Q&A with Soryu Forall

Why is a reverence for the power of animals apparently missing from modern Buddhism? Recently, a MAPLE Resident who has a deep love for indigenous spirituality heartfully asked Sōryū this question. His answer explores our assumptions about Buddhism, about the world around us, and how a connection with animals and nature is essential.
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The Monastic Academy is a training center dedicated to creating wise, powerful, and loving leaders who are an unstoppable force for social and environmental peace on Earth.
If you're interested in learning more, go to our website monasticacademy.org

We are accepting applications for 2-3 month-long apprenticeships. The training will provide you opportunities to dive deeply into mindfulness practice in community, working, and dedicated sitting periods. The apprenticeship is FREE with room and board provided.
Learn more here: www.monasticacademy.org/apprentice

The Wisdom of the Porcupine -  Q&A with Soryu Forall

What do we do when we feel so much grief for the destruction of nature that it hurts? This can be difficult to face, but fortunately a MAPLE resident was courageous enough to ask Soryu for guidance on it. In an answer that can provide solace and encouragement for those who care for the world, he touches on:
- how to relate to the grief
- how to perceive the problem so that we truly contribute to resolving it
- why it's important to see we are living the solution when we're doing as much good as we can
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The Monastic Academy is a training center dedicated to creating wise, powerful, and loving leaders who are an unstoppable force for social and environmental peace on Earth.
If you're interested in learning more, go to our website monasticacademy.org

We are accepting applications for 2-3 month-long apprenticeships. The training will provide you opportunities to dive deeply into mindfulness practice in community, working, and dedicated sitting periods. The apprenticeship is FREE with room and board provided.
Learn more here: www.monasticacademy.org/apprentice

How To Face Grief For Destruction - Q&A with Soryu Forall

In order to sustain our practice, it's essential to celebrate our progress, but how do we do that without so much of the ego that we work hard to relinquish? Soryu Forall provides guidance on this tricky aspect of spiritual development. 

This excerpt is from a Q&A session at a silent retreat in May 2021.
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The Monastic Academy is a training center dedicated to creating wise, powerful, and loving leaders who are an unstoppable force for social and environmental peace on Earth.
If you're interested in learning more, go to our website monasticacademy.org

We are accepting applications for 2 month-long apprenticeships. The training will provide you opportunities to dive deeply into mindfulness practice in community, working, and dedicated sitting periods. The apprenticeship is FREE with room and board provided.
Learn more here: www.monasticacademy.org/apprentice

How to Celebrate Success Without Ego - Q&A with Soryu Forall

In striving for our aspirations, we may be held back by damage to our self-trust in the past due to not following through on commitments. This can happen even to a highly skilled practitioner. Someone like that, a long-time MAPLE resident, asked Soryu what to do about it. His answer revealed that while such mistakes have serious consequences—perhaps more than we know—there is a simple principle for restoring integrity.  

This excerpt is from a Q&A session at a silent retreat in May 2021.
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The Monastic Academy for the Preservation of Life on Earth (MAPLE) is a training center dedicated to creating wise, powerful, and loving leaders who are an unstoppable force for social and environmental peace on Earth.
If you're interested in learning more, go to our website monasticacademy.org

We are accepting applications for 2 month-long apprenticeships. The training will provide you opportunities to dive deeply into mindfulness practice in community, working, and dedicated sitting periods. The apprenticeship is FREE with room and board provided.
Learn more here: www.monasticacademy.org/apprentice

What to Do If I Don't Trust Myself? - Q&A with Soryu Forall

Do you find that you tend to fall asleep if you don't keep yourself alert with things like coffee or constant activities? 

This is common for us who live in the modern world. While solutions usually include getting more sleep—or more coffee, it may also have to do with how we engage with our lives. Soryu Forall provides guidance on how cultivating the elements of mindfulness—clarity, concentration and equanimity—can help.

This excerpt is from a Q&A session at a silent retreat in June 2021.
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The Monastic Academy is a training center dedicated to creating wise, powerful, and loving leaders who are an unstoppable force for social and environmental peace on Earth.
If you're interested in learning more, go to our website monasticacademy.org

We are accepting applications for 2 month-long apprenticeships. The training will provide you opportunities to dive deeply into mindfulness practice in community, working, and dedicated sitting periods. The apprenticeship is FREE with room and board provided.
Learn more here: www.monasticacademy.org/apprentice

How Not To Sleep Through Life - Q&A with Soryu Forall

Inner Peace World Peace - Clip

The Monastic Academy just completed their retreat experimenting with meditation and Circling, an interpersonal meditation form.

Resident Steven Jango-Cohen had an experience in the retreat where he saw that, when it comes down to it, he doesn't always trust the path. He discovered when he does trust the path, a trustworthy part of himself emerges in the practice of authentically relating to others.

Here he leads the Sunday Sit focusing on the question: Who is the real you?

(Parts of exercises in this talk edited out of respect for privacy)

Sunday Sit -  Steven Jango-Cohen - Am I Being Fake Right Now - 10.29.2017

Soryu Forall gave this talk at the Monastic Academy on 04.26.2018 to residents and guests

How can we be liberated from the most destructive cult(ure) the world has seen? How can we prevent this cult(ure) from destroying life on earth?

(MAPLE Ethos #11) Forging a New Future

Video of the Birthday Circle Exercise in this audio can be found here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNGldfaqlI4

We often use words like love and compassion, but what do these words actually mean?  Is it possible the foundation for love is our attention? What we pay attention to is what we protect and perpetuate.

 In anticipation for our October circling retreat, Monastic Academy Assistant Teacher Peter Park led an exploration of attention in connection with ourselves and others in practices of circling.

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/circling-relationship-meditation-retreat-monastic-academy-october-2018-tickets-48673906966?aff=erelexpmlt

Sunday Sit - Attention As Love - Peter Park - 09.11.2018

Christopher 'SanShin' Russell has been enthusiastic (and wary) about technology-assisted meditation for the past decade.

On 01.06.2018 He led a talk, guided meditations and Q&A on technology and meditation.

Elements of the 1st guided meditation were inspired by links below, and the 2nd guided meditation featured sounds also listed below, created by Jogen Salzberg of Great Vow Zen Monastery


Sunday Sits https://www.centerformindfullearning.org/sundays/
Bhante Sujatha http://www.bhantesujatha.org/love-in-action/
Blue Lotus Temple http://www.bluelotustemple.org/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_meditation
http://www.shoyeido.com/product/kyoto-autumn-leaves-kyo-nishiki/daily-incense 
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18041606
https://store.heartmath.com/
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/shinzen-week-long-retreat-november-neuro-mindfulness-tickets-48673088518#
https://www.shinzen.org/
https://education.musc.edu/MUSCApps/facultydirectory/Short-Edward
https://www.bodhineurotech.com/
https://e-meditation.com/
https://choosemuse.com/
https://www.brightmind.com/
http://homepracticeprogram.com/
https://www.lifepracticeprogram.com/
https://biohackersummit.com/2016/10/15/dr-rhonda-patrick-health-benefits-of-sauna/
http://www.hannesbend.com/index.php?/current/myndful/
http://www.hannesbend.com/index.php?/bs/eclipse/
https://www.chacmc.org/technology

Cell Phone Meditations
https://www.mindful.org/simple-mindful-cell-phone-practice/
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/11/the-binge-breaker/501122/
https://www.mindful.org/simple-mindful-cell-phone-practice/
https://www.mindful.org/addicted-to-your-phone-try-this-practice-phone-in-hand/
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-art-now/201410/cell-phone-meditation
https://www.tujawellness.com/a-meditation-for-cell-phones/
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/well/mind/how-to-be-mindful-with-your-phone.html#commentsContainer

https://www.zendust.org/about/bios/jogen-salzberg-sensei
https://www.mixcloud.com/jogen-adam-salzberg/

https://www.sciencealert.com/how-blue-wavelengths-light-affect-retinal-cell-tissues-eye-disease?fbclid=IwAR1OJ5IVDFBxxbqku20_PTtmPesW3vZ7fnPU9gH4N6JxvkflD0QiJpxyk4c

https://www.wimhofmethod.com/

https://www.amazon.com/Science-Enlightenment-How-Meditation-Works/dp/1591794609/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=CHVHX68XNKZW8YYSPT80
https://repository.upenn.edu/mapp_capstone/155/
http://mikeysiegel.com/
https://www.jaysanguinetti.com/

Sunday Sit - Cellphone Samadhi (Technology And Meditation) - Christoper SanShin Russell - 01.06.2019

We tend to question the validity of texts such as the Avataṃsaka Sutra, that can be so unfamiliar that they seem meaningless. Yet we don't often question the world we live in, one largely made up by the human mind. It's a world where, for instance, nature is being turned relentlessly into money—the real turned into the imaginary. It can be hard to see clearly that we are giving up our power to this story of money. With even just one breath, we can cut through extraneous thinking and stories to be with what's real again.

This talk was given at a silent retreat in April 2019 on Easter. This is a time for the MAPLE community to focus exclusively on awakening. It references the First Stage in the Ten Stages from the Avataṃsaka Sutra, but knowing the text is not necessary.
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The Monastic Academy is a training center dedicated to creating wise, powerful, and loving leaders who are an unstoppable force for social and environmental peace on Earth.
If you're interested in learning more, go to our website monasticacademy.org

We are accepting applications for 2-3 month-long apprenticeships. The training will provide you opportunities to dive deeply into mindfulness practice in community, working, and dedicated sitting periods. The apprenticeship is FREE with room and board provided.
Learn more here: www.monasticacademy.org/apprentice

Real Or Imaginary? - Soryu Forall

A Modern Monastery (Mindfulness & Leadership Training Center) in Lowell, Vermont https://www.monasticacademy.com/

How Not To Sleep Through Life - Q&A with Soryu Forall

Monastic Academy

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