Insight Meditation Satsang with Sean Oakes

This meditation and study group is based in the Insight Meditation tradition and its sources in Thai Forest and Burmese Theravāda Buddhism. To this foundation, we add exploration of Mahāyāna Dharmas particularly from the Perfection of Wisdom (Prajñāpāramitā) literature and lineage. The group meets weekly online, and on fourth Tuesdays live at the Alembic. The focus of the group is on deepening in Buddhist liberation practice, and exploring the links between individual & systemic liberation in the form of social justice and collective healing. I bring a particular focus on working with the nervous system and resolving the symptoms of trauma, supported by devotional practice, study, and ethics as the basis of the path. All are welcome.

Cost is $5, plus Dāna (pay what you can). Find the online version here: https://momence.com/l/5ehEBRM2

Please purchase your ticket in advance, as we cannot guarantee entry for walk-ins. We recommend arriving 15 minutes early to allow time for check-in and settling in.

Sean Oakes, PhD (he/him, queer, of Spanish/Puerto Rican and Northern European ancestry living on unceded Pomo land in California), teaches Buddhism, Yoga, and somatic practice. He has studied in Theravāda, Zen, and Vajrāyāna Buddhist lineages since 1993, including training as a monk in Burma, and was authorized to teach Insight Meditation by Jack Kornfield in 2010. His primary Buddhist teachers include Kornfield, Sylvia Boorstein, Gil Fronsdal, Eugene Cash, Kittisaro, Ṭhānissara, Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, Anam Thubten, and Chammyay Sayadaw (U Janaka), with whom he ordained as a bhikkhu for a Rains Retreat in Burma in 2002.

He studied Haṭha and Vinyāsa Yogas with Alice Joanou, Rachel Shaw, Amanda Moran, and David Moreno, and taught mindfulness-based āsana and prāṇāyāma for 10 years. He performed for many years in music, dance, and performance art, including with Keith Hennessy’s Circo Zero, and was certified in Somatic Experiencing (SE) and Organic Intelligence (OI) with Steven Hoskinson, integrating the complex systems approach from OI in a distinctively Buddhist approach to trauma resolution. He received his PhD in Performance Studies from UC Davis in 2016, writing on extraordinary states of consciousness in Buddhist meditation and experimental dance. He teaches at Spirit Rock Meditation Center, East Bay Meditation Center, Insight Timer, and elsewhere, focusing on the integration of philosophy, somatics, and social justice discourse with the Dharma.