Thursday, December 15, Chris will give a talk after the 7:30 pm meditation on the hindrance of sleepiness and mental sluggishness in meditation and in life. The talk will include some discussion of the causes of lethargy and suggestions for working with it, especially in meditation. The following Thursday, 12/22, there will be a discussion of the same topic. Chapter VIII in Bhikkhu Analayo’s book, “Satipatthana Meditation: A Practice Guide” would be a good resource for this topic.
The current series of Thursday night talks are exploring topics related to meditation in more detail, starting with the approaches recommended for developing mindfulness. The talks for the next couple of months will be based on the Satipatthana Sutta, the Buddha’s discourse on the foundations of mindfulness. In that discourse the Buddha gave a clear description of many different approaches to mindfulness meditation, beginning with the body, but also including mindfulness meditation of feelings, thoughts and emotions, and other topics. A good resource for this series of talks would be the book “Satipatthana Meditation: A Practice Guide” by Bhikkhu Analayo. However, the talks will be self-contained, so it won’t be necessary to read the book, and we’ll give other resources for the meditation approaches covered in the talks.
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Weekly Meditation Schedule:
In-Person Meetings:
Those who regularly attend the in-person meetings have developed a masking policy for the time we are meeting indoors. The community levels of Covid will be checked each time we publish a newsletter. When community levels are low; masks will be optional. When community levels are medium or high, masks will be required. If there is any attending member that feels more comfortable with everyone masking, we will all mask in support of the most vulnerable among us.
Currently, the Covid community levels are low in Benton County; masks are optional on Saturday morning unless any participant feels more comfortable with everyone masking. There are vulnerable people attending the Wednesday morning session who have requested that everyone mask, so masks are currently required for the Wednesday morning meditation. Please bring a mask to the in-person sessions in case there is an attending member with greater vulnerability.
The Covid Community levels are posted on the following website: https://covid19.bfhd.wa.gov/cases-and-roadmap-to-recovery/
We hold two in-person meditation sessions each week on Wednesdays at 9:30 a.m. and Saturday morning at 8:00a.m., at All Saints Episcopal Church, 1322 Kimball Avenue in Richland. Please see our Events Calendar or more details. We meditate for half an hour, followed by an optional time for sharing and conversation after meditation. No problem if you want to just meditate and then leave.
The indoor meeting hall has chairs available. However, if you prefer to use your own chair, blanket, cushion or bench, you are welcome to bring it. We meet in the Parish Hall, through the glass door at the back of the church.
Online Meetings:
In addition to our in-person meetings we have three online meditations a week, on Wednesday morning, Thursday evening, and Saturday morning. The Zoom links for those meetings can be found on the Events Calendar. You’re welcome to join us online for any of the 3 meetings each week.
During the Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday online meetings, we “sit together” for meditation for half an hour. Meditations include guided meditations, meditations with some initial guidance and instruction, and silent meditations. The Wednesday morning meditation starts at 9:30 am, with half an hour of meditation, followed by half an hour of sharing. On Thursday evenings there is a talk or discussion and sharing following meditation. Meditation is from 7:30 until 8:00 pm, with the talk and discussion ending at about 9:00 pm. The Saturday morning meditation starts at 8:00 am, with half an hour of meditation followed by half an hour of sharing.
If you can’t or don’t wish to join the online sessions you can just meditate at the same time as we’re meeting and know that there are others from the group who are meditating with you.
We’re looking forward to welcoming some of you in person and being there online for others.
Warm regards,
Insight Meditation of the Mid-Columbia