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Living Creatively in Turbulent Times – Coronavirus and Triratna Exeter activities

Saraswati

Dear friends,

I hope that you are keeping as well and in good heart as possible under the present turbulent and uncertain circumstance. At present we are unable to offer any face-to-face Exeter Sangha activities due to the current coronavirus status, so we plan to sustain our Sangha here in Exeter and South Devon in alternative ways.

Practising mindfulness and loving-kindness during times of crisis is ultimately what supports us all to stay emotionally positive and to grow. We therefore want to keep alive our connection as friends in the Sangha and our shared Dharma practice, supporting each other as much as possible.

Continuing our Sangha evenings online.

We are planning to keep our Sangha evenings going on Thursday evenings using zoom. You can follow a link, which I will email shortly before the session (you can also sign up for an account at zoom.us ). You will need to email me  in advance to let me know that you wish to participate.

The free zoom platform allows meeting of up to 40 minutes (for up to 100 participants!) so we will start at 7 pm with a welcome and at least a guided meditation along with, perhaps, some chanting a chance to hear a little from everyone. We will then have a ‘tea break’ (and allow for those who want to join in the Clap for our Carers) and then recommence the meeting for up to a further 40 minutes with a chance to explore some aspect of the Dharma (perhaps focusing on what is particularly helpful in these troubling times). This will of course be a bit of an experiment which we will adapt and refine as we go along but I do hope that as many of us as possible will be able to join in.

Other online gatherings

Our priority will be to sustain our Thursday Sangha evenings but if this proves successful and if there is an interest, we may organise other online gatherings such as a led morning meditation session. You can also access additional online sesions in the wider Triratna Sangha – see ‘Other Resources’ below.

Keeping in touch

We will be using our online platforms to keep in touch and to provide information and resources. These are:

Triratna Exeter page on The Buddhist Centre Online (you may need to create an account and ‘follow’, but both are pretty simple) and our Facebook group Exeter Triratna meditation and Buddhism group. Both allow for comment and participation.

We may also send out further newsletters from time to time.

Other resources

Triratna has developed several resources to support people in their Dharma practice and keep alive an experience of Sangha and connection.

The buddhistcentre.com has developed a Dharma Toolkit for Uncertain Times  (again, you may need to create an account and ‘follow’).

A number of  Buddhist Centres are providing a range of online resources and teaching which you can also find at the Buddhist Centre Online: Triratna Online

Finally, if you have any questions or suggestions please do not hesitate to contact me. I wish you as much solace and ease as possible.

With love,

Nandavajra

Finding Peace in a Turbulent World: An Introduction to Buddhism and Meditation

Triratna Devon

Six weeks from Thursday 23rd Jan to Thursday 27th Feb, 2020, from 7 pm to 9 pm.

It seems as though we are living in a turbulent world and we can experience ourselves as blown around by what the Buddha called the ‘worldly winds’ of pleasure and pain, gain and loss, praise and blame, and, fame and infamy, which blow constantly regardless of how we try to stop them. However, Buddhism teaches that we can engage more positively and creatively with the world, and our experience, and that we can cultivate peace and be happier and kinder. On the course we will explore some of the most fundamental teachings of Buddhism and learn two meditation practices – one to cultivate a calmer mind and another to help us become kinder.

The six sessions will be held on our regular Thursday evenings from 7 to 9 pm at the Exeter Natural Health Centre, starting on 23rd Jan and continuing weekly until 27th Feb 2020. Due to the size of our venue places are limited so please book and decide to attend the course in full. The cost of the course is by donation, but we suggest £60 (for the full course) if you are well resourced, and £30 if you are less so. To book a place we ask for a £10 deposit for which you will receive a course booklet. For more information and to book please email nandavajra

Radical Buddhism – 6 Week Course

Saraswati

Discover central Buddhist ideas and how they can change your life

This six week course explores how we might bring about positive change in our lives through the application of central Buddhist principles and meditation. We will explore how these ancient teachings can help us to lead a richer, fuller and happier life in the modern world.

Six weeks from Thursday 16th May 2019, from 7 to 9 pm, at Exeter Natural Health Centre (ENHC). Due to the size of our venue places are limited so please book by emailing Nandavajra and decide to attend the course in full. The cost of the course is by donation but we suggest £60 for the full course (if you are well resourced and £30 if you are less so).

Changes for Triratna Exeter

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As you will know, Mokshini recently left our team and moved to Berlin where she is happily settling . As a result we have been reviewing how we run our group and our activities in Exeter.

I am very pleased to be able to say that a number of us will be forming a more conscious team so that our Sangha becomes more a ‘shared enterprise’; I feel optimistic about this and believe it is a positive development that will mean our Sangha can prosper. As it stands our developing team include Alex, Sue, Sarah, Will, Paul, Stewert, Bernadette, Paul, Laila, Robin, Vidyadasi, Karunadarshin, Sukamala, Satyajit and Nandavajra.

As part of our review we decided that it is important that we continue with a weekly evening event (Sangha evening) as a focus for our Sangha, but that from the beginning of 2019 it will change to Thursday evening as this is a better fit for a number of us in the team. I hope that those of you who attend Sangha evenings will not be inconvenienced by this change.

Nandavajra

Practice Nights in August

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We are continuing our practice nights throughout August at the Exeter Natural Health Centre in the Phoenix Room, at 7pm  – next week is Dharma Day, one of the Buddhist Festivals that celebrates the teachings of the Buddha and other wise Buddhist teachers over the millennia. Over the next few weeks we’ll be looking at stories and key texts in the Buddhist tradition, All welcome!