Meditation Study Series
Meditation Study Series
Our next online series is on Tuesday evenings starting October 14th, 2025 at 7pm.
Join our seasonal meditation study series for intermediate and experienced meditators in a supportive community. Facilited by (Rev.) Andrew Blake of Sarana Institute.
What to Expect
Our Tuesday evening series is a gathering of like-minded meditators interested in deepening practice and integrating Buddhist teachings into daily life. Each class will include sitting and walking meditation, a contemplative practice, and space for council and group discussion of the teachings.
This course is open to all levels of meditation practice and those interested in integrating Buddhist approaches and teachings into their lives and healing. If you are new to meditation, please don't hesitate to contact us before registration.
Description of our Upcoming Series
Spring Meditation Series: "Walking the Whole Path of Life Together"
The whole of the Buddha’s teaching path is centred on freedom from attachment and from the causes of suffering—such as despair, anxiety, regret, shame, forgetfulness, and anger. These arise both within us and in relation to the complex world around us.
Buddha offered practices and guidelines as methods to navigate and embody an abiding awareness that brings clarity and compassion, while also providing skillful means to meet the forces of samsara that pull us away from freedom and into negative, unwholesome states.
In A Whole-Life Path: A Lay Buddhist Guide to Crafting a Dhamma-Infused Life, meditation teacher Greg Kramer explores the foundation of the Buddha’s Eightfold Path. This book will serve as a guide for our series, and if you wish, you may purchase it ahead of our gathering. The first two chapters can be found online here.
Join us this fall as we explore how living in relationship with the Eightfold Path is, in essence, living the life we truly want. Each of us longs for a regular meditation practice and a happy life, and we dream of a world dedicated to peace. Yet we often fail to follow through on what we know supports us, and we continue to judge and react to ourselves and others.
The Eightfold Path teachings include:
Right view
Right intention
Right speech
Right action
Right livelihood
Right effort
Right meditation
Right wisdom
Each of these is a lens for seeing the mind more clearly and acting in alignment with the true voice of the heart.
Greg Kramer begins with the Six Tenets of a Whole-Life Path as an approach to meeting each teaching of the Eightfold Path with awareness. (You can read about them here.)
Dates and Times
Tuesday Evenings from 7 - 9 pm ET on Zoom
Starts October 14th for 10 Weeks until December 16th
Registration Fee
There are a few options for registering:
Base Fee: $250
Supportive Fee: $300 for those who can contribute more
PWYC Fee: Any amount that you can contribute
*as a spiritual gift, the dharma is not a commodity bought and sold. Our registration fees go to support Rev. Andrew and the work at Sarana Institute. If the suggested fee is challenging, pay an amount that works within your finances. Everyone is welcome in our sangha, and finances must never be a reason not to join us.
About (Rev.) Andrew Blake
(Rev.) Andrew Blake, Buddhist Chaplain, Psychotherapist and Co-Founder of Sarana Institute
Andrew is the Director of Program Development at Sarana Institute, and his wife, Angie, is a co-founder. In 2010, Andrew was ordained as a Buddhist Chaplain by Roshi Joan Halifax, a leader in compassion, caregiving and end-of-life. His thesis, Mindful Listening at End-of-Life, was recently published and explores the roles of mindfulness, empathy and compassion, from both neuroscience and Buddhist psychology perspectives, as skills to prevent caregiver “empathy fatigue.”
A teacher and educator of mindfulness meditation, Buddhism, End-of-Life caregiving, and his Mindful Listening work, Andrew has created training and curriculums at the University of Toronto through the Applied Mindfulness Mediation Program, at Sick Kids Hospital through The Mindfulness Project, at Hincks Dellcrest Centre, as well as numerous conferences, hospitals, hospices and organizations involved in service, healthcare, end-of-life care, volunteer caregiving. In addition to his teaching, he guides individuals and families at end of life and serves as an officiant at memorials and funerals. www.andrewblake.ca
