Upcoming Programs
StreetZen
Empathy&CompassionInstitute
CCT™, 8-weeks course developed at Stanford University
2024 Mar 20 ~ May 8 Wednesdays 8~10 pm (online)
2024 Mar 23 ~ May 11 Saturdays 2~4pm (Gugi-dong MindSpace)
Reading group for Seung-Seop Kim’s Responding to the Suffering of Others finished
2024 Jan 14 ~ Feb 4 Sundays 8~9 pm (online)
Dr Gabor Maté, a documentary (Korean subtitles available)
(StreetZen)
Presents:
Thich Nhat Hanh
Happiness is Here and Now
🌳🌳🌳 A class in ENGLISH 🌳🌳🌳
Taught by John Beaudry
Thich Nhat Hanh is one the most important modern Zen teachers. He is famous for his simple, clear and skillful teachings, which help regular people enter into Zen practice easily, and integrate daily life activities into Zen practice. His teachings are simple, but also deep, so Thich Nhat Hanh is a reliable guide for both beginning and experienced practitioners.
In this class we will rely on StreetZen’s Three Factors of Practice to help us understand and integrate what we learn from Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings. For practitioners new to MindSpace and StreetZen, there will be an orientation on Saturday, January 20, from 11:00 am to 2:00 pm. If you are new to StreetZen, please sign up and come to orientation. It will help a lot in understanding the class.
▶ Dates: 2024. Jan. 23 ~ Mar. 12, Tuesdays 7:30 ~ 9:30 pm (8 weeks)
▶ Location : MindSpace(#203-B, Yojin Sherei 110-1 Gugi-dong, Jongno-gu, Seoul)
▶ Detailed Schedule
- Week 1 (1/23). Interbeing: How to look at life and understand what we are seeing.
- Week 2 (1/30). Mindfulness: Learning how to be fully and deeply present for real life.
- Week 3 (2/6). Suffering and Happiness: Facing suffering and creating happiness.
- Week 4 (2/13). Difficult emotions: How to take care of Anger, Fear and Anxiety.
- Week 5 (2/20). Three Doors of Liberation: The Practice of Creating freedom.
- Week 6 (2/27). The Two Truths: Daily life experience connects us to the profound reality
- Week 7 (3/5). The Three Dharma Seals: Impermanence, Non self and Nirvana
- Week 8 (3/12). The Four Immeasurable Minds: Cultivating Love, Compassion, Joy, Equanimity.
▶ Class Format
- Lecture
- Q&A
- Dyad exercise
- Discussion and sharing experience
▶Registration: Fill out the google form( forms.gle/GuTui1FXaAqdXTdd8 )
deposit the fee to the bank account below
▶Fee: \300,000 (Kookmin Bank 760-21-0380-880 Gwon Seona)
▶Inquiry : mindspaceonline@protonmail.com 02-379-2022
▶Directions: MindSpace #203-B 110-1 Gugi-dong, Jongno-gu, Seoul
Days of Mindfulness
You are welcome to join us for Days of Mindfulness. These days offer a small taste of Plum Village mindfulness practice.
Day of Mindfulness
The art of creating the energy of mindfulness, peace, and happiness in everyday life.
2024 Feb 24 Saturday 10am ~ 2pm (Gugi-dong MindSpace)
2024 Mar 23 Saturday 10am ~ 2pm (Gugi-dong MindSpace)
2024 Apr 27 Saturday 10am ~ 2pm (Gugi-dong MindSpace)
Compassion Cultivation Training (CCT™)
8-week course developed at Stanford University
CCT™, 8-weeks course developed at Stanford University
2024 Mar 20 ~ May 8 Wendsdays 8~10 pm (online)
2024 Mar 23 ~ May 11 Saturdays 2~4pm (Gugi-dong MindSpace)
Stanford CCT™ Intensive
Reading group for Seung-Seop Kim’s Responding to the Suffering of Others
2024 Jan 14 ~ Feb 4 Sundays 8~9 pm (online)
Understanding and healing trauma at the root of our deepest wounds with insights from Dr Gabor Maté, a documentary seen by 6 million people in 230 countries around the world ( Korean subtitles available)
Every Week We Will Meet LIVE For 2-Hours
Launching our eight week journey with an overview of the program. Share our aspirations and intentions for enrolling as a community. We’ll define compassion and its components: awareness, being emotionally moved by suffering,having a wish to see the relief of that suffering, and being motivated to respond to suffering. We’ll discuss and introduce compassion as an ‘unfolding process’ and engage in a guided focus meditation to help settle the mind and clarify intentions.
The content of this class guides the participants to recognize the obvious and more subtle experiences of love and compassion, both physically and psychologically. Guided practice in this class will deliberately evoke feelings for a loved one. There will be small group breakout rooms (voluntary) to share and explore experiences of loving kindness practice.
This class will focus on developing a mindset that supports a sense of warmth, tenderness, acceptance, and a deep sense of concern for yourself. Connecting with your own feelings and needs and learning to relate to them with compassion can be difficult for many people. In this class we explore the obstacles to self-compassion and learn why this is the foundation of being able to genuinely develop compassion for others. There will be guided meditation practices and open group discussion.
Building on the previous class, skills of self compassion in this class focus on the importance of holding positive feelings such as warmth, appreciation, joy, and gratitude towards yourself. Recognizing and celebrating your own positive qualities increases the capacity to see the best in others as well. This class introduces reflections to help you delineate and clarify your own personal values that bring happiness and make life meaningful.
This class is intended to deepen your recognition of the basic sameness of self and others. All humans have fundamental aspirations to attain happiness and overcome suffering. Guided practice and small group exercises help you enhance your ability to see and feel the perspective of others. This is done progressively, beginning with a loved one, then moving to a neutral person and from there to a difficult person. We’ll reflect on and deepen appreciation of interconnectedness, and develop gratitude towards others, understanding that they support our survival and flourishing.
Expand the circle of one’s concern to embrace all of humanity, simply through the deep recognition that, ‘just like me, all others wish to achieve happiness and overcome suffering’. This class includes discussion and strategies to manage difficult emotions that can arise with compassion. We will discuss empathy fatigue and how to address burnout when offering compassion to others. The principle that developing and deepening feelings of dedication and commitment will bring more energy to the practices of compassion.
Building on the topic of the previous week, we’ll continue to explore extending compassion to others, including adversaries. We will discuss the tribal mindset and “us vs. them” thinking. We’ll highlight the importance of developing wise compassion and discernment when addressing and acting on social justice issues (i.e. implicit biases/ ‘othering’ ). Guided practice in the Tibetan meditation known as Tonglen will involve visualizing “taking away” the suffering of others and “giving back” happiness, joy, and well-being.
This class will explore different understandings of altruism and the drive to do something about others’ suffering. The meditation for the final week is an integrated practice that combines the essential elements of all the preceding steps into a holistic compassion meditation. We will review and practice with commitment and dedication so that you can continue integrating compassion into daily life, and in so doing, connect with and sustain your own sense of purpose and meaning in life.
John Beaudry (StreetZen)
John taught at Gamidang for more than 10 years, beginning in 2011. John also was an instructor for many years at the primary university for Korean buddhist monks, Joongang Sangha University, in Korea. He also taught for four years in a special training school for Buddhist nuns at the International School of Buddhist Studies. John created StreetZen as a secular, practical Zen program that focuses on daily life experience.
John has gone on retreat with Thich Nhat Hanh in Hanoi, Vietnam and has met and interviewed many renowned Buddhist teachers, such as Joseph Goldstein, Mingyur Rinpoche, Jack Kornfield, Pa Auk Sayadaw and Joan Halifax. John likes to spend time in small hermitages in the mountains of Korea. Before becoming a Zen practitioner and teacher, John was the producer at the award-winning theater company, The Show Below, in Sacramento, California. John teaches StreetZen in South Korea, California and online for international practitioners.
Seona Gwon PhD
Seona Gwon is a certified CCT™ teacher and Mindful Self Compassion (MSC) facilitator, teaching in both Korean and English. For 15 years, Seona was an Instructor at Joongang Sangha University, the primary buddhist university in Korea for monks and nuns, also taught in Dongguk University, and at the International School of Buddhist Studies (ISBS). As a producer, she brought the Zen Master, Thich Nhat Hanh to South Korea in 2003, and Zen teacher Norman Fischer in 2017. Seona has a PhD in Buddhist Studies. She has been a practitioner of Korean Zen (Seon) since childhood. Her central path is developing and deepening her own compassion and then manifesting it in life and action in the larger world.