Insight Meditation

Organisation: Southern Insight Meditation (Charitable Trust)

Type of Meditation: Insight/Vipassana Meditation

Affiliated to: Insight Meditation Society, Massachusetts USA, Spirit Rock, California USA, and Gaia House, Devon, England.

Brief Description:
Based in the Theravadan Buddhist traditions of Thailand and Burma, Insight Meditation is primarily concerned with ‘seeing clearly’ into the nature of things – ‘who are we?’, and ‘what is this?’. Concurrent with this development of wisdom comes the development of the heart qualities of compassion and lovingkindness – this practice being not purely for our own benefit, but for the benefit of others with whom we have contact. In practice we initially use the breath as a focus in order to establish concentration, followed by a gradual expansion of attention/awareness to finally include the totality our experience – physical sensation, sound, emotions, mind states and thought. Insight Meditation is concerned with our own direct experience, with discovering for ourselves, rather than adherence to a system of beliefs, and as such is accessible to people of any or all spiritual traditions.

Following a tradition from the time of the Buddha, no charge is made for teachings, but rather it is left open to people to give, anonymously, as much or as little as they feel moved to. ‘That which is freely received is to be freely given.’

Website:

Insight meditation in Aotearoa/ New Zealand

Centres around Aotearoa

Auckland:

Regular Activities:
Sitting group on Wednesday nights from 7.30 to 9.30 at the Yoga Centre, 308 Great North Rd, Auckland
For more information:Phone (09) 372 9333

Christchurch

Meeting Place: Ferndale School, 104 Merivale Lane.
Regular Activities:
Regular Meditation Retreats with local and international teachers
Regular Introduction to Meditation Courses
Public Talk on the Third Wednesday of each month, 7.30pm, all welcome
Weekly Meditation and Discussion
Library of tapes and books
Related Books in Canterbury Public Library:
Books by Stephen or Martine Batchelor, Sharon Salzberg, Christopher Titmuss, Jack Kornfield, Joseph Goldstein.
For more Information:
Phone Julie 348 1462 or Dermot 381 4617 or click here to email

Hamilton

Regular Activities:
Hamilton's insight meditation group sits on the 1st and 3rd Friday of the month.
To find out more:
phone 07 854 9205 or click here to email

Waiheke Island:

Regular Activities:
Sitting group meets fortnightly on a Friday from 6pm at 11 Ostend Rd as well as Thursdays at 10:30am.
For more information:Phone 09 372 8150 or email

Wairarapa

Regular Activities:
In Masterton, the sitting group gets together on the first and third Thursday of the month at 7:30pm at 22 Tararua Street.
For more information:
email

Wellington

Regular Activities in Wellington:
We are pretty active with several groups and retreats happening. We meet to
meditate and listen to Dharma talks weekly at the Studio, 27 Dover St,
Island Bay on Thursdays. Other local groups have been meeting,
including on a sporadic basis one in the Hutt Valley, and another one
up the Kapiti coast in Raumati.
Contact Details:
PO Box 6626, Wellington
phone Caz on 04 389 4831 or click here to email