Spirit Rock Meditation Center is dedicated to the teachings of the Buddha. We provide silent meditation retreats, as well as classes, trainings, and Dharma study.
brief teachings |
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Meditation Instructions
SIT comfortably, with your back straight but not stiff or tense. Gently close your eyes and feel the sensations of the breath as the air passes the nostrils or upper lip. The sensations of the in-breath appear simply and naturally. Notice how the out-breath appears. Or you might choose to feel the movement of your chest or abdomen as the breath enters and leaves your body. Wherever you choose to follow the sensations of breathing, whether the in and out at the nostrils or the movement of the chest or abdomen, train your awareness to connect clearly with the first moment of the beginning in-breath. Then sustain the attention for the duration of just that one in-coming breath. Connect again at the beginning of the outbreath and sustain your attention till the end.More » -
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Great Compassion
Great compassion is like the sky, because it covers all living beings; great compassion is like the earth, because it produces all the teachings; great compassion makes it possible to see buddhanature, by first clarifying real knowledge for the sake of others. Great compassion makes it possible to pass through unyielding barriers, by plumbing the profound teachings more and more for the sake of others. Great compassion makes it possible to penetrate the transcendental, by seeking a life beyond for others. Great compassion can develop powerful application, by striving on this path for the sake of others. Great compassion can activate intrepidness, by keeping a vigorous will alive for the sake of others. Great compassion makes it possible to get beyond regression, because the mind is settled for the sake of others. Great compassion can produce broad learning, by studying everything for the sake of others. More » -
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A Still Mind
The only silence we know is the silence when noise stops, the silence when thought stops—but that is not silence. Silence is something entirely different, like beauty, like love. And this silence is not the product of a quiet mind, it is not the product of the brain cells which have understood the whole structure and say, “For God’s sake, be quiet”; then the brain cells themselves produce the silence and that is not silence. Nor is silence the outcome of attention in which the observer is the observed; then there is no friction, but that is not silence. More » -
Stay with Your Broken Heart
When anyone asks me how I got involved in Buddhism, I always say it was because I was so angry with my husband. The truth is that he saved my life. When that marriage fell apart, I tried hard—very, very hard—to go back to some kind of comfort, some kind of security, some kind of familiar resting place. Fortunately for me, I could never pull it off. Instinctively I knew that annihilation of my old dependent, clinging self was the only way to go. . . . Life is a good teacher and a good friend. Things are always in transition, if we could only realize it. Nothing ever sums itself up in the way that we like to dream about. The off-center, in-between state is an ideal situation, a situation in which we don’t get caught and we can open our hearts and minds beyond limit. It’s a very tender, nonaggressive, open-ended state of affairs. More » -
From the Canon: The Visible Teaching
Once a wandering ascetic, Moliya Sivaka, addressed the Blessed One as follows:“It is said, venerable sir, ‘The dhamma is directly visible.’ In what way, venerable sir, is the dhamma directly visible, immediate, inviting one to come and see, worthy of application, to be personally experienced by the wise?”“Well, Sivaka, I shall in return question you about this. You may answer as you see fit.“What do you think, Sivaka: when there is greed in you, will you know, ‘There is greed in me’? And when there is no greed in you, will you know, ‘There is no greed in me’?” — “Yes, venerable sir, I shall know.”“If you thus know of the greed present in you that it is there; and when greed is absent that it is absent—that is a way the dhamma is directly visible. More » -
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Dear Abbey Dharma Spring 2011
Dear Abbey Dharma,I have been on the Buddhist path for a large portion of my life. I practiced Zen while I was a teenager and practiced Tibetan Buddhism in my late 20s. Now, in my late 30s, I find myself going it alone after becoming weary of ritual. Do most people go through this weariness at some point? I am still on the path, just without a teacher or lineage. Is this wise?–Lone Wolf BuddhistDear Lone Wolf, More »
