Interested in joining the program?
The focus of the coming year’s program is the practice of Natural Meditation.
Registration for the 2025 Margha Program will take place from October 23 through November 15.
🔹🔸🔹 REGISTER HERE 🔹🔸🔹
Please send questions about the program directly to the MARGHA TEAM.
Do you know someone who might like to join the 2025 Margha program?
Send them a link to this page and recommend they sign up for our newsletter (sign up in the footer).
Any additional program information and updates will be posted there.
Margha Program Overview
About the Margha Program
Margha Program content alternates year-to-year between Natural Meditation and Bodhicitta, which may be completed in any order. Margha is intended for newcomers as well as seasoned practitioners who are looking for a structured program to learn, progress, and deepen in a sequence of profound yet accessible meditations adapted from traditional Himalayan Buddhist practice. Some participants choose to work with each series of practices for many years. Margha means “path” in Sanskrit.
Guided by a team of Natural Dharma Fellowship (NDF) teachers and Margha Mitras (spiritual friends/mentors), the Margha Program is built around monthly online and in-person small-group meetings. Each student chooses or is assigned a Margha mitra for the year. Meditation practices are introduced by the mitras during monthly meetings, through online resources, including guided meditation audios, and via monthly readings from assigned texts. A curated selection of suggested books, articles, essays, and podcasts is also provided to complement the teachings. In addition, during twice-yearly retreats at Wonderwell Mountain Refuge, essential teachings are provided by Lama Liz Monson and Margha Program Director Camille Hykes.
Spiritual Friendship (Mitra & Mentor)
Mitras offer guided meditations and teachings during the monthly meetings, and provide support and address questions related to the Margha practices. Participants are invited to engage in individual dharma meetings with their mitra three times during the year.
It is important to also note that participants offer invaluable support for each other as they explore the practices and teachings together during the Margha year. Margha groups offer participants the opportunity to enact qualities of the heart, and to deepen in their understanding of the gem that is spiritual friendship.
Answers to common questions are provided below. If you have questions that are not addressed here, please contact Margha Program Coordinator Jean Fazzino Lain at .
Bodhicitta
A series of contemplative practices to deepen in love, self-compassion, compassion for others, wisdom, sympathetic joy, and equanimity with the intent to cultivate a life of spiritual practice.
The Bodhicitta year focuses on practices of loving-kindness and compassion, and includes the Lojong heart-contemplations as transmitted in the Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism. Participants learn a series of contemplative practices to deepen in love, self-compassion, compassion for others, wisdom, sympathetic joy and equanimity.
The curriculum, a thorough distillation of traditional Tibetan Buddhist training, was created jointly by Lama Willa Miller and Lama John Makransky for the students of Natural Dharma Fellowship, with the intent to cultivate and nourish a life of spiritual practice. It is transmitted by Lama Liz Monson, Spiritual Co-Director of Natural Dharma Fellowship, and Margha Director Camille Hykes with support from a dedicated circle of mitras (spiritual friends/mentors) who are well-trained in these practices.
Natural Meditation
A series of meditation practices that facilitate, develop and deepen experience of the nature of mind: Shamatha (Calm Abiding), Vipashyana (Insight), and Open Awareness.
During the Natural Meditation year, participants are guided and supported through a comprehensive program of meditation, study, and contemplation, which provides a framework that gently invites and opens participants to experience present, fresh wakefulness, our intrinsic buddha nature. Meditation instruction in shamatha (calm abiding), vipashyana (insight), and open awareness is offered.
Frequently Asked Questions
Margha is open to everyone, beginner and seasoned practitioner alike, who wishes to explore Himalayan Buddhist teachings and feels a commitment to spiritual practice at a deeper level.
It is important to note that the Margha Program is a curriculum of meditation training and study. It is not, nor intended to be, a substitute for therapy, counseling, or medical treatment. If you are currently in therapy, we recommend that you consult your therapist about the appropriateness of engaging in the Margha Program and meditations. Our mitras teach, invite questions and discussion, and guide the meditation practices being transmitted. They are not qualified or authorized to provide therapy.
Participants choose their monthly group from a mix of online and in-person groups during the initial registration process. Hybrid groups are not offered as such groups are not optimal within the small group communal format.
Participants will remain with their group for the entire year. Once the program has started, transferring between groups is discouraged.
2025 Groups
- Remote 1: 1st Tuesday, 11:30 am-1:30 pm ET (Roxanne Broadbent, Judith Coleman)
- Remote 2: 1st Monday, 6:30-8:30 pm ET (Roxanne Broadbent, Michael Hirshland)
- Remote 3: 1st Monday, 6:30-8:30 pm ET (Philip Osgood, Alex Marie)
- Remote 4: 1st Sunday, 6:30-8:30 pm ET (David Bayer, Erica Zinter)
- Remote 5: 1st or 2nd Sunday, 4:00-6:00 pm ET (Richard Zipoli, Eric Brus)
- Remote 6: 2nd Monday, 6:30 pm-8:30 pm ET (Jan Cook, Alan Tuttle)
- Remote 7:1st Sunday, 6:30-8:30 pm ET (John Rott, Tamara Daly)
- Remote 8: 1st or 2nd Sunday, 7:00-9:00 pm ET (Eric Brus, Elisse Ghitelman)
- Remote 9: 1st Monday, 7:00-9:00 pm ET (David Bayer, Jean Fazzino Lain)
- Remote 10: 1st Sunday, 6:30-8:30 pm ET (Jean Fazzino Lain, David Martin)
- Remote 11: 1st Sunday, 4:00-6:00 pm ET (Jeff Sullivan, Judith Coleman)
- NW Philly (in-person only): 1st Sunday, 3:30-5:30 pm ET (2nd Sunday in September) (Heather Marg-Bracken, Thilo Marg-Bracken)
This program is designed in a monthly format for individual and group practice and study. Participants are responsible for their own “daily-ish” meditation practice, as well as assigned reading which is outlined in their monthly practice guide. They will be asked to commit to attending most monthly meetings with your designated small group, and to either attend the Winter or Summer retreat and/or listen to audio files which will be made available following the retreat.
Registration for the Margha Program opens in the fall of each year. An announcement will be posted on this page when the time is near – generally in October. Registration will be posted on the NDF Schedule Page when it opens. Check our Schedule for information and access to the Registration form.
The yearly program begins with a Welcome and Orientation Meeting with your Margha group in January. The program officially begins with Winter Retreat, which will also be held in January. (The Summer Retreat will be held in June or July.) Monthly groups will meet from February through November. The date and time of the monthly meetings vary from group to group, and details will be available on the Registration Page.
Retreat information such as dates, descriptions, and registration will be posted on the Schedule Page of the NDF website. Retreats are offered in a hybrid format at Wonderwell Mountain Refuge in Springfield, NH.
It is Natural Dharma Fellowship’s aspiration that no one be turned away from our programs and retreats because they cannot pay the full cost.
The Margha Program offers a three-tier sliding fee scale so you may choose the amount that best fits your budget: Monthly payment plans are available if you wish to budget the fee over the year.
- May All Beings Benefit: $40/month ($480/year*) – For those who can afford it, this fee level helps provide support for those with limited financial resources and assists with the care and development of the Margha Program.
- A Middle Way: $25/month ($300/year*) – This fee covers the basic cost of the Margha Program.
- Held in Sangha Loving-Kindness: $15/month ($180/year*) For those with limited financial resources or recent financial hardship.
*If you choose to pay annually instead of monthly
If the lowest payment level does not fit your financial situation, please do not hesitate to request financial aid. Options will be available on the registration page. This is a simple process and does not require extensive information.
The program entrance fee does NOT include the cost of on-site retreats at Wonderwell Mountain Refuge in Springfield, NH, or the online component of these hybrid retreats. The cost of required books, generally two per year, is also additional.
