Exploring body, speech, and Mind – Buddhist approaches to Contemporary well-being. Workshop led by Dr. Elaine Yuen, Pallavi Deshmukh, and Jonathan Watts
Timings: 9:30 – 12 & 2:30 – 6:00
Tea break: 10:30-11
Lunch break & rest: 12-2:30
Evening tea break: 4:00-4:30
The 3-day experiential workshop entails meditation, movement and art, rooted in contemporary Buddhist practices for well-being
Description:
In our contemporary life, we often meet multiple challenges to the experience of well-being. Traditional Buddhist teachings point to how our experiences are shaped through our somatic experience(s) (body), our communicative and energetic experience(s) (speech) and how we understand the world (mind). In this 3-day experiential workshop we will use these traditional Buddhist frameworks to explore how contemporary understandings and practices inform well-being. Presentations will include explorations through contemplative practices, movement and art.
About Dr Elaine Yuen
Elaine Yuen, PhD, is a senior teacher and Upadhyaya in the Shambhala Buddhist community. Her root teacher is Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche, and she has been a meditation instructor and teacher since the early 1980s. Elaine continues to be deeply interested in how we shape our social interactions with caring and authentic presence.
About Pallavi Deshmukh
Pallavi is a dharma student in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. Inspired by the teachings of her main teacher, Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche, she enjoys integrating the Buddhist view into everyday life through expressive arts, meditation, and daily activities. A certified dance/movement therapy practitioner and visual arts facilitator, and trained in Buddhist counseling, Pallavi conducts one-on-one online therapy and counseling sessions, as well as offline workshops.
About Jonathan Watts
Jonathan Watts (U.S.A./Japan) graduated from Princeton University with a B.A. in Religious Studies and also a minor in Political Science. He immediately moved to Asia and spent three years working in the INEB Secretariat in Bangkok, while studying and practicing at the forest monastery of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu. In 1993, he moved to Japan and spent the decade coordinating the INEB Think Sangha, an engaged Buddhist “think tank” working on a variety of social issues. In 1999, he joined the Jodo Pure Land denomination research institute and edited and co-wrote Buddhist Care for the Dying and Bereaved with Rev. Yoshiharu Tomatsu. In 2006, he joined Kodo Kyodan’s International Buddhist Exchange Centre (IBEC), from which he has been involved in a wide variety of engaged Buddhist issues in Japan, now published in a two-volume set called Engaged Buddhism in Japan. Since this time, he has also helped develop Japan’s first Buddhist chaplaincy training program, the Rinbutsuken Institute of Engaged Buddhism, where he teaches Buddhist social analysis and systems care.