addition to her Dharma teaching, Lila works as a writer, editor, and journalist. She had a Radcliffe Fellowship in 2008 to support her novel writing and lives in Somerville, MA.