I have decided that the recommended reading for the next intensive study group is “The Issue at Hand—Essays on Buddhist Mindfulness Practice” by Gil Fronsdal. The book can be bought through Amazon or downloaded for free through this URL: https://www.insightmeditationcenter.org/books-articles/the-issue-at-hand/. The book is not very long and is divided into small chapters, but what the author writes is very congruent with my views about the Dharma and meditation practice. I think it will be fun and quite beneficial to have a series of discussions regarding what you are reading and how it applies to your meditation practice. As usual for this series, I encourage you to commit to daily meditation practice of at least 45 minutes—if that is hard for you, let’s talk about it! I hope to have individual interviews with each participant during every meeting, with time for general comments and questions between the interviews.
The format for the series of meetings is well-established: 8 weekly meetings on Saturday or Sunday afternoons from 3-4:30. I suggest a voluntary donation to the Orlando Insight Meditation Group of $160, paid either through the OIMG website or by sending a check made out to the Orlando Insight Meditation Group, sent to Peter Carlson, 1818 Carrigan Avenue, Winter Park, FL, 32789. If that is not affordable, please donate as much as you can, as this is the primary source of income for OIMG. I am not asking for any personal donation to me for the series.
Please respond to peter@orlandoinsightmeditation.org, as I would like the meetings to begin the weekend after the one-day retreat on May 10, which means the first meeting weekend would be May 17/18, and the last meeting July 5/6. The preferred number of participants in each group is 7, with the expectation that some folks will occasionally have other commitments and will miss a meeting. Please let me know which day you prefer but be willing to attend on a different day if that seems valuable for the group dynamics. We will not schedule the first meeting until I decide we have an appropriate number of participants; if there are not enough commitments, the meetings will occur on either Saturday or Sunday
Please contact me with any questions and email your commitments with your phone number ASAP in order to enroll even if I already have that information; I need the email address and phone number in case we need to reschedule a meeting. I wish you well. Peter
For more information call 407 339-5444 or email peter@orlandoinsightmeditation.org