Levels:
Med 1 – Introduction to Mindfulness Meditation

This class is a great entry point for anyone who wants to learn how to meditate. Whether you’re battling anxiety, stress or depression, having a hard time focusing, seeking spiritual growth, or simply want to feel better and be more present, this class teaches the basics of establishing a mindfulness meditation practice that can have remarkable physical, psychological, and spiritual benefits. You’ll learn how to quiet your mind, get your ego in check, and live a more fully present life.

Mindfulness for Real Life

If you frequently feel anxious, uncertain, distressed, lonely or disconnected, you’re not alone. The suffering is real and feeling vibrantly alive is possible. Mindfulness and meditation practices can support us to get beyond just coping to a renewed sense of connection and purpose, especially when we study and practice together, grounded with a sense of community. We can find our way home by sharing the experience of interbeing. We call this course “Mindfulness for Real Life” because our focus is engagement with the tools of practice in the nitty-gritty reality of life. Whether you are a new or experienced meditator, you will learn the rationale for mindfulness and meditation, receive skillful mentoring, and experience how to cultivate your practice and keep it accessible in your daily life.

Continuing Meditation: Refresh, Sustain & Deepen Your Meditation

If you’re seeking to re-engage or deepen your meditation practice and are looking for connection with others in a guided group meditation practice, this course is for you. Gathering weekly will connect you with the community of other meditators and provide support and guidance by a skillful teacher, grounded in trauma-responsive mindfulness. This new continuing meditation course is open to anyone who has previously participated in at least one meditation course. Curiosity is the only other requirement. We know the benefits of mindfulness: less reactivity to stress, embodied steadiness and emotional balance, clear decision-making, compassionate action, and much more. But it’s hard to develop a consistent practice solo; practicing with a group provides accountability and provides support when questions arise and your commitment wavers. Having access to a teacher helps you to let go of expectations you might have about linear progress and re-directs you to the heart of the matter: the purpose of meditation practice is to live our lives with mindful awareness and intention.

Continuing Meditation: Cultivating Wakefulness and Compassion

As we engage in meditation and mindfulness, we encounter deep joys, unexpected blessings, and even the challenges of going deeper into our practice.  We come face-to-face with things we do not like or react negatively toward.  Our minds are busy which obscures our natural wakefulness and spaciousness. This class will teach us to see these obstacles as invitations to greater wakefulness and compassion.

Mindfully Connecting to the Natural World

Join us as we rediscover the sacredness of the natural world and how we can use its constant presence to anchor ourselves mindfully in this moment. Readings each week will explore the elements of Earth, Wind, Fire, and Water, and, on the fifth week, how our consciousness draws us into relationship. Participants will be invited to select a “sit spot” both at home and on the ground of the Earth and Spirit Center, where we’ll sit in reflection on the land and recognize our interbeing with nature. Time will be given each week for sit spot practice as well as article discussion.

Mindful Happiness Retreat: An Introduction to Strategies for Peace and Well-Being

While we’d all love to be a little happier, what specific actions can we take to make a difference in our lives? The one-day Mindful Happiness retreat is very experiential approach that gives you the rationale, the steps to take, and the dedicated time to really delve into the transformative process. Come start your happiness journey with a motivated group of like-minded participants!

Beginning the Meditation Journey-Planting Seeds

Foundations of Meditation and Mindfulness - This class is designed both for persons who are new to meditation as well as for those who already have a practice and wish to deepen it. In this brief four-week class on meditation, we will cultivate an intentional meditation practice of deepening our attentiveness to and care for our full selves and the world around.

Mindfulness, Healing & Wholeness

Re-membering our wholeness. If you feel disconnected, broken, or wounded, you are not alone. We are all wounded in essential and frequently secret ways, and it can be difficult to know how to begin to heal. Join us for a complete reframing of what it means to be broken, and what it means to heal. In the second part of our healing series, we will focus on re-membering ourselves into wholeness. Together we will find wisdom, strength and guidance within ourselves, our community, and in the larger natural world. Together we will discover ways to re-member ourselves into wholeness.

Continuing Meditation: Meditation in Motion

In his book Mindful Movements – Exercises for Wellbeing, the wise Thich Nhat Hanh says “Often it helps to meditate with other people. Sitting together, breathing together, we can feel very peaceful and happy. But sometimes we need to stop sitting in one place and start to move around!” Our Meditation in Motion class we will be taking Thich Nhat Hanh’s suggestion and we will “start to move around”, bringing our meditation practice from the chair to an embodied experience. As we move in a mindful & intentional manner, we can bring mind, body, & spirit into harmony.

Introduction to Mindfulness Meditation

Turn Your Stress into Strength! Manage the stress in your life using research-based techniques including deep breathing, mindfulness, and visualization. You will leave the sessions inspired and on your way to a happier, more peaceful and fulfilling life. Trained, certified, and experienced in resiliency and wellness coaching, your facilitator Paula Kommor starts with the belief that you are whole, resourceful, and creative. As a group, we will focus on your strengths and past successes to help you build a sustainable resiliency habit. Give yourself the gift of self-care...

The Gift of Aging: Approaching the Transition

So many of us exist in a deeply conditioned, strongly reinforced view of death as the ultimate enemy. We not only fear the end of life in this form, but also avoid most exposure to alternate understandings, adopting instead a posture of denial and resistance to reality, and greatly limiting the richness of experience possible in our later years.

Free Workshop: Introduction to Meditation

Why are CEOs, attorneys, healthcare professionals, counselors, educators, and the military starting to pay attention to mindfulness meditation?  Why has this ancient spiritual practice suddenly become so popular? Come to this free 60-minute class to see if mindfulness meditation might be for you.