Meditation Classes, Courses & Retreats in The Hamptons | Meditation Classes in Hampton Bays

Meditation in Hampton Bays

Sunday
9:30-10:15am
Prayers for Meditation: Heart Jewel Prayers

10:30-11:45am
Meditation Class

Happiness is Easy:
Bringing Happiness to Ourself, Relationships and Life
with Elizabeth Muzyka

Normally we seek happiness in our relationships. But happiness comes from our own mind, our inner peace. Consequently we expect too much from our relationships and instead of them producing the happiness and harmony we long for, we experience anxiety, disappointment and frustration. In this course we will learn a simple and effective meditation to cultivate happiness and to connect to our potential for lasting happiness and freedom. Rather than seeking happiness in our relationships, we will learn how to bring happiness to our relationships... and to every facet of our life. The inner confidence that arises from this approach enables us to use even our difficulties as the means to grow spiritually and to progress towards a lasting experience of happiness, known as liberation.

August 8     Happiness is Easy

August 15   Letting Go of the Needy Mind

August 22   The Mind of Liberation

August 29   Bringing Happiness to Our Relationships

Sept 5         True Love and Lasting Freedom

Sept 12      Happinesss is Easy (with guest teacher)

$10
Free for VMC monthly members

The Four Noble Truths- the Buddhist Path to Inner Peace:
An Introduction to Buddhist Meditation and Its Application to Our Daily Life
with Elizabeth Muzyka
Based in Geshe Kelsang Gyatso's book, How to Solve Our Human Problems.
When we experience problems and setbacks we usually respond by feeling unhappy and develop painful minds of anger, depression and discouragement. As a result, we complicate our lives even more. Our relationships become strained and our minds are filled with pain and agitation. Buddha's teaching on the Four Noble Truths shows us how to break free from this cycle of unhappiness and to develop within our minds the path to permanent freedom and the happiness of enlightenment. In particular, by learning to overcome our anger and uncontrolled desire, we will gradually solve all of our daily problems and we will begin to feel happier and be productive in our lives.

Sept 19      Transforming Desire

Sept 26      1st Noble Truth- Freedom from Suffering

Oct 3        2nd Noble Truth- Breaking Free from Problems

Oct 10    3rd Noble Truth- Enjoying Peace of Mind

Oct 17      4th Noble Truth- The Path to Inner Peace

$10
Free for VMC monthly members

Please Note: Although taught as a series, each of these classes stands on their own as a complete class.
Feel free to drop in on a class-by-class basis. Classes are suitable for both beginners and more advanced meditation practitioners.

Prayers for Meditation 6:30pm - 6:50pm


Tuesday Evening Meditation Class        7-8:15pm

Sept 7     Heart Jewel Puja

How to Solve Our Human Problems
with Charlene and Shirley
Based in Geshe Kelsang Gyatso's book, How to Solve Our Human Problems, this series will introduce us and help us go deep into Buddha's teaching on the Four Noble Truths.

In this busy world, our experiences of happiness are fleeting and short lived, while inner peace eludes us completely. Our negative states of mind, such as uncontrolled desire and anger, create endless problems for ourselves and others and prevent us from fulfilling our deepest wishes. Buddha's popular teaching on the Four Noble Truths offer a clear and simple solution, guiding us to an oasis of peace within our hearts. We will learn exactly what problems are and where they come from, find out how we can respond to difficult people and situations with a postive mind and discover how to reduce the painful minds of tension, frustration, anger and resentment with practical, essential advice.

Sept 7       Heart Jewel Puja

Sept 14     Introduction: How to Solve Our Human Problems

Sept 21     The Four Noble Truths: Desire

Sept 28     The Four Noble Truths: Suffering

Oct 5        The Four Noble Truths: Origins

Oct 12     The Four Noble Truths: Cessations

Oct 19      The Four Noble Truths: The Path

Oct 26      Patience

$10
Free for VMC monthly members

Chanted Prayers and Meditation

Friday Evenings 7-7:45pm

Heart Jewel
This practice is the heart essence of Kadampa Buddhism. In the first part we visualize our Spiritual Guide as Je Tsongkhapa and make prayers and requests to purify negativity, accumulate merit and receive blessings. This prepares our mind for a meditation on Stages of the Path to Enlightenment. After the meditation we make prayers to our Dharma Protector, Dorje Shugdän. Through this we can overcome obstacles to our practice and create favorable conditions so that we can nurture and increase our pure Dharma realizations.
Free

Heart Jewel: The Guru yoga of Je Tsongkhapa combined with the condensed sadhana of his Dharma Protector

This sadhana includes two practices revealed by the Wisdom Buddha Manjushri. The first is a special Guru yoga in which we visualize our Spiritual Guide as Je Tsongkhapa, who himself is a manifestation of Manjushri. By relying upon this practice, we can purify negativity, accumulate merit, and receive blessings. In this way, we will naturally accomplish all the realizations of the stages of the path of Sutra and Tantra, and in particular we will attain a very special Dharma wisdom.

The second practice is a method for relying upon the Dharma Protector Dorje Shugdän. Through this, we can overcome obstacles to our practice and create favourable conditions so that we can nurture and increase our Dharma realizations. If we rely upon the Dharma Protector Dorje Shugdän sincerely, our faith in Je Tsongkhapa will naturally increase and we will easily gain experience of the pure Buddhadharma transmitted directly to Je Tsongkhapa by the Wisdom Buddha Manjushri.

These two practices are the very essence of the New Kadampa Tradition of Mahayana Buddhism. If we practise them regularly and sincerely, we will reap a rich harvest of pure Dharma realizations, and eventually come to experience the supreme joy of full enlightenment.

An extensive explanation of this sadhana can be found in the book Heart Jewel, by Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso.