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Events and Retreats - 2022
Please Note: meditation can be contraindicated and may be harmful for people with Complex Trauma, PTSD. Substance Dependence or Psychosis. If in doubt, please seek advice from a psychologist or psychiatrist and speak to our Retreats Manager before booking your place. COVID-19 (Coronavirus) Update Monday 3 January 2022: MIM has implemented a Covid-Safe Plan that is updated regularly to follow the most up-to-date government guidelines and we want to reiterate their guidance around vaccination, physical distancing, mask wearing, and hygiene practices. We will be offering both online and face-to-face retreats in 2022 in line with our Covid-Safe Plan and government guidelines and where there are further lockdowns we will revert to online only. We are excited to be hosting the following events. We publicise the details of our retreats, and take bookings, approximately 3 - 4 months prior to each retreat. Stay in touch with details as they are publicised via our regular e-newsletters (subscribe via this website, top right of each page), this website, and our Facebook page. JUNE
"Open Sky Dharma Circle" - A Half Day Women's Circle with Robyn Gibson & Angela McGee Sunday 19th June, 1:30pm - 4:30pm, In-Person, Armadale Insight teachers Angela McGee and Robyn Gibson lead and support these monthly, half day retreats, held in noble silence. The afternoons include: * Guided seated meditations * Walking meditation * Dharma inquiry - investigating how practice is supporting your life * Dharma talks by the teachers * Guided heart practices This regular Women's Circle aims to foster a community of fellow beginner and experienced meditators to share meditation practice together, strengthen your home practice, offer each other support and connection and welcome sharing and dharma wisdom in a safe practice space. Now, more than ever, we need somewhere to step into quietude, seek refuge together and find solace in dharma practice. Now, more than ever, the dharma can offer us liberating tools to navigate the unpredictable terrain of this human life. If you identify as a woman and you’re looking for an afternoon of support, practice and enquiry, join us. Venue 24 Beatty Ave Armadale, 3143 Cost $20 + dana for Angela & Robyn's teaching Bookings Book your place here Enquiries insightretreats@hotmail.com "The Body's Intelligence": Weekend Retreat with Jess Huon 10am - 4.30pm, Saturday 25th June - Sunday 26th June 2022, Abbotsford Convent "If we don’t know what the teachings say, it can be sometimes easy to fall back upon our preconceptions and patterns of habitual thought, which have gotten us into trouble in the first place." Reggie Ray During this day of practice together we’ll return to key teachings that aid us in forging a clearing - where fresh insight can arise - through the thickets of our inner lives. In the Insight tradition, within the 4 foundations of mindfulness, the body is placed at the centre of our practice. We’ll be exploring staying in the body in a way that helps us cut through the mind’s habitual stories and elaborations. These can wind us up, spin into over-thinking or hurl us down painful thought patterns. Sensation unchecked will throw us into the mind. The body is the anchor to what’s happening in the ‘here and now’. We will experientially explore settling ‘into the body,’ and meeting our experience, in a way that allows for movement rather than stagnation. Download Flyer Venue Abbotsford Convent, 1 St Heliers Street, Abbotsford, 3067 Cost $110 + dana for Jess's teaching Bookings Book your place here Supported Place Our Supported Place Fund is able to give people experiencing financial hardship a 30% discount. Please contact Emma on the email below to apply Enquiries insightretreats@hotmail.com AUGUST
Two Streams: Urban Day Retreat with Jess Huon & Panel Talk at Night 10.30am - 4.30pm & 6.30pm - 8.00pm, Sunday 28th August 2022, Abbotsford Convent & Online ‘Integral practice is a patient, all-encompassing, vital and sinewy affair. . .' - Auribindo Buddhist practice offers us a generous view – that ultimately we need not be defined by our personal suffering. This gives us a ‘seat in freedom’, no matter how brilliant or messed up we believe ourselves to be. However an embodied meditation practice that fosters ‘flashes of freedom’ also begins to shine light on stunted areas of development in our psyche. Some meditators can bypass or downplay this uncomfortable material – yet many are knocking on therapists’ doors to engage in this personal work. On this day of practice and inquiry, Jess will draw on her twenty years of meditation practice and her own psychotherapeutic process. She will put forward her insight into how these two tracks to growth can work hand in hand, as we walk and sometimes stumble towards a ‘cohesive whole’. She will explore what it is to work across these domains –and where we might fall short if we don’t. About the Evening Panel Talk An evening panel conversation framed within shared silence to look at the rich, edgier and sometimes less spoken of aspects of our meditation practice. This communal inquiry between Jess, students and guest speakers will draw on our collective richness and wisdom. In this session we will explore psychological terrain and how this relates to our meditation practice. You are invited to bring the rawness and edges of your practice into the light of communal conversation. Let’s gather insight together. Come along, alone or with friends and partners - all welcome. Download Flyer Venue Abbotsford Convent, 1 St Heliers Street, Abbotsford, 3067 Bookings In-person Retreat & Panel Talk: $75 + dana for Jess's teaching In-person Retreat Only: $60 + dana for Jess's teaching Evening Panel Talk Only: $30 + dana for Jess's teaching Online Retreat & Panel Talk: $35 + dana for Jess's teaching Supported Place Our Supported Place Fund is able to give people experiencing financial hardship a 30% discount. Please contact Emma on the email below to apply Enquiries insightretreats@hotmail.com 4-Day Residential Retreat with Anton Eastick Wednesday 31st August - Sunday 4th Sept 2022, Kallara Conference Centre, Strathbogie Ranges During the Covid lockdowns, we all gorged on online teachings and as we know, at some point this mass of information all becomes very dissatisfying. Listening to someone else’s truth will never set us free and the peril lies in believing too much of what you hear and developing untested opinions. When you listen to a teaching, you may like or dislike what you hear but still don’t know the truth. Another person’s words will never set us free. True wisdom is not a matter of faith in a doctrine, but rather come from testing that teaching out to see the truth for ourselves. This is what practice is all about and this is what refreshes our deepest being. The true dharma is not something that can be communicated with words. You take the teachings, reflect on them, feel into them and digest them until it’s a sure thing and really seen for yourself. “The Dhamma that comes from the heart, flows like water from a spring that never runs dry. But the knowledge that comes from memory is like rainwater in a jar. Once the rainy season is over, it soon comes to an end.” Ajahn Chah This Insight Meditation retreat will have daily instructions, talks, guided meditations, a yoga period and 1-1 time with the teacher as needed. All are welcome. Venue Kallara Conference Centre, Boho South, Strathbogie Ranges, VIC Cost (all accommodation is in single rooms) $590 + dana for Anton's teaching Bookings & Enquiries www.antoneastick.com.au OCTOBER One Day Retreat with Anton Eastick 10.30am - 4.30pm, Sunday 9th October 2022, Bargoonga Nganijin North Fitzroy Library & Online Bookings opening in August "Open Heart, Open Mind" - 7-Day Residential Retreat with Carol Perry and Angela McGee Friday 14th October - Friday 21st October 2022, Kallara Conference Centre, Strathbogie Ranges This is the retreat that inspired the formation of Melbourne Insight Meditation. The retreat includes sitting, walking and standing meditations, optional yoga asana to assist in sitting, private and group interviews, questions and inquiry with teachers, dharma talks, instructions for meditation, mindfulness work period and free time. Carol Perry has 40 years experience in the Insight tradition. She is a senior teacher with Melbourne Insight Meditation. In 1972 Carol co-founded a rural community where she continues to live. Carol is a long-time social activist on ecological and social justice issues. She leads a monthly Women’s Wisdom & the Dharma group in the Northern Rivers area and is a Certified Hakomi Psychotherapist. Angela McGee is a Dharma teacher in the tradition of Insight Meditation. She teaches regularly with Melbourne Insight Meditation Group and teaches retreats in Australia and Bali. Angela is keen to explore how the Dharma teachings can open our hearts, guide our day to day lives and deepen our connection to all of life. She is a psychotherapist in private practice in Melbourne and has also taught Yoga for 25 years in the tradition of Krishnamacharya. Download Flyer Important Retreat Information to read before booking Venue Kallara Conference Centre, Boho South, Strathbogie Ranges, VIC Cost (all accommodation is in single rooms) $920 + dana for Carol & Angela's teaching Bookings Click here to book Supported Place Our Supported Place Fund is able to give people experiencing financial hardship a 30% discount. Please contact Emma on the email below to apply Enquiries insightretreats@hotmail.com "Practice & Artistry": Urban Day Retreat with Jess Huon & Panel Talk in the Evening 10am - 4.30pm, Saturday 29th October 2022, Abbotsford Convent ‘Underneath it all, we are wild and we know it’ - Reggie Ray Meditative practice is a training that asks us to arrest habitual movement of mind, and abide in an internal space where we are not jammed up against our ‘self’. This leaves room for a different kind of ‘knowing’ to arise. Whilst falling into depth loosens an isolated sense of ‘self’, this open space also shoots up wild arrays of distinct feelings, images and phrases - particular to our own nature. We can be instructed to not give this attention, to allow it to move on through, yet sometimes this creative material wants to leap out. What do we allow to roll by like unclaimed baggage and what do we pick up and handle? What makes us know, as artist Harry Dodge describes, when we are on the ‘beam’? How can we trust in our own movement, an inner quickening of congruency, and follow, follow, follow it, even if it doesn’t fit appearances, or seems ‘out of the box’? About the Evening Panel Talk An evening panel conversation framed within shared silence to look at the rich, edgier and sometimes less spoken of aspects of our meditation practice. This communal inquiry between Jess, students and guest speakers will draw on our collective richness and wisdom. In this session we will explore artistic practice and how this relates to our meditation practice. You are invited to bring the rawness and edges of your practice into the light of communal conversation. Let’s gather insight together. Come along, alone or with friends and partners - all welcome. Download Flyer Venue Abbotsford Convent, 1 St Heliers Street, Abbotsford, 3067 Bookings In-person Retreat & Panel Talk: $75 + dana for Jess's teaching In-person Retreat Only: $60 + dana for Jess's teaching Evening Panel Talk Only: $30 + dana for Jess's teaching Online Retreat & Panel Talk: $35 + dana for Jess's teaching Supported Place Our Supported Place Fund is able to give people experiencing financial hardship a 30% discount. Please contact Emma on the email below to apply Enquiries insightretreats@hotmail.com NOVEMBER Touching the Earth: 5-Day Silent Retreat with Robyn Gibson and Rupert Marques Friday 25th November - Wednesday 30th November2022, Kailash Ashram, The Grampians We live in a time where the marriage of outer engagement and inner understanding is an essential feature of the movement toward an enlivening and equitable human presence on this earth. This retreat is an opportunity to explore this through slowing down and settling into a rhythm and quality of presence that supports us in remembering what is important, what nourishes us and allows us to more freely bring ourselves to this life. Supported by our relationship with the wider natural world, we will combine nature-based practice with contemplative practice, exploring the mutuality of these ways of deepening presence. We will explore the mutuality of experiential ecopsychology practices drawn from a four directions eco-centric wheel of development with meditation practice based around the four foundations of mindfulness. Dharma talks, the opportunity for group inquiry and individual interviews with teachers will also be offered. In support of deepening this exploration, the majority of the retreat will be held in silence, interspersed with periods of shared inquiry. Three threads of practice – individual contemplative practice, community inquiry and connection with the land – will serve as the foundation through which to explore a number of themes, including Belonging, Engagement and Reciprocity. To live in these times with the enormity of the problems we collectively face is at once both a challenge and a privilege; to live when so much is in the balance and yet so much is possible. This retreat is offered as support and inspiration for our collective engagement, well-being and even our flourishing in the midst of these times. Bookings opening in July "Practice & Sexuality": Urban Day Retreat with Jess Huon & Panel Talk in the Evening 10am - 4.30pm, Saturday 26th November 2022, Abbotsford Convent Working with energies When the going gets tough, or stressful, sadly, the playfulness of eros can clamp down. At some point, in an embodied mediation practice, sexual energy arises. Its resurgence can be a result of dedicated practice and its energy cultivated within the seat of practice. Whilst this energy animates and activates life, it can also be overwhelming, frightening, weird, addictive, and as we know, used in harmful ways. Some spiritual traditions have decided to safeguard against it; to negate it, wipe their hands of it. Yet the French remind us; “what has been denied will come back with a gallop.” This day will be rooted in foundational practices to support us to abide with our own energy in liberating and healing ways - in resonant connection with self, other, and the world. In this, we re-affirm and celebrate eros. We will practice courting the whole gamut of our ever-changing human experience and exploring this particular energy. About the Evening Panel Talk An evening panel conversation framed within shared silence to look at the rich, edgier and sometimes less spoken of aspects of our meditation practice. This communal inquiry between Jess, students and guest speakers will draw on our collective richness and wisdom. In this session we will explore psychological terrain and how this relates to our meditation practice. You are invited to bring the rawness and edges of your practice into the light of communal conversation. Let’s gather insight together. Come along, alone or with friends and partners - all welcome. Download Flyer Venue Abbotsford Convent, 1 St Heliers Street, Abbotsford, 3067 Bookings In-person Retreat & Panel Talk: $75 + dana for Jess's teaching In-person Retreat Only: $60 + dana for Jess's teaching Evening Panel Talk Only: $30 + dana for Jess's teaching Online Retreat & Panel Talk: $35 + dana for Jess's teaching Supported Place Our Supported Place Fund is able to give people experiencing financial hardship a 30% discount. Please contact Emma on the email below to apply Enquiries insightretreats@hotmail.com THE MIM SUPPORTED PLACE FUND
Our Supported Place fund assists people living with financial difficulty, and who are unable to meet the full costs of a retreat. The fund is financed by donations from other retreat participants, cancellation fees and any MIM surpluses. A Supported Place is granted via an application process. Currently, a Supported Place attracts a 30% discount off the advertised retreat cost. One or two supported places are available per retreat. If you are keen to attend an MIM retreat but are unable to financially cover the retreat cost, please email Emma on insightretreats@hotmail.com COVID-19 (CORONAVIRUS)
MIM has a Covid Safe Plan for all our face-to-face events in line with guidance from the Department of Health and Human Services. If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to contact us on melbourneinsightmeditation@gmail.com to discuss them. Our dharma practice is very important during this time to acknowledge our feelings, see clearly and take practical steps, whilst also remaining calm. |
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