Welcome to our 2021 Programme
January 2021 update
We begin this year so grateful for the Dharma and for all of you during these complex times.
With our deepest wishes for your well-being, we are offering many ways to practise this Winter and Spring, whether you’re new to meditation or an experienced practitioner. We hope these will be supportive and nourishing in the midst of all that is happening around us.
We expect our retreat centre will remain closed until March at least, and we don’t yet know when our residential retreats will open for bookings. There are some provisional residential dates listed in the programme below, so you can view what we have planned.
In the meantime, we look forward to welcoming you online. We have heard from our online participants that practising together virtually can be incredibly supportive and inspiring, and the sense of sangha can be really powerful.
Retreat fees are flexible to allow participants to pay according to individual means.
May our practice serve the welfare, happiness, and safety of all life in this year ahead.
A note on dana/generosity
None of your registration fee goes to the teacher(s). Gaia House teachers rely on the generosity of students for their livelihood. There is an opportunity to make a dana offering to the teachers at the end of each event.
ONLINE
Online Meditation Day: Awakening in the Thick of It
With Gavin Milne
29 January
This is part of a series of events around the theme “Awakening in the Thick of it”. Events can be attended individually, or as a whole series. All levels of experience are welcome.
During this day of exploration, held on a Friday within school hours with a closing meeting at 8pm, we will ground ourselves in the Buddha’s teachings, as the foundation for opening to the fullness of our lives.
ONLINE
Online retreat: Relaxed, Open, Awake
With Zohar Lavie and Nathan Glyde
31 January – 5 February
Life is always uncertain, but these days it’s profoundly and clearly felt. When we meet this we may shut down, become stressed, or seek distraction. This is understandable, yet it leads us away from well-being. Dharma teachings invite us towards a wiser, calmer, and kinder alternative. We can compose and steady the mind through practice: gaining greater clarity and embodying greater care towards what is happening. We can encourage the heart to open from contraction: expanding the possibilities of a deeper more skilful response. These Dharma skills of awakening resource us for meeting our sensitive hearts and living well in the midst of life.
ONLINE
Online Series: Embodying Human Awakening – Living In the World but Not Of It
With Leela Sarti
7 February 7 March 11 April 23 May 13 June
Welcome to a series of one-day retreats exploring the possibility of being grounded in the depth of timeless presence in the midst of daily life. We will inquire how to live a full life from silence and emptiness, and yet being yourself in peace with others, and doing what needs to be done.
Previous attendance on a silent meditation residential retreat of three nights or more at Gaia House or another residential centre will be assumed.
ONLINE
Online Meditation Day: Depth of Being
With Leela Sarti
7 February
This is part of a series of events ‘Embodying Human Awakening – Living In the World but Not Of It’, which can be booked individually or as a whole series.
A human life infused with meaning, freedom and love, a fulfilling life, means to develop a taste for certain values; a taste for truth, depth and simplicity of being. You do not need to achieve these qualities, you just need to appreciate them and orient yourself towards them, allowing yourself the time and opportunity for them to emerge and become an integrated part of your life.
Previous attendance on a silent meditation residential retreat of three nights or more at Gaia House or another residential centre will be assumed.
ONLINE
Online Young Person’s Retreat: Loving Awareness
With Gavin Milne
12 – 15 February
At the heart of the Buddha’s path of liberation, is the simple but extraordinary practice of ‘awareness’, or what is sometimes called ‘loving awareness’. As a quality of both heart and mind, this kind and accepting presence is ceaselessly new and beyond all words, able to meet our life just as it is, as the foundation for insight and transformation.
This retreat is for 18-25 year olds of any background and practice experience. It will be supported by meditation guidance, Dharma teachings, and small group meetings. All levels of experience are welcome.
ONLINE
Online Retreat: Meeting Life’s Ups and Downs
With Gina Sharpe and Martine Batchelor
20 – 21 February
During this online weekend retreat we will explore how the four excellent qualities (Brahma Viharas), friendliness, compassion, joy and equanimity can help us to meet with heart and creativity life’s ups and downs.
This retreat is open to all, including beginners and those with experience. Please join us.
ONLINE
Awakening in the Thick of It – Online evening session
With Gavin Milne
25 February, 7pm – 9pm (GMT)
This is part of a series of events around the theme “Awakening in the Thick of it”. Events can be attended individually, or as a whole series. All levels of experience are welcome.
During this practice evening, rather than focussing on a particular Dharma teaching, we will allow our own lives and experience to be our guide. During this practice evening, rather than focussing on a particular Dharma teaching, we will allow our own lives and experience to be our guide. We will spend some time in formal meditation, and some time sharing and exploring the teachings.
ONLINE
Online Retreat: Stillness Moving – The Play of Opposites
With Kirsten Kratz and Jaya Rudgard
3 – 7 March
On this retreat we will meditatively and playfully investigate our notions and assumptions of so-called opposites and the role of perception in creating our worlds. We will explore stillness and movement, sound and silence, inner and outer, to discover the freedom that can come from balance and clear seeing in a perpetually changing world.
For experienced meditators who have attended at least one week of a silent residential meditation retreat.
ONLINE
Online Meditation Day: Fulfilment
With Leela Sarti
7 March
This is part of a series of events ‘Embodying Human Awakening – Living In the World but Not Of It’, which can be booked individually or as a whole series.
A human life infused with meaning, freedom and love, a fulfilling life, means to develop a taste for certain values; a taste for truth, depth and simplicity of being. You do not need to achieve these qualities, you just need to appreciate them and orient yourself towards them, allowing yourself the time and opportunity for them to emerge and become an integrated part of your life.
Previous attendance on a silent meditation residential retreat of three nights or more at Gaia House or another residential centre will be assumed.
ONLINE
Insight Meditation and Yoga Online Retreat
With Yanai Postelnik and Helen Stephenson
12 – 15 March
Meditation and yoga are natural partners in the spiritual life. Drawing on the Buddha’s teachings of mindfulness and awakening, and the yoga teachings of Patanjali, this retreat will combine the practices of hatha yoga and Insight Meditation.
All levels of experience are welcome.
Living Fully, Dying Freely – CANCELLED
With Martin Aylward
19 – 24 March
Our lives are uncertain; deeply precious, and inevitably fragile. This retreat invites us to look deeply into living and dying, exploring and resolving the fears and defences that hinder our freeness of being, opening our hearts and understanding to the real possibility and realisation of living, and dying, with a wide-open free heart.
A residential retreat at Gaia House or can be joined online. All levels of experience are welcome.
ONLINE
Awakening in the Thick of It – Online evening session
With Gavin Milne
25 March, 7.30pm – 9.30 pm
This is part of a series of events around the theme “Awakening in the Thick of it”. Events can be attended individually, or as a whole series. All levels of experience are welcome.
During this practice evening, rather than focussing on a particular Dharma teaching, we will allow our own lives and experience to be our guide. The evening will include some formal meditation, sharing and exploring the teachings, and relational inquiry practice in small groups.
RESIDENTIAL
Your Body, Buddha’s Body
With Catherine McGee and Gail Aylward
29 March – 4 April
Gain new perspectives on what it might mean to be an embodied being in this world; contemplating our body as the meeting place of our heart mind and the world; caring for our body as the ground of the path to the end of suffering; recognising our body as the instrument that can know the awakening of a Buddha. Relating to our body in these ways, we come to participate in our life with greater rootedness, meaningfulness and love, and more ready to respond in our world. Join us, take your seat, and come to know your body as Buddha’s body.
Suitable for people who already have a daily sitting practice and have already sat at least one week-long residential Insight Meditation retreat at Gaia House.
Save the date
ONLINE
Radical Questioning: An online Seon retreat
With Martine Batchelor
9 – 13 April
This retreat will focus on the practice of radical questioning to help us open to the richness of the human experience within its environment and creatively engaged with uncertainty.
Previous attendance on a residential silent retreat would be an advantage.
ONLINE
Online Meditation Day: Embodiment
With Leela Sarti
11 April
This is part of a series of events ‘Embodying Human Awakening – Living In the World but Not Of It’, which can be booked individually or as a whole series.
A human life infused with meaning, freedom and love, a fulfilling life, means to develop a taste for certain values; a taste for truth, depth and simplicity of being. You do not need to achieve these qualities, you just need to appreciate them and orient yourself towards them, allowing yourself the time and opportunity for them to emerge and become an integrated part of your life.
Previous attendance on a silent meditation residential retreat of three nights or more at Gaia House or another residential centre will be assumed.
RESIDENTIAL
&
ONLINE
Work Retreat: Awakening in the Thick of It
With Gavin Milne
20 -23 April
This is part of a series of events around the theme “Awakening in the Thick of it”. Events can be attended individually, or as a whole series.
This retreat is open to all, including beginners and those with experience. Please join us.
The work retreat is an opportunity to develop the practice of awakening through the type of tasks and activities that comprise much of our lives. In essence, the path of awakening is not governed by any particular situation or activity, but more the attitude, assumptions and orientation we bring to life in any moment. During this retreat, emphasising curiosity and kindness, we will practise together in both sitting meditation and whilst engaging in tasks, exploring themes such as service, continuity, intention, and opening to challenges.
Save the date
ONLINE
Online Retreat: Abiding with a Heart Imbued with Love
With Catherine McGee
30 April – 3 May
In this online retreat we will explore ways of practising with the body to cultivate restfulness, steadiness, nourishment and a coming home with our body. As we learn to ‘abide’ more deeply, we will explore the beautiful qualities of heart; loving kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity.
Some experience of meditation will be helpful.
ONLINE
Online Meditation Day: Beauty of Being
With Leela Sarti
23 May
This is part of a series of events ‘Embodying Human Awakening – Living In the World but Not Of It’, which can be booked individually or as a whole series.
A human life infused with meaning, freedom and love, a fulfilling life, means to develop a taste for certain values; a taste for truth, depth and simplicity of being. You do not need to achieve these qualities, you just need to appreciate them and orient yourself towards them, allowing yourself the time and opportunity for them to emerge and become an integrated part of your life.
Previous attendance on a silent meditation residential retreat of three nights or more at Gaia House or another residential centre will be assumed.
ONLINE
Online Meditation Day: Awakening Together
With Leela Sarti
23 June
This is part of a series of events ‘Embodying Human Awakening – Living In the World but Not Of It’, which can be booked individually or as a whole series.
A human life infused with meaning, freedom and love, a fulfilling life, means to develop a taste for certain values; a taste for truth, depth and simplicity of being. You do not need to achieve these qualities, you just need to appreciate them and orient yourself towards them, allowing yourself the time and opportunity for them to emerge and become an integrated part of your life.
Previous attendance on a silent meditation residential retreat of three nights or more at Gaia House or another residential centre will be assumed.