Level 1 – Retreat Schedule
Level 1 Schedule
Local variations to this schedule may occur.
Everyone attending the retreat is expected to attend all sessions.
Anyone who misses a session will not be able to return to complete the course, unless they have made a prior arrangement with the teacher.
Day 1
6:00 to 9:00pm:
Evening session
- Introduction–An overview of meditation practices
- Basic principles of intensive concentration meditation
- Review of the 7-point posture
Day 2
10:00 to 12:30am:
Morning session
- Introduction to concentration using the 3-point breath
- Ordinary vs. extraordinary forms of practice
2:00 to 4:30pm:
Afternoon session
- Factors that potentiate the practice
- Common problems and methods to deal with them
- Distracting thought, drowsiness & flightiness
6:00 to 8:00pm:
Evening session
- Application of methods to deal with thought and drowsiness/flightiness
- Vigilance practice
Day 3
10:00 to 12:30am:
Morning session
- Deepening concentration: Intensifying & Easing up
- Skill in concentration
2:00 to 4:30pm:
Afternoon session
- Concentration using the 7-point object
- The problem of partial staying
6:00 to 8:00pm:
Evening session
- Concentration using the mind-perspective
- Concentration with support–an overview of the state
Day 4
10:00 to 12:30am:
Morning session
- The development of physical pliancy
- Concentration without support
- Skill in intensifying & easing up
- Stabilizing the flow of mind-moments; stream access
2:00 to 4:30pm:
Afternoon session
- Automatic concentration, one-pointedness, and equanimity
- Assessing progress–The Nine States of Staying using the elephant path model
- Meditation on movement & stillness
- Stabilizing concentration from the mind-perspective
6:00 to 8:00pm:
Evening session
- Overview of the ordinary insight meditations
- Meditation on emptiness of self representation
Day 5
10:00 to 12:30am:
Morning session
- Emptiness of self meditation continued
- Emptiness of phenomena meditation–the ‘Mind Only’ perspective
- Developing skill in emptiness meditations
2:00 to 4:30pm:
Afternoon session
- Emptiness & compassion combined meditations
- Developing mental pliancy & its role in insight meditations
- Meditations on emptiness of temporality
- Nagarjuna’s Eight Extremes meditation
- Mahamudra meditation on the Unelaborated Mind and the Always There Mind
- Stabilizing the Simultaneous Mind, from the mind-perspective
6:00 to 8:00pm:
Evening session
- Extraordinary or essence insight meditations–an overview
- Stabilizing the Simultaneous Mind as always there
- Simultaneous Mind meditation on coarse-level thought–water & waves meditation
Day 6
10:00 to 12:30am:
Morning session
- Water & waves (continued)
- Simultaneous Mind meditation on coarse-level sense perception–dreamer &
dreams meditation
- One Taste meditation–non-duality of the Simultaneous Mind
- Advanced One Taste meditation–Sealing whatever occurs as empty upon arising
2:00 to 4:30pm:
Afternoon session
- Sealing all occurrences as empty upon arising
- Automatic emptiness practice during and after the meditation session
- Overview of Non-Meditation Instructions
- Gampopa’s Four Means to Set Up Awakened Wisdom
- Maitripa’s negation instructions
- The extraordinary version of compassion meditation
6:00 to 8:00pm:
Evening session – No formal class
- Evening practice: automatic emptiness each moment, off the pillow (no formal class, participants practice on their own with given instructions)
Day 7
10:00 to 12:30am:
Morning session
- The problem of artificial vs. spontaneous activity of mind
- How making something happen or preventing something from happening obscures awakened wisdom
- The problem of conceptualization
- Review of the practice as a means to set up awakened wisdom
- Skillfully identifying & removing the obstacles to awakened wisdom
- Protecting instructions–real mindfulness without artificial activity, with awareness-itself as both the vantage point of and the object of meditation
2:00 to 4:30pm:
Afternoon session
- Continuation of protecting instructions
- Individualized assessment of habits of mind that obscure awakened wisdom
- Setting up meditation; shifting the locus to the ground of awareness; practice from the vantage point of awakened wisdom
6:00 to 8:00pm:
Evening session – No formal class
- Practice that never ceases; continuous awareness of whatever arises moment-by-moment, sealed as empty upon arising Made calm/set-free as empty upon arising
Day 8
10:00 to 12:30am:
Morning session
- Application of the practice to everyday living–the issue of spontaneous presence
- How to deepen the gains
- Path-walking instruction
- Precious opportunity meditation
- Closure