Dharma Talks
given at Insight Meditation Community of Richmond
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Every moment of experience arrives simple and bare, but the mind rarely leaves it that way. This talk explores SN 35.95, the Māluṅkyaputta Sutta, and Māluṅkyaputta's insight that suffering is not in what we experience, but in what we add to it.
This talk explores the life of the Buddha from his early years as Prince Siddhattha through his awakening under the Bodhi tree. Through his search, struggles, and realization, we uncover insights into suffering, striving, and the Middle Way.
Drawing from their new book "This Messy, Gorgeous Love: A Buddhist Guide to Lasting Partnership", devon and nico share practical insights on bringing mindfulness and compassion into the beautiful complexity of intimate relationships. A guided meditation is followed by a teaching.
From a simple moment of contact, the mind can create a lot of mental proliferation (papañca), leading to stress and conflict. This talk shows how to interrupt that process through clear, present-moment awareness, drawing on the Honey Ball sutta (MN18), and the Buddha's teachings to the wanderer Bahiya (Ud 1.10).
In this talk, we explore how our stress, emotions, and habits don’t arise randomly but depend on specific conditions. By learning to recognize and understand these conditions in meditation and daily life, we begin to loosen reactivity and cultivate the causes for greater freedom and peace.
