Freeing us from our Stories, Wounds and Beliefs: 5-Day Buddhist Practice Retreat. Taught By: Renate Seifarth and Stephen Fulder

Freeing us from our Stories, Wounds and Beliefs:

5-Day Buddhist Practice Retreat

Finding Freedom Within Powerful Individual and Group Narratives including the Holocaust

Taught By: Renate Seifarth and Stephen Fulder

Background

We often hold deep-seated stories, and hidden painful memories which tend to be projected into our daily life. They unconsciously restrict our inner freedom. An example is the Holocaust which for Jews and Germans may still be a trans-generational wound creating psychological patterns such as guilt, conflict or the victim mind. Or we may still hold individual scars such as childhood abandonment or violence which interfere with our basic joy in daily life. Buddhist practices such as mindfulness and metta meditation can be extraordinarily helpful in revealing and dissolving these patterns and so allowing us to live with natural freedom and full potential.

In 2013 practitioners from Israel and Germany met in Berlin in a retreat that explored issues of deep memory, identity and history as Germans and Jews. Acknowledging each others suffering and transcending the mutual identification of being descendants of victims and perpetrators led to a deep healing of such hidden scars that inhibited inner growth. To continue this process German practitioners are invited in 2014 to a retreat with Israeli practitioners in Israel. The course will include Vipassana, Metta, Deep Dialogue and other methods as appropriate. The course language will be English.

Dates

The course will be from 9th to 14th June 2014. Israeli participants should come to a preparation day on 8th June 2014. Participants from Germany or outside Israel will be given information on other retreats, events and travel opportunities in the region, including Palestine.

Teachers

The course will be taught by Renate Seifarth, senior dharma teacher from Germany, and Stephen Fulder, founder and senior teacher of the Israel Insight Society (Tovana) the main Theravada Buddhist/Vipassana organisation in Israel.

Accommodation and Location

The course will be held at the retreat center Mashiv Nefesh in Clil, Western Galilee, Israel, a beautiful ecological village in the Galilee Hills. Mashiv Nefesh (www.mnclil.wordpress.com) is in the midst of olive orchards and nature, and consists of 2 halls, toilets and showers, a big kitchen and dining area. It is simple and there are no facilities for sleeping. Participants can bring a tent or sleep in the hall or they can stay at a Guest House 5 minutes walk away for an extra charge.

Registration

Everyone should register by e-mail in English to Ada Avshalom at: ada.avshalom@gmail.com She can also be reached for inquiries at: +972-504860867 (from abroad) 0504860867 (inside Israel). A registration fee of 50 Euros / 250 shekels will be required. Ada will inform participants how to send the registration fee in Israel and in Germany.

Cost and 'Dana'

The registration fee is needed to pay for advance costs in particular teacher travel costs. However there will be no further advanced charge for the use of Mashiv Nefesh, food and the teaching which will all be on a dana basis. Participants will be invited to support the retreat and the teaching in the traditional Buddhist practice of generosity or 'economy of the heart'. However those that wish to hire a bed in the Guest House will need to pay additionally directly to the Guest House approximately 90 shekels or 20 Euro per day.

Who Can Join?

The course is open to all who were in the 2013 Berlin course and anyone else who is involved with the dharma and has sat Vipassana retreats in the past.