5 week course co-taught with Juha Penttilä beginning November 14th, 2022

Course dates: Five sessions on Mondays from the 14th of November till the 12th of December, 2022
Course meeting time: 19:30 – 21.30 Eastern European Time (GMT +2), (5:30pm UK, 12:30pm New York, 9:30am Los Angeles)
Cost: Offered on a dana basis
Teachers: Susy Keely & Juha Penttilä

Registration: Registration Link

There are many worthwhile intentions for breath-based meditation practices, including cultivating nourishing states of well-being, deepening the subtlety and sensitivity of one’s attention to support insight practice, cultivating the experience of pleasantness within the body, and increasing stability of attention, among others.   This course hopes to offer a “lab” in which to playfully explore the range of of meditative capacities that unfold in these useful and lovely directions.  Practitioners with a range of intentions for their breath and energy body practices are invited to participate.

On this course we will emphasize attending to the experience of the breath in the whole body using both broad and narrow attention as well as sensing the body on subtle, energetic levels.  We will draw on a variety of methods including Rob Burbea’s approaches to working with the energy body.  Within the course, we will emphasise the importance of creativity, exploration, and playfulness in deepening one’s meditation practice.

Within the course some of the meditative capacities we’ll investigate/explore are:

Each session will include practice instructions and guided meditation, as well as time for questions. The course sessions will be recorded for course participants only, so you can follow the teachings even if the live times of the course are not possible for you. In addition to these teaching and practice sessions, an optional daily meditation sit will be available to the participants to support daily practice and deepening in the dharma. Optional group meetings will also be offered as part of the course structure. The course is offered on a donation basis.

Prerequisites:

This course is not suitable for people completely new to meditation. Some familiarity with meditation practice is required for participation, and an openness to new ways of approaching practice is helpful. Participants are expected to take on these practices for the duration of the course.

This course will offer practices that open the possibility of sensing and experiencing the body and the breath in new and different ways. While the teachers will do their best to offer a supportive container for such exploration together, we will be unable to provide individual support. Therefore we ask that you feel confident that your practice and life circumstances are relatively stable.  If you have any questions about this please feel free to ask using the “contact” page.

Teachers:

Juha Penttilä has been practicing meditation since 2002. He has spent extended periods of time on retreats and in monasteries in Asia and Europe and is one of the founding members of Nirodha, the Finnish Insight Meditation practice community. Juha completed his Insight Meditation teacher training in 2020. In addition to exploring meditation, Juha’s teaching is influenced by the current climate crisis and engaged perspectives into the Dharma.


Susy Keely has practiced Buddhist meditation since 2001, and began practicing insight meditation five years later.  In 2015 she began studying and training with Rob Burbea, and completed her teacher-training with him in 2020.  She teaches meditation in Los Angeles, California, and is an artist and a parent.  She is passionate about exploring the intersection between creative energies and contemplative practice, and supporting meditators wishing to pursue deep practice in the midst of daily life.