Specially for People of Colour / BAME / Mixed Racial Heritages / Global Majority
How to Fight Without Hating — Valerie Brown
Tues 9 June | 7:00 – 9:00 PM (London time)
An Online Gathering for/BAME/BIPOC to Cultivate Power, Peace, and Love
As Black and Brown people, we are in the fight of our lives. Our lives are constricted by systems and structures that foster discrimination and injustice. The legacy of violence, especially unlawful police violence, perpetrated against Black people, Asian people, indigenous people, people of color, differently abled people, people of various gender identities and expressions and sexual orientation, and others who are marginalized, is our constant reality.
All this is compounded by the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on Black, Asian, Latinx, immigrant, and low-income communities, which areamong the hardest hit, grossly under-resourced, and devastatingly vulnerable.
Our hearts and our supports are broken open by grief, fear, and anger. How do we fight injustice and not hate? How do we fight injustice and support ourselves? How do we deepen our resolve for a more just and equitable world in an unjust and inequitable world?
So, Where Do We Go from Here...
This online gathering explores mindfulness practices in the Plum Village tradition, founded by Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh, forhealing, self-love, inner peace, and calm. Listen to your own inner wisdom in a safe, confidential, and liberatory, all-body loving, all-gender honoring, virtual community healing space.
Our gathering includes sitting mediation, a Dharma talk, individual reflection, and small and large group dialogue.
About Valerie
Valerie transformed her high-pressure, twenty-year career as a lawyer-lobbyist to human-scale, equity-centered work with leaders and teams to foster trustworthy, compassionate, and authentic connections.
She began practicing in the Plum Village tradition in 1995, was ordained in the Order of Interbeing in 2003, and received Lamp Transmission in Plum Village, France in 2018. She is also the member of Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and a certified Kundalini yoga teacher.
Kaira Jewel
Sat 13 June | 3:00 – 5:00 PM (London time)
In this two hour gathering, we will explore the Buddha's final teaching to take refuge in oneself and how we can experience our own wholeness in the present moment.
How can we be present for the feelings of loneliness and feeling we are not enough? Especially as people of colour, or people of culture (as Resmaa Menakem says), living within the reality of white supremacy, there can be a deep, ancestral experience of not belonging, of not being accepted.
We will look at practices and ways of looking that can open our eyes to our fundamental goodness and the nobility that is intrinsic to each of us and can never be destroyed. In this way we claim our own belonging to and in the world.
We will practice guided meditation, Kaira Jewel will offer a dharma reflection, and there will be time for dharma sharing and Q&A. We will also experience InterPlay forms bringing in the wisdom of the body through improvisation and mindful movement. Please bring a journal or paper and writing instrument.
About Kaira
Kaira Jewel Lingo is a Dharma teacher, was ordained for 15 years as a nun in Thich Nhat Hanh’s Order of Interbeing, and is now based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. She provides individual spiritual mentoring and leads retreats internationally, offering mindfulness programs for educators, parents and youth in schools, in addition to activists, people of color, artists and families.
She teaches regularly at Schumacher College, was lead teacher for Mindful Schools' year long training for educators, and is a guiding teacher for One Earth Sangha. She explores the interweaving of art, play, ecology and embodied mindfulness practice and is an InterPlay leader.
Dene Donalds
Sat 18 July | 3:00 – 5:00 PM (London time)
Dene Donalds has been practicing the Dharma since 1995. After visiting Plum Village for the first time in June 2001, and deeply moved by Thay he committed to receiving The 3 Jewels and 5 Mindfulness Trainings.
In 2007 he received the 14 Mindfulness Trainings and started offering Thay's Teachings and Buddhist Chaplaincy in prisons.
In 2016, Dene recieved the Lamp Transmission and became the first person of colour in the UK to practice with ‘The Lamp’. Denes heart felt wish is that other members of the UK Colours of Compassion Sangha join him.
REGULAR MEETINGS
Every Tuesday online via Zoom, beginning either at 2:00 PM or 7:00 PM on alternate weeks.
Upcoming dates:
- Tuesday 2 June 2:00 – 4:00 PM
- Tuesday 9 June 7:00 – 9:00 PM
- then alternating afternoons and evenings every Tuesday...
The Colours of Compassion Sangha — led by members of Heart of London — practise mindfulness in the tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh.
With walking, silent and guided meditations, reading, sharing and singing, we hope to practise in a way that builds peace and joy, and heals suffering.
Please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. for further information and if any questions.