The Mystical Positivist is now a weekly radio show on KOWS-LP 107.3 FM, Occidental, CA. Listen live on Saturday evenings from 4:00 - 6:00pm, PST, via the web at KOWS Live Stream.
This week's podcast features:
- This week’s show features a conversation in the studio with Kittisaro and Thanissara, Buddhist teachers and practitioners who are strong proponents of the “Engaged Buddhism” movement. They are co-authors of Listening to the Heart: A Contemplative Journey to Engaged Buddhism. Separately, Thanissara authored Time To Stand Up: An Engaged Buddhist Manifesto for Our Earth—The Buddha’s Life and Message through Feminine Eyes.
Kittisaro grew up in Tennessee, graduated from Princeton as a Rhodes Scholar and went on to Oxford before going to Thailand to ordain with Ajahn Chah in 1976. He was a monk for 15 years and during that time helped found Chithurst Monastery and Devon Vihara in the UK. He also taught extensively during this time and was involved in the training of monks. He disrobed in 1991 and since then has taught internationally in the US, Europe, South Africa, and Israel. He has studied and practiced Chan and Pure Land since 1980, informed by the Chinese school of Master Hua. Kittisaro has completed two one year long silent self retreats and is currently writing in between continuing his teaching engagements.
Thanissara was born into a London Anglo-Irish family, and started Buddhist practice in the Burmese school in 1975. She was inspired to ordain after meeting Ajahn Chah and spent 12 years as a Buddhist nun where she was a founding member of Chithurst Monastery and Amaravati Buddhist Monastery. She was also co-initiator of events for children and families at Amaravati. Thanissara has facilitated meditation retreats since 1989 and has an MA in Mindfulness-Based Psychotherapy Practice from Middlesex University & the Karuna Institute in the UK. She is author of several books: Garden of the Midnight Rosary, The Heart of the Bitter Almond Hedge Sutra, co-authored with Kittisaro Listening to the Heart, and her latest is Time to Stand Up: An Engaged Buddhist Manifesto for Our Earth.
Both Thanissara and Kittisaro co-founded Dharmagiri Sacred Mountain Retreat in 2000 in South Africa, where they continue to lead retreats and support Kulungile, a loving home for vulnerable children and adults. They are core teachers at Insight Meditation Society, Massachusetts, co-founders of Chattanooga Insight, TN, and are are on the Teacher Council at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California. They also co-founded Sacred Mountain Sangha, which is based in Sebastopol, CA, and which recently launched the Dharmapala - Protectors of the Earth & the Dharma - Training facilitated by Kittisaro & Thanissara.
More information about Kittisaro and Thanissara's work can be found at:
- Sacred Mountain Sangha website: sacredmountainsangha.org
- Dharmagiri Sacred Mountain Retreat website: www.dharmagiri.org
- Kulungile website: www.kulungilekids.org
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