Author Archives: Mindful Heart

EVERYTHING ARISES, EVERYTHING PASSES AWAY RETREAT 9/16 to 9/18/2011

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EVERYTHING ARISES, EVERYTHING PASSES AWAY RETREAT
Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha invites you to participate in a three-day non-residential
retreat, “Everything Arises, Everything Passes Away” beginning Friday evening,
September 16th, 2011 and ending at noon on Sunday, September 19th, 2011. The
retreat will be held at Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha’s meditation space located in the
Bradford Park Office Complex, 600 N. Weinbach Ave., Suite 960, Evansville, Indiana
47711.

Mary MacGregor, Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha’s Senior Teacher will lead the retreat
with the assistance of Mike Boren, Jan Carter and Caron Leader. The retreat will consist
of sitting & walking meditation along with Dharma talks.
The cost of the retreat is $100.00. The retreat fee will be used to cover operating
expenses only. You make an additional donation of Dana to the Sangha if you wish.
Any additional donations will be given to the Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha. If you are
experiencing a financial hardship, financial assistance may be requested. However, due
to the current financial status of the Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha, assistance might be
limited.

The retreat will begin with registration at 5:30 p.m. on Friday evening followed by
instructions, Dharma talk and sitting meditation. We will begin on Saturday at 8:30 a.m.
and end at 4:30 p.m. There will be an evening meditation option available. We will start
again at 8:30 a.m. on Sunday. The retreat will conclude at 12:00 p.m. sharing a potluck
lunch.
This will be a silent retreat other than designated question and answer times. In order to
gain the most of a non-residential retreat, it is recommended that you continue your
silence at non-meditation times throughout the entire weekend. This includes times
when you are at your home or hotel as well as during meals. To ease the logistics of the
retreat, we ask that you eat your meals prior to or after the retreat times with the
exception of Saturday’s lunch. Please bring a sack lunch for this meal. The Sangha will
have tea and water but you may wish to bring your own drink as well. At the conclusion
of the retreat, we will join together for a potluck meal. We ask that you bring a
vegetarian dish to share.

To register, please fill out the registration form along with a $50.00 deposit. Mail to:
Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha
Attn.: Non-residential retreat
Bradford Office Complex
600 N. Weinbach Avenue, Suite 960
Evansville, IN 47711

We hope that you take advantage of this retreat opportunity. It is a great way to
strengthen and/or energize your practice. Your attendance also supports the
maintenance of Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha. If you have any questions, please call
812.434.6643 or email mindfulheart@gmail.com.

Residential Retreat with Annie Nugent

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The Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha & The Awakening Heart Dharma Group of the Carbondale Unitarian Fellowship are hosting a retreat with Annie Nugent. Sat. May 19th
Registration beginning at 9:00 a.m. with retreat starting at 10:00 a.m. Retreat ends after the noon meal on Thurs. May 24. Weekend option: ends Sunday after the evening meal, May 20th.
Prices: Entire retreat $660.00 single occupancy/$510.00 double $300.00 deposit Weekend option: $200.00 single/$175.00 double $100.00 deposit
Please click the link below to print the form and mail the completed form with your deposit to:
Annie Nugent Retreat
c/o Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha
Bradford Park Office Complex
600 N. Weinbach Suite 960
Evansville, IN 47711

Deposits must be received by March 31, 2012. No refunds after this date of the deposit amount. The remaining amount will be accepted at the registration table upon arrival or you may pay in full at any time.

Kordes Retreat Center is on the beautiful grounds of the Monastery Immaculate Conception, a Benedictine Convent in Ferdinand, IN. Known to the locals as “the castle on the hill”

TOPIC: Living the Buddha’s Teachings A certain joy comes into our lives when we realize the scope of the Buddha’s teachings – they don’t narrow or limit our lives, rather they bring a growing ease of mind and an expansiveness into life. This retreat is an invitation to explore the depth of the teachings as wisdom and compassion are cultivated in the midst of the fullness and vibrancy of daily life.

Annie Nugent has practiced in the Theravada and Tibetan traditions since 1979 under the guidance of a range of teachers including Sayadaw U Pandita, Tulku Akong Rinpoche and various western teachers. She was the resident teacher at the Insight Meditation Society from 1999-2003 and has since been teaching elsewhere in America, including the annual IMS 3 month retreat and The Forest Refuge. Her teaching style aims to reveal how our all aspects of our lives are opportunities to develop a clear and direct understanding of the Truth.

Click this to print retreat registration form

Venerable E. Nanda Thero to honor the Buddha’s Birth, Life and Passing on Saturday, June 25,

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Join the Venerable E. Nanda Thero, a Theravadan Buddhist monk from Sri Lanka, to honor the Buddha’s Birth, Life and Passing on this Saturday, June 25, from 5 to 8 p.m. at Christ Church Cathedral, 425 S. Second Street.

Buddhist ceremonies, an opportunity to light a candle for a departed loved one and a walk for peace in the downtown Louisville area are some activities planned.

For more information, call Interfaith Paths to Peace at (502) 214-7322 .

Metta

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What a warm feeling to talk about financial crisis and have the sangha respond with sincerity and concern. As people have become aware of the need, they have responded with ideas, money, volunteer work.

But I wanted the sangha to know my gratitude. Lovingkindness to you all, mary

Metta for Mary Lee and Frank

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Please offer Metta to Sangha participant, Mary Lee McManus, her husband Frank and her family. Mary Lee’s husband, Frank, is expected to die today and has been suffering from cancer for several years. May they be at ease during this difficult time.

Memorial Service for Chris Fuchs, Thursday May 5 at 7:00 pm

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Please join us Thursday evening for a memorial service for sangha member Chris Fuchs who passed away this past week. Chris lovingly served the Sangha in many ways. She cleaned and decorated the meditation hall. We owe the arrangement of our furnishings and decorations to her keen eye and artistic sensibilities. Chris created the beautiful greeting and note cards that are available in exchange for a gift of dana to the Sangha. She also showed her sense of humor in many ways. During her time of cleaning the meditation hall, Chris nicknamed the vacuum cleaner “Ajahn Vacuumo”, humorously acknowledging that all things are our teachers. She even showed up at one of our Uposatha Day celebrations dressed as Lotus the Clown!

Please join us in remembering Chris and supporting her family by attending the memorial service which will be officiated by Caron Leader and Mike Boren. It is Thursday May 5 at 7:00 pm at Browning Funeral Home, 738 Diamond Avenue in Evansville.

To give Sangha members the opportunity to attend, the Thursday evening sitting will be shortened to 30 minutes and there will be no Dhamma talk.

Uposatha Day Celebration / New Buddha

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Uposatha Day was special this year because the Sangha has a new Buddha!

Mary MacGregor lead the Celebration

with a talk and sitting.
A special thanks to the Teachers for such an informative presentation on this special day.

Retreat Pictures

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Pictures from retreat at LaSalle Manor in Plano, Il.

Leigh Brasington, Mary and Santikaro. Teachers for Jhana, dependent co-arising and mindfulness with breathing retreat. Mary, Mike & Caron attended 4/1/10- 4/11/10.

Place where Mary took her precepts, LaSalle Manor in Plano, IL

Buddha’s Birthday Celebration at Ten Thousand Buddhas Summit Monastery

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Members of the Mindful Heart Buddha Sangha were invited by Reverend Thich Hang Dat to be part of the celebration of the Buddha’s Birthday at Ten Thousand Buddhas Summit Monastery near Corydon, Indiana.  The Vietnamese, Burmese, Karen, and Sri Lankan communities of Louisville support this monastery and over a hundred attended the festivities.  We were given front row seats for the ceremony and fed very well.  The ceremony featured chanting in Vietnamese and a procession up to bathe the baby Buddha which symbolizes purifying the Buddha being born in ourselves.





Retreat Reflections: Balancing the Mind and Heart

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We arrived at the retreat center the same way I arrived at Buddhism, generally headed in the right direction, but definitely not a straight path. Located at the Oakwood Retreat Center just east of Muncie IN, we drove into the cornfields looking for the Rainbow Farm, an International Emissary Community. I kept the idea that “it is what it is” in the forefront of my mind, along with a map in my lap. Arriving around 5:30 we were in time for the evening meal but not the retreat orientation. Several of us had been to retreats before and while on the road we discussed the ideas behind a silent retreat as well as the benefits of it.
The retreat was led by Matthew Flickstein, founder of the Forest Way in Virginia and the author of The Meditator’s Atlas: A Roadmap of the Inner World. For two days (Friday evening to Sunday at noon) we meditated, sitting and walking. We found another reason for focusing on our breath during meditation: there is no baggage attached to the breath. It is automatic, breath in and breath out. Only in extended meditation do you become aware of the subtleties involved, that equanimity allows wisdom to arise because we are not pushing or pulling but we are “being present in our own mind”.
Matt said that mindfulness means no judgment, just awareness of what is. Maybe not acceptance, but at least a chance to see clearly and perhaps more comprehensively as the mind becomes quiet. While accepting that the world is the way it is, we should make it the best place it can be for us. This realization is much easier to maintain in a calm environment like the Rainbow Farm with trails through woods, gardens and meadows. It gave us the chance to go beyond our usual path outwardly as well as an inward journey to silence. What a luxury!
On Sunday morning we reviewed the seven qualities of the mind:
1. Virtue (clears up issues from the past & the present)
2. Self reliance (ala Emerson-confidence to speak from that truth)
3. Concentration (brings stability to the mind)
4. Well being (living now is living outside of time: no past no future)
5. Wisdom (live with I don’t know)
6. Spiritual insight (eradication of identifying with the mind)
7. Freedom, surrender (that meditation isn’t, getting used to is)
The awareness of these qualities and using them with heart brings the dhamma to our everyday life. With this thought in mind, we found a straighter journey homeward albeit with much laughter and talk about our individual experiences at the retreat, and a promise to continue our voyage further into Buddhism.
Metta, Jan Carter