The Wakeful Body (Online Course)
Live Online + unlimited access to course recordings
An eight-week course, Mondays and Wednesdays, 5:00-6:30 pm ET
A live eight-week online course with Lama Willa Baker following her book The Wakeful Body. This experiential learning course explores how the body is the key not only to a fruitful meditation practice, but to an easeful life. Special attention will be paid to becoming more embodied in our daily life, through practical exercises, meditation and ways of understanding.
Many of us have a complicated relationship with the body. In its vulnerability to aging and illness, we tend to think of our body in ordinary or even pejorative terms. Yet many meditation masters of the past have taught that the body is a temple, a mandala, a profound source of wisdom. How do we reconcile these two perspectives?
In this eight-week course, participants will explore the body as a domain of practice and wisdom, diving deep into the physical, energetic and cognizant dimensions of experience. Through dharma instruction, contemplative movement and study, participants will learn how to bring awakening from the realm of ideas into the truth of embodiment.
Course includes:
Weekly Teaching and Guided Meditation with Lama Willa on Wednesdays (1.5 hours, 5:00-6:30 pm ET), with occasional Q&A and meetings with peers. Teachings will explore the path of somatic mindfulness: how to develop an ongoing practice of integrating principles of wisdom and compassion into the body and nervous system.
Weekly gentle yoga practice with Lama Willa on Mondays (1 hour, 5:00-6:00 pm ET) to work on integrating the course themes into a practice of movement. Modifications (chair yoga) will also be offered during the live sessions.
Lama Willa encourages participants to commit to a daily practice (a minimum of 15 minutes per day) for the eight-week duration of this course.
Resources include:
- Course Syllabus with weekly reading assignments from The Wakeful Body: Somatic Mindfulness as a Path to Freedom (Shambhala Publications 2022) – available directly from Shambhala Publications or from other booksellers
- Bibliography for further exploration of embodied practice
- Guided Meditations (pre-recorded), available on SoundCloud
- Exclusive access to professionally mastered yoga videos featuring Vajra Vinyasa Yoga, movement practices that accompany the meditations in the The Wakeful Body. Watch and learn from Lama Willa on demand throughout the eight weeks.
Required Course Resources (for use during the course):
- The Wakeful Body: Somatic Mindfulness as a Path to Freedom by Willa Blythe Baker (Shambhala Publications 2022)
- “Embodiment,” 2022 article by Willa Blythe Baker
IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Please read carefully! The Zoom link will be emailed to all those registered several days before the course begins. Register after the course begins, you will get the Zoom link shortly after you submit your registration.
If you don’t see an email from Natural Dharma Registrar or Wonderwell Mountain Refuge in your inbox, it may have mistakenly gone to your spam/junk folder or Promotions or Update categories in Gmail. Please put these two email addresses in your Contact or Safe-Send list to make sure you receive our emails:
The same Zoom link will be used each week, so you may want to save it in your calendar so that it is easily accessible. It will also be available in the dashboard of your user account once it is uploaded to your resources.
PROGRAM COST
It is Natural Dharma Fellowship’s aspiration that no one be turned away from our teachings and retreats because they are unable to pay the full price. In order make our offerings affordable for all who wish to attend, we offer a three-level fee structure:
- May All Beings Benefit! – supporting access for all and assisting with the care and maintenance of Wonderwell Mountain Refuge
- A Middle Way – covering the base cost
- Held in Sangha Loving-kindness – offering ease when financial resources are limiting
The pricing options for a particular course are based primarily on its length and are intended to give you an idea of what it costs to offer that course. The amounts listed are suggestions. You may write in any amount that fits your financial situation. Any amount offered above the Middle Way level will be considered a tax-deductible donation and will be acknowledged as such in writing.
Access to Recordings
NDF offers unlimited access to recordings, which are accessed in your user dashboard (more information about user accounts provided in a pre-retreat letter). If you have a user account, please register with the same email you use to log into your dashboard
Availability will vary depending on the type of event and the backlog for our precious resource volunteers. Thank you for your patience.
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