(Insight Meditation Society - Retreat Center)

Steve Armstrong: Opening Talk: Retreat format, refuges and precepts

My biding motivation for the practice of teaching is to share my interest, my understanding and my confidence in the Buddha's way for a balanced and deeply happy life.  Given the pace of our culture and the direction in which it is going, mindfulness is essential to sanity.  Since my first vipassana retreat in 1975, I've experienced the wisdom of sanity, peace and freedom.

Now, the challenge in sharing the dhamma is to translate the Buddha's understanding into an idiom that speaks to the whole of our lives.  As practice matures, the focus in guiding others shifts from informing the skeptic, inspiring the depressed and doubtful, soothing the suffering, energizing the lazy, cautioning the ambitious to discovering the subtler sources of suffering and happiness in our understanding and behavior.  With deepening vipassana insight, students joyfully and confidently disentangle their minds.

In all of this, what sustains me as a teacher is the unwavering confidence that mindfulness is the source of our healing, sanity and freedom.  Vipassana practice offers us a perspective on reality that is liberating, both personally and at every level of human interaction.  Initially, my unwavering commitment was to the practice.  Now my commitment includes service in sharing the dhamma and wherever possible informing, inspiring and encouraging others in the practice.

Religion & Spirituality

Buddhism

My biding motivation for the practice of teaching is to share my interest, my understanding and my confidence in the Buddha's way for a balanced and deeply happy life. Given the pace of our culture and the direction in which it is going, mindfulness is essential to sanity. Since my first vipassana retreat in 1975, I've experienced the wisdom of sanity, peace and freedom. Now, the challenge in sharing the dhamma is to translate the Buddha's understanding into an idiom that speaks to the whole of our lives. As practice matures, the focus in guiding others shifts from informing the skeptic, inspiring the depressed and doubtful, soothing the suffering, energizing the lazy, cautioning the ambitious to discovering the subtler sources of suffering and happiness in our understanding and behavior. With deepening vipassana insight, students joyfully and confidently disentangle their minds. In all of this, what sustains me as a teacher is the unwavering confidence that mindfulness is the source of our healing, sanity and freedom. Vipassana practice offers us a perspective on reality that is liberating, both personally and at every level of human interaction. Initially, my unwavering commitment was to the practice. Now my commitment includes service in sharing the dhamma and wherever possible informing, inspiring and encouraging others in the practice.

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Steve Armstrong: Opening Talk: Retreat format, refuges and precepts

Steve Armstrong: Opening Talk: Retreat format, refuges and precepts