Living Kindness: Buddhist Teachings for a Troubled World with Kevin Griffin

In Person daylong at the Insight Meditation Center and online via Zoom.

Lovingkindness, or metta, is sometimes depicted as a simple “open your heart and love everybody” practice, but a closer look at the Buddha’s teachings reveals a more complex and nuanced picture. In a time of great conflict and contention in our society, it can be extremely valuable to see how the Buddha addressed these relevant topics:

• the challenges of living with other people;
• the risk of hating anyone, even your enemies;
• and the dangers inherent to conventional loving relationships.

Kevin uses his teachings on lovingkindness to emphasize the importance of sila, or ethical behavior, the potential for opening into deeper meditative states of peace and equanimity, and the importance of developing a non-discriminating, unconditional love on the path of awakening.

The retreat will include meditation, lecture, small group discussion, and Q&A.

On this daylong we will:

• explore several suttas that will open up our understanding of lovingkindess;
• practice metta as well as mindfulness meditation;
• look at how these teachings and practices can transform the way we live in the world through the commitment to non-ill will and selfless activity.

Kevin Griffin is a Buddhist teacher and author of several books, including “One Breath at a Time: Buddhism and the Twelve Steps.” A co-founder of the Buddhist Recovery Network, he was instrumental in the emergence of a Buddhist approach to recovery. He has practiced Insight meditation for over forty years and been teaching since the late 1990s. His latest book, Living Kindness, explores the metta teachings of the Pali Canon.