News

More to come…

In the past, TCVC has limited our communications to announcing our retreats. Going forward, we’d like to keep in touch a bit more (but no more than monthly), with writing and other work by people from the TCVC community.

Beth Racette, a long-time meditator from Madison, Wisconsin shared two wonderful paintings and this reflection:  I express deep gratitude for many TCVC retreats that I have attended over the past 15 years. These paintings, entitled “Indra’s Net”, are my exploration of the web of interconnection.

We’d love to hear from you!  Please send your submissions to info@tcvc.info.

Highlights of the June Retreat

Sixty three people attended the June retreat with Kamala Masters and Tara Mulay at Koronis Ministries near Paynesville, Minnesota. It was a lovely week. We enjoyed a warm welcome from the Koronis staff, the spacious meditation hall with a view of the lake, and nourishing meals.

We greatly appreciated the compassionate guidance from Kamala and Tara. Their dharma talks have been uploaded to the Dharma Seed website.

For those of you who attended the retreat, below is a writing by Teijitsu, an 18th century abbess of Hakujuan, near Eiheiji, Japan. Tara referred to this text in her talk on the three characteristics of experience to be realized through insight meditation.
 
She saw that all phenomena arose, abided, and fell away. She saw that even knowing this arose, abided, and fell away. Then she knew there was nothing more than this, no ground, nothing to lean on, stronger than the cane she held.  Nothing to lean upon at all, and no one leaning…  And she opened the clenched fist in her mind and let go, and fell, into the midst of everything.
 
Sallie Tisdale, The Women of the Way: Discovering 2,500 years of Buddhist Wisdom

Connecting with our Teachers
 Vipassana Metta at Home

Join Kamala Masters and Steve Armstrong every Wednesday for a guided meditation and short dharma talk and/or question and answer period. Sign up here to receive a weekly Zoom invitation.

Tara Mulay

Tara Mulay will be teaching a number of retreats the last half of this year. Click here for her schedule.

Residential Retreat with Deborah Helzer

Deborah Helzer will be teaching a residential retreat at Common Ground Retreat Center November 12-16.

Save the Dates

Save the date for the TCVC winter retreat: February 16–23, 2025 with Chas DiCapua and Rebecca Bradshaw. The retreat will be held at Koronis Ministries near Paynesville, Minnesota. Details will be published in October and registration opens November 1, 2024. 

Click here for other opportunities for retreat practice in the upper Midwest.

Forward this email to your friends!

We encourage you to tell others about TCVC retreats and help them feel more at ease with the idea of attending a retreat.  Click here to subscribe to our newsletter.

Wishing you well,
TCVC Board

On Sunday, June 9, the retreat will open with an evening meal and social time at 6PM, with noble silence beginning at 7:30PM when the retreat begins.

On Friday, June 14, the retreats closes with a 10:30AM brunch.

For all other days (Monday through Thursday), the retreat schedule will be as follows:

*            5:45 a.m           Wake-up, Stretch

            ** 6:15              Sit, Chant Refuges & Precepts

               7:00               Breakfast

            ** 8:30              Sit (Instructions, Q&A)

               9:30              Walk

            ** 10:15             Sit

               11:00             Walk

            *  11:30              Lunch, Rest

            *   1:00              Walk

            ** 1:30              Sit   

                 2:15             Walk

            ** 3:15            Sit (Guided)

                 4:00            Walk/Mindful Break

            *   4:30            Light Meal

            ** 6:00           Sit

                 6:40           Walk

            ** 7:00            Dharma Talk

                 8:00             Walk/Mindful Break

            ** 8:30             Sit, Chanting

                 9:00             Rest, Further Practice

              * Bell is rung at this time

              **Bell is rung 10 minutes before this time

TCVC hopes to diversify who we serve by setting aside ten seats for Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) for our June retreat. If not all of the seats are taken by BIPOC participants before May 17, any remaining seats will be released to the general population.

This is a great opportunity for BIPOC people to receive the teachings of the Buddha from two highly respected women of color, Kamala Masters and Tara Mulay. 

We’ve updated our online registration form to indicate whether or not you’re a BIPOC participant. If you’re mailing your registration using the form from our newsletter, please indicate somewhere on the form if you’re BIPOC. Registration opens on April 1.

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Kamala Masters

Kamala Masters is one of the founders and teachers of the Vipassana Metta Foundation on Maui. She teaches retreats in the Theravada tradition at venues worldwide, including being a Guiding Teacher at the Insight Meditation Society at Barre, Massachusetts. Practicing since 1975, her teachers have been the late Anagarika Munindra of India and the late Sayadaw U Pandita of Burma, and Sayadaw U Tejaniya of Burma with whom she continues to practice. Kamala has a commitment to carrying and offering the purity of the teachings of the Buddha in a way that touches our common sense and compassion as human beings, and allows the natural inner growth of wisdom. She lives on Maui where she raised four children, and is now blessed with seven grandchildren. Kamala practiced both insight and loving kindness meditations intensively under the guidance and preceptorship of Sayadaw U Pandita, in the USA, Australia and in Burma as a nun and a lay woman.

Tara Mulay

Tara Mulay teaches and mentors Insight Meditation practitioners to refine their mindfulness practice, both on the meditation cushion and in daily life. Her dharma offerings stem from the lineage of Mahasi Sayadaw, and she has gratefully drawn influence from many other teachers within and outside of the Mahasi lineage, including Howard Cohn, Kamala Masters,  Joseph Goldstein, and Sayadaw U Tejaniya.  Tara practiced criminal defense law in California for over 20 years.  She was a leader of Mission Dharma in San Francisco, and in 2016 she co-founded the San Francisco Black, Indigenous, and People of Color Insight Sangha.  In 2021, she was authorized to teach by Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts.

Tara felt initially drawn to dharma practice upon encountering the Buddha’s teachings rejecting caste as a measure of worth and of capacity for awakening. She believes classical Buddhist practices, designed to cultivate compassion, non-greed, non-hatred, and non-delusion, are uniquely potent vehicles for empowering people in marginalized communities and effecting social change. For more information visit Taramulay.com.