Contemplative Practice Sampler

Session C (3:30-4:15pm)

C1. Contemplative Movement

Facilitator: Rick Merrill

The practice of contemplative movement allows us to rediscover and nurture our innate capacity to live more fully. Within a supportive atmosphere we can loosen up the assumptions that we hold in our bodies and gain the confidence to trust ourselves and be more genuine, sensitive and playful in our lives. This session offers an experience in movement and meditation for all, regardless of previous experience.

C2. Meditation to Encourage Warmth and Well-being

Facilitator: Cathy Comstock
 

Increasingly, research on meditation suggests that for the practice to have its full effect, it is important to change stories of the self that are denigrating and critical, so common in a highly judgmental society.  Doing so helps keep the mind from distraction while also arousing very salutary reactions, both inwardly and outwardly. In this session we will discuss ways of helping to re-shape stories of the self—whether those of our students or of ourselves—in company with a guided meditation designed to awaken our responses of warmth and compassion toward ourselves and others.  No meditation experience necessary.

C3. Listening Meditation

Facilitator: Mark Miller

Much of the richness and beauty of life is sensed, not thought up. By bringing awareness to our sense perceptions, the nature of reality seems to shift; our experience becomes fuller, more satisfying and complete. To listen is to open to the world without expectation or reservation. By listening without labeling or defining the sounds we hear, we free ourselves to learn more about the world around us, and to appreciate a “thing as it is,” as Zen master Shunryu Suzuki Roshi put it.

C4. Gratitude and Loving Kindness

Facilitator: Linda Anson

Join Linda for an exploration of loving kindness and movement through Qi Gong.