Community Practice Day

Sacred Activism: A Panel Discussion

With Jason Appt,  Regina Smith, Ramon Parish, Jeffrey Pethybridge, Moudi Sbeity; moderated by Charlotte Rotterdam

Location: Nalanda Events Center and Online https://naropa.zoom.us/j/99029293079

What does it mean for our engagement in the world to be fueled by sacred vision? What role does contemplative practice play in guiding our actions and interactions to build just, vibrant and thriving communities? How do we maintain fierce and clear vision even as we hold a view that includes all? Join some of Naropa’s beloved community members as we explore the meaning, relevance and implications of sacred activism in our lives and the world today. 

Regina Smith, is a spirited educator inspired by poetic vision and grounded in heart-and-body-centered clarity and compassion. She is the Queen Dreamer and CEO of The Center for Radical Connection where she offers radical authenticity and training in mindfulness and power dynamics to organizations who wish to develop inclusive cultures for the greater good. She serves Naropa University as the Chief of Staff to the President and Vice President of Mission, Culture and Inclusive Community. Regina holds an MFA in Poetry from Sarah Lawrence College, an MA in Buddhism-Informed Contemplative Counseling from Naropa University and is pursuing her doctorate in Anthropology and Social Change at California Institute for Integral Studies.

Ramon Gabrieloff-Parish is an assistant professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Naropa University. He focuses on the equity dimensions of the sustainability movement through courses in food and environmental justice. He also teaches foundations in embodiment, contemplative learning and theory, diversity and social identity and community learning.

Ramon is committed to the revival of rites of passage and other ceremonies and practices of cultural, natural and cosmic regeneration, through his work with organizations like Golden Bridge, Youth Passageways and his recent role as board chair of Frontline Farming.

Jeffrey Pethybridge is the author of Striven, The Bright Treatise. His work appears widely in journals such as Chicago Review, Volt, Poor Claudia, Best American Experimental Writing, The Iowa Review, LIT, New American Writing and others. He teaches in the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University where he is Director of the Summer Writing Program. He is also the North American Editor for Likestarlings, a web-archive of collaborative poetry and poetics.

He lives in Denver with the poet Carolina Ebeid and their son Patrick; together they curate and host the Lord Weary’s Reading Series, and edit Visible Binary. He’s currently at work on a documentary project centered on the recently released torture memos entitled “Force Drift, an Essay in the Epic.” He grew up in Virginia.

Jason Appt, PhD, is a psychologist, psychotherapist, meditation instructor, and psychology professor at Naropa where he teaches critical mental health studies and transpersonal and decolonial psychologies. Like his teacher, former World Wisdom Chair at Naropa and founder of Jewish Renewal, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, ז׳׳ל, Jason is interspiritual or religiously polyamorous with Judaism as primary partner. He is a student of ancient Near Eastern mythology and history, Abrahamic/Sarahic (Jewish-Christian-Islamic) liberation theologies, and the history of Zionism, colonialism, and empire, including Christian Zionist/restorationist roots of Jewish Zionism. He was born in Cahokia/St. Louis where his family were émigrés from Eurasia or the Russian empire’s Pale of Settlement. Currently settled in the southeastern peninsula of Turtle Island, he is politically and medicinally active in Palestine solidarity work and Native American and Afro-Brazilian churches, and ambivalently makes pilgrimage to al-Sham or the Levant (Palestine/Israel) for spiritual, political, cultural, and ancestral healing purposes.

Moudi Sbeity is a first-generation graduate student from Lebanon in the Mindfulness Based Transpersonal Counseling program. They also serves as the MCIC graduate assistant, focusing on curating the weekly newsletter, and organizing and supporting community events. Prior to attending Naropa, Moudi co-owned and operated a Lebanese restaurant in Salt Lake City, which also served as a safe space for the queer community. Moudi was also a named plaintiff in Kitchen v. Herbert, the landmark case that brought marriage equality to Utah and the 10th circuit states, including Colorado, in 2014. As a person who stutters, he is passionate about writing and poetry as transpersonal practices in self-expression and relational healing, and finds immense joy in sharing space with others on the page. When not wearing any of those identities, Moudi enjoys solo walks, tea and conversation with friends, and learning to play the oud.

Charlotte Rotterdam, MTS, is the Director of Naropa’s Center for the Advancement of Contemplative Education (CACE) and is an Instructor in the Core College, World Wisdom Traditions, and the Graduate School of Psychology. Charlotte co-developed and is faculty in Naropa’s WELCOME: Mindful Compassion Training; and serves as a meditation instructor in CU’s Crown Institute’s Compassion and Dignity Training for educators. She is a Senior Teacher (Dorje Lopön) at Tara Mandala Buddhist Retreat Center. The mother of two boys, she has published essays on the intersection of spiritual practice and daily life in Mandala, Lion’s Roar, Buddhadharma and Fearless Nest, an anthology. Together with her husband, Charlotte is currently writing a book, Skymind, on Buddhist teachings inspired by the 11th century Tibetan yogini Machig Labdrön, forthcoming from Shambhala Publications. www.skymind.us.

Lunch on your own or with friends and colleagues!

BIPOC Lunch

RSVP https://forms.office.com/r/Kv0Bd4gMxk

Members of the Naropa BIPOC community are welcome to gather, rest, and be nourished together during the lunch hour. 

Location: Nalanda 9235

Bring your BIPOC friends, colleagues, and teachers as well! Hosted by MCIC x Students of Color and Allies.

Food Truck!

The Little Lama Cafe is partnering with PotalaMomo food truck and will be Nalanda from 8am-5pm!

Be sure to visit the Donations Only Book Fair and Community Organizations Tabling event!

Community Partners Tabling

Come engage with some of our wonderful, active, and local community partners.

Location: Nalanda Atrium (south entrance)

Community Partners

• Rocky Mtn Peace and Justice Center https://www.rmpjc.org/
• Boulder County Climate Justice Hive https://boulder.earth/about/
• Green Faith Boulder County https://greenfaithbouldercounty.org/
• TheMyCoalition https://www.themycoalition.org/
• Out Boulder County https://www.outboulder.org/
• Queer Asterisk* https://queerasterisk.com/
• and more!

Donations Only Book Fair: Books from our beloved faculty will be available at a book fair, for donations only. If you’d like to bring books to rehome, please do. Donations will be going to our library. Any books left behind will be donated to the Boulder Public Library. 

Location: GREEN ROOM – First floor, by north entrance, all day

In-Person Offerings

The Practice of Unbreakable Solidarity with Stephen Polk

Location: Nalanda 9246

What exactly is democracy and how can it be used to deepen relationships to self and community? Especially in social movement contexts, how can democratic process help groups win by cultivating what movement scholars call, unbreakable solidarity? This workshop presents democratic process as both a contemplative practice and a successful way for political groups to organize internally. Attendees will engage in contemplative and experiential exercises with a focus on the relationship between theory, practice and strategy.

For this workshop, Stephen Polk draws on two decades of experience in democratically organized housing cooperatives, diverse and varied social movements, and from a wide range of disciplines including contemplative studies, political theory and environmental studies.

Stephen Polk, MA, has been active politically, socially, and ecologically for the last two decades. Based in the Denver Metro area, he received his MA from the University of Colorado Denver in Political Science. His master’s thesis analyzed the political and practical dimensions of permaculture within Denver’s collective housing community, the community in which he has called home since 2004. Stephen has worked primarily on a community level addressing issues ranging from anti-oppression and truly affordable housing, to the construction of regenerative systems in communal settings. Stephen is an Assistant Professor in the BA Environmental Studies Program, and the MA Resilient Leadership Program.

Deeper Ground amidst Crisis with Michelle Gabrieloff-Parish

Location: Nalanda 9130

Challenging times call us to find deeper ground—connected to ancestry, identities, movements, inspiration, Nature, and pain. We come together whether to create a more just world, or simply for the sake of our own balance. Logic alone may not save us. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, numb, powerless, enraged; join us to commune and explore new ways of approaching our predicament while finding sources of strength and resilience. We will gather in a contemplative, real, inclusive, multi-racial, multi-gendered space to play and build with interactive tools honoring the pain of radical injustices while growing our imaginative capacities for creating a more just and beautiful world. 

Michelle Gabrieloff-Parish brings over 27 years of experience uniting the fields of sustainability and justice. She is a former US State Department BoldFood fellow (Uganda) and served as a US delegate for the Colorado River in Mexico. Michelle serves on the Colorado Water Equity Partnership, the advisory board for Frontline Farming, and the State of Colorado’s “Biochar for Oil and Gas Plugging” Working Advisory. She is the founder of FLOWS (Foundations for Leaders Organizing for Water and Sustainability) an environmental justice program and budding non-profit She has studied intensively with Joana Macy as a facilitator for the “Work That Reconnects” and is a permaculture teacher and student. She is also a poet, currently featured at Meow Wolf Denver.

As founder of the “Once and Future Green”, Michelle consults for and trains Frontline communities, governments, and institutions to forward community-driven climate solutions with anti-oppression and ecological design tools

Nonviolent Direct Action Art Training with Rocky Mountain Peace & Justice Center

Location: Nalanda 9138

Get creative in this interactive Nonviolent Direct Action Art Training! Join us as we come together to learn creative, fun, and effective ways to use art to promote social and societal change. Art is an essential part of social movements – art creates lasting images that convey our messages in visually and emotionally compelling ways, to win hearts and minds in our calls for change. Come ready to get playful and build community, and be sure to bring clothes you don’t mind getting paint on! In this training, we will cover an array of different art mediums and how they can be used in nonviolent direct actions. We will have interactive screen printing and block printing stations set up, so everyone will leave with a DIY piece of social movement art to take home!

Chris Allred – I graduated from CU in the Spring of 2012 with a degree in Film Studies.  Film making is a lifelong passion I’ve shared with my brother and friends since childhood.  During my second year in college, there was a professor named Cathy Comstock who inspired me to learn more about nonviolence. She made a recommendation to visit RMPJC during a university course about Gandhi and meditation in 2010.  My Dad taught me about meditation while growing up, which helped as a foundation for study.  RMPJC became an inspiring place to continue volunteering with activism and practicing nonviolence.  Art and activism have become very motivational forces in my life.  I began work at RMPJC in 2014 as a Nuclear Guardianship Coordinator, and currently help with tasks such as coalition and alliance building, administrative, fundraising, campaign planning, documentary film and photography, coordinating internships, and Nuclear Guardianship.

Giselle Herzfeld: From a young age, Giselle decided that she had to dedicate her life to collective justice and liberation for all. For as long as she can remember, she has been out in the streets protesting for social and societal change. Some of her earliest memories include protesting with her parents to end the Iraq war and preserve bilingual education in Colorado. As a young adult, she has campaigned for progressive candidates and worked in the climate change, anti-nuclear, anti-war and pro-Palestine movements. After completing her Bachelor’s degree in International and Comparative Policy Studies from Reed College, she moved back to her home state of Colorado to work for environmental and anti-war nonprofits, and she currently works with the Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center as a campaign coordinator.

Contemplative Dance Practice with Darlene Lorrain

Location: Nalanda 9189  

Contemplative Dance Practice (CDP), a Naropa Heritage practice developed in the 1970’s by Barbara Dilley at Naropa, invites us to examine and integrate our outer and inner worlds, alone and together. It brings together the discipline of sitting meditation with free movement investigations and the practice of improvisation.

CDP is a laboratory to cultivate self-compassion and compassion for others as a means of enhancing well-being and resilience, and bolstering one’s capacity to benefit others. Synchronizing body-mind-heart in the moment is an important practice in order to take right action in life.  CDP offers participants time to connect with themselves through stillness and movement in an authentic and creative way.  In group practice, we explore stepping into an unknown world and practicing being fully present with what arises.  As a well-wisher/witness, we practice curiosity and open-heartedness towards ourselves and others, developing appreciation for the diversity of human experience.

 Come as you are, no experience necessary. Bring an open mind and willingness to play.

All are welcome. You have everything you need for the journey.

Darlene Lorrain (BA, Dance Therapy, Naropa University 1986), trained in traditional, improvisational dance and Arial arts.  In 1984, she began studying Contemplative Dance Practice (CDP) with Barbara Dilley. She was adjunct faculty for Naropa’s Early Childhood Education BA and MA in Education. Since 2000, she has been teaching and facilitating Contemplative Dance Practice at Naropa and also integrates the form into training courses for educators. Darlene has lead CDP classes and retreats in Colorado, New Mexico, Greece and India. The work of embodiment and presence is a key part of her personal and professional life. Having taught children and adults for over 40 years she finds the exploration of deep play and Contemplative Dance Practice a source of balance and freshness for the body, mind and spirit for people of all ages and experiences.

Peace Through a Bowl of Tea

Location: Nalanda Cafe

Is peace possible through tea? Sen Genshitsu―the 15th-generation descendant of Sen no Rikyū and eminent former Grand Master of the Urasenke tradition of Chado―has spent the majority of his life campaigning for world peace by promoting “peacefulness through a bowl of tea.” This humble beverage that we often gulp down for caffeine or taste has a long history of medicinal, social, political, activist, and spiritual uses. In studying The Way of Tea as a philosophy and a practice, we learn lessons of humility, courtesy, harmony, and—hopefully, inevitably—peace.

In this offering, tea practitioners from Boulder Tea Hut and the Naropa Tea House will serve tea. We will share the Leaves in a Bowl style, and demonstrate the chanoyu style followed by a serving of matcha. There will be light instruction followed by Q&A; the majority of our time will be contemplating tea and peace with one another.

Reserve your spot! Please note there is a 15-person limit per session.

Sarah Richards Graba of the Naropa Tea House is a writer and teacher with an eclectic spiritual life that includes zen, yoga, witchcraft, shamanism, tea ceremony, and more. She is an adjunct professor at Naropa, primarily teaching writing in the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics. She has been studying chanoyu for 10 years (after discovering it at the Naropa Tea House), and has been a lover of all tea for life.

Rev. Bunan Brown of Boulder Tea Hut is a Zen priest in the Rinzai Zen Hollow Bones lineage. He specializes in somatic attachment repair and seems to have a penchant for building spaces to meditate and drink tea.

Stephan van der Mersch of Boulder Tea Hut is proficient in Mandarin and lived in Taiwan for some years. He has deep ties to the culture of the region, which support his journey in the Way of Tea. Stephan had Tea for the first time with Wu De at Tea Sage Hut in Taiwan in early 2016, connected with Bunan around Tea that Spring, and they promptly began construction on the Sunshine Springs Teahouse, a handcrafted labor of love spanning six years (located five miles west of Boulder).

This workshop is supported by the generous help of the Naropa Tea Club and Boulder Tea Hut communities.

Questions or tech issues? Contact us at naropateahouse@naropa.edu

Contemplation in a Cup: The Japanese Way of Tea at Naropa Tea House on Arapahoe Campus

Location: Arapahoe Tea House

Please join Chado practitioner Andrea Becker for a bowl of tea in the historic Naropa Tea House. Small groups of guests will enjoy a sweet and a bowl of matcha prepared in the Urasenke style.

Reserve your spot! Please note there is a 5-person limit per sitting.

Andrea (Drea) Becker, Writer, Photographer, Chajin, graduated from JKS in 2018 and has been studying chadō for six years. www.dreadoes.com

This offering is supported by Anh Le Ngoc Pham of Rocky Mountain Chado.

Sacred Activism through De-colonial Shamanic Family Constellations 1:45-4:30pm with Dr. Anna Dinallo

Location: Nalanda 9190

Please note this is a two session workshop, by signing up you are committing yourself to the entire afternoon and will not be able to participate in other workshops offerings.  SPACE IS LIMITED-Registration is now closed. Thank you!

Rest is Resistance. Stillness is Strength. Beyond story is Unbinding.

Come join a shamanic journey that will anchor rest, stillness, and inner knowing beyond human words. The workshop will create a space for participants to connect with ancestral gifts through the Orders of Love.  The workshop is a blend of hypnosis techniques, drumming therapy, and psychodrama, to unpack our ancestral history for war, genocide, and forced migration. By giving place to our own ancestral wars, we anchor inner peace, and engage in sacred activism. Dr. Dinallo will share perspectives from their Latinx heritage and training in Curanderismo.

Workshop Outline:

Opening Directions with Song

Journeying to your inner sanctuary

1-2 constellations that all participants can choose to role play/family sculpt

Processing time and sound bathing.

Tools: For the workshop please plan to bring a journal and a pen for any reflective activities. If you have a drum or rattle, bring it! Come in comfortable clothes where you can stretch and sit. You can also bring a pillow, blanket or extra meditation cushion if you want to be extra cozy. You can also bring: Stones or animal totems, if you like.

Copal Limpias (Clearing):

The Aztecs called Copal,  the blood of trees, the exuding resin of a species taxonomists classified as Protium copal. This was the sacred incense of the Maya and Aztec civilizations — quantities of it discovered sequestered within the Great Temple at Tenochtitlan preserved as lumps and bars. We will also use this for a sacred clearing ritual called a limpia. You can get a Limpia if you would like!

Disclaimer: This process is not therapy, it is therapeutic. And all students are encouraged to have a therapist.

Dr. Anna Dinallo is cross trained and licensed as a psychotherapist and Doctor of Oriental Medicine. Dr. Dinallo began her teaching career in El Salvador in post–civil war outdoor rural settings, and is deeply inspired by liberation psychology. They implore a contemplative education as a form of social justice work to inspire action oriented pedagogical approaches to counselor education. Some classroom frameworks Dr. Dinallo enjoys implementing include family systems, shamanic attachment work, and Daoist Five Element theory applied to counseling relationships. She is an avid Vedic Astrologer, and her current research includes ketamine assisted psychotherapy, and cross-cultural somatic typologies. Her intention at Naropa is to create a unified field that is student-centered, compassionate, and a playful learning environment for diverse counselors in training. This year she is teaching Mindfulness, Human Growth and Development, and Jungian Psychology in the MA in Clinical Mental Health Counseling program, concentration in Mindfulness-Based Transpersonal Counseling.

HYBRID:

Solidarity as Holiness and Opposite of Whiteness with Jason Appt*

HYBRID!  In person and Online.

Location: Nalanda 9240

Zoom Link: https://naropa.zoom.us/j/2127995989

Jewish activist Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz wrote: “I may be secular, but I know holiness when I hear it. One of its names is solidarity, the opposite of ‘whiteness.’ The more you claim it, honor it, and fight for it, the less it costs.” Yet whiteness also specializes in solidarity. That is, solidarity, organizing, and activism span from right to left, elite to grassroots, state to non-state actors, and selective to collective regarding who gets freedom and justice: nation-states, militaries, police, UN, G7, NATO, BRICS, IMF, WBG, G77, India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC), Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)/New Silk Road, Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), Tricontinentalism, LGBTQIA+, pan-isms (e.g., pan-Indianism, pan-Africanism, pan-Arabism, pan-Islamism), Eurasianism, Eurafricanism, Afroasianism, etc. Join us for an authentic movement-inspired witnessing, moving, and speaking circle on what authentic solidarity, fluidarity, or holiness means to us.

Jason Appt, PhD, is a psychologist, psychotherapist, meditation instructor, and psychology professor at Naropa where he teaches critical mental health studies and transpersonal and decolonial psychologies. Like his teacher, former World Wisdom Chair at Naropa and founder of Jewish Renewal, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, ז׳׳ל, Jason is interspiritual or religiously polyamorous with Judaism as primary partner. He is a student of ancient Near Eastern mythology and history, Abrahamic/Sarahic (Jewish-Christian-Islamic) liberation theologies, and the history of Zionism, colonialism, and empire, including Christian Zionist/restorationist roots of Jewish Zionism. He was born in Cahokia/St. Louis where his family were émigrés from Eurasia or the Russian empire’s Pale of Settlement. Currently settled in the southeastern peninsula of Turtle Island, he is politically and medicinally active in Palestine solidarity work and Native American and Afro-Brazilian churches, and ambivalently makes pilgrimage to al-Sham or the Levant (Palestine/Israel) for spiritual, political, cultural, and ancestral healing purposes.

Online:

Beginning a New: A Relational Practice of Reconciliation and Renewal with Marina Dorian*

Zoom Link: https://naropa.zoom.us/j/3617516044

Beginning Anew is one of the many mindfulness practices from Vietnamese Zen master, global spiritual teacher and peace activist, Thich Nhat Hanh in the Plum Village Tradition of Engaged Buddhism. Thich Nhat Hanh (known to his students as Thay) lived a life of sacred activism such that his life was his teaching and his message. After his transition in 2022, the sanghas he created across the world continue his message of peace and unity through practice.  Beginning Anew is a relational practice of right speech, reconciliation and renewal that can be used by people in any relationship with each other who wish to communicate with mindfulness and kindness to navigate the storms and misunderstandings that may arise in relationships. We will honor Thay’s legacy by learning the historical context, three parts of this practice and having an opportunity to begin the process of reconciliation and renewal in our own lives by watering positive seeds in ourselves and others.

Marina Dorian, Ph.D., is a core faculty member in the Mindfulness Based Transpersonal Counseling program, teaching at Naropa University since 2018. She is a psychologist and meditation instructor incorporating mindfulness and compassion in her clinical work, coaching and scholarship. She facilitates annual mindfulness retreats in nature and is a board member at the nonprofit Surprise Farm Retreat Center in Ramona, CA. Dr. Dorian currently teaches diagnostic psychopathology, couples therapy, and mindfulness courses including compassion training. She is meditation practitioner and student of Thich Nhat Hanh and practices with a local sangha in San Diego in the Plum Village Tradition.

Faculty Focus*

We are excited to offer a Contemplative Pedagogy workshop, specifically designed for faculty. All Naropa faculty are invited and encouraged to join. This is a unique opportunity to engage with other faculty around particular topics in contemplative education, Naropa’s unique educational lineage.

The Voice is the Sound of the Mind with Lee Worley*

(faculty only!)

Location: Nalanda 9176

How we speak and how we hear are precious human tools for communicating our vision or intention to our world. Practice in becoming more skillful with their nuances and more fearless in voicing our truth authentically are two aspects of Chögyam Trungpa’s teachings on Mudra Space Awareness. In this brief session we will explore several of his exercises that work with breath, eyes, voice and gesture. Can space, as Trungpa says, become, “a powerful acoustical system”?

Lee Worley is Professor Emerita of both the Theater Studies B.A. and the Contemplative Education M.A. at Naropa University. Under the guidance of its founder, Chögyam Trungpa, she began studying Mudra Space Awareness in 1974 and is currently an authorized Mudra teacher with students in the US, Europe, Canada and Brazil.

A practitioner of Vajrayana Buddhism since 1976, she was appointed by Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche to be one of his four Western Buddhist teachers, or “Mitras” (Spiritual Friends) in the sangha of Nalandabodhi International. She also teaches at Nitartha Institute for higher Buddhist Studies.

Lee has written two books: Coming From Nothing: the Sacred Art of Acting and Teaching Presence: Field Notes for Players.

In-Person Offerings

Activist Mail with Amy Bobeda

Location: Nalanda 9124

Collage, Stamp, & Monoprint Postcards. Connect to the long tradition of mail as connection, resistance, and political action and practice collage, stamping, and monoprints in this workshop.  

Amy Bobeda directs the Naropa Writing Center, where you should all hang out! She teaches in JKS & Visual Arts as well as The New Local Nonprofit in Boulder.  

Slam Poetry with Lorenzo González

Location: Dojo

Join us for an electrifying Slam Poetry workshop where words ignite, emotions soar, and voices resonate. Dive into the art of spoken-word expression. Whether you’re a seasoned performer or a curious newcomer, this interactive session offers a supportive space to craft, refine, and share your truth. In this workshop you will craft a compelling verse and master its delivery. Unleash your creativity and find your unique voice in a dynamic community of poet-performers. Come discover the magic of Slam Poetry and let your words reverberate with passion and purpose.

Lorenzo González, most recently played Padre Tomás in Miracle at Tepeyac with Denver’s Su Teatro and directed Noche Mística an original Spanish-language theater project devised with local Latinx creatives through VOICES in Carbondale, CO and performed at The Arts College at Willits (TACAW). Lorenzo has been a theatre performer, director and educator for the last thirty years. Among the many theatres he has worked at are: Los Angeles’ Ahmanson Theatre; RED CAT at Disney Hall; The Oregon Shakespeare Festival for six seasons; San Jose Repertory Theatre; Seattle Repertory Theatre; Arizona Theatre Co.; Tacoma Actors Guild; El Teatro Campesino; Colorado Shakespeare Festival; Los Angeles’ Independent Shakespeare Company. He is an Associate Artist with El Centro Su Teatro of Denver, and Director of Performance Programs at Naropa University where he also served as chair of the BFA in Theater and MFA in Theater: Contemporary Performance. He received his MFA from the Professional Theatre Training Program at the University of Delaware.

A Dharma of Solidarity: Finding My Role in the Collective Movement with Micha Kurz and Lodi Siefer, Boulder County Climate Justice Hive

Location: Nalanda 9248

From my own identities and position, out to the local ecosystem of communities I belong to, and further out to the global spiritual/political moment we share… How am I showing up; how can I participate and contribute? Is it with delight; is it with prayer; is it with rage?

Come explore: What’s my piece of the sky to hold up?

Gather together with local organizers active in Boulder County’s social and climate justice efforts to explore these questions in conversation.

Micha Kurz, co-lead of the BoCo Climate Justice Hive: I’m a rabble-rouser, a founder of organizations, and a conspirator of political movements. I’ve been a youth counselor, a community organizer, a leader, a follower, and a friend. I’ve worked with U.N. agencies, INGOs, Academia and Social Movements. I’ve advocated, sometimes successfully, for policy change around the world. As a cis-straight presenting man active in solidarity, I’m learning much about how to get out of the way. I’ve spent years in military uniform, and many more years protesting militarized policies, organizing to deconstruct colonial politics. I practice centering marginalized people and taking leadership from impacted communities.

https://boulder.earth/micha-kurz/

Lodi Siefer, co-lead of the BoCo Climate Justice Hive: I’m a Naropa-trained psychotherapist turned organizer. I’m super excited about the intersection of social and earth justice; working toward a future of respect and well-being for all beings brings me such joy. I’m a queer/gender queer partnered parent of a sensitive neurodiverse kiddo. As a white person with class privilege, I have humility for how much I have to learn and unlearn. To leadership, I bring curiosity, a love of group dynamics, respect for the body’s deep wisdom, and an eye for inviting in guidance from the rest of the natural world.

Peace Through a Bowl of Tea

Location: Nalanda Cafe

Is peace possible through tea? Sen Genshitsu―the 15th-generation descendant of Sen no Rikyū and eminent former Grand Master of the Urasenke tradition of Chado―has spent the majority of his life campaigning for world peace by promoting “peacefulness through a bowl of tea.” This humble beverage that we often gulp down for caffeine or taste has a long history of medicinal, social, political, activist, and spiritual uses. In studying The Way of Tea as a philosophy and a practice, we learn lessons of humility, courtesy, harmony, and—hopefully, inevitably—peace.

In this offering, tea practitioners from Boulder Tea Hut and the Naropa Tea House will serve tea. We will share the Leaves in a Bowl style, and demonstrate the chanoyu style followed by a serving of matcha. There will be light instruction followed by Q&A; the majority of our time will be contemplating tea and peace with one another.

Reserve your spot! Please note there is a 15-person limit per session.

Sarah Richards Graba of the Naropa Tea House is a writer and teacher with an eclectic spiritual life that includes zen, yoga, witchcraft, shamanism, tea ceremony, and more. She is an adjunct professor at Naropa, primarily teaching writing in the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics. She has been studying chanoyu for 10 years (after discovering it at the Naropa Tea House), and has been a lover of all tea for life.

Rev. Bunan Brown of Boulder Tea Hut is a Zen priest in the Rinzai Zen Hollow Bones lineage. He specializes in somatic attachment repair and seems to have a penchant for building spaces to meditate and drink tea.

Stephan van der Mersch of Boulder Tea Hut is proficient in Mandarin and lived in Taiwan for some years. He has deep ties to the culture of the region, which support his journey in the Way of Tea. Stephan had Tea for the first time with Wu De at Tea Sage Hut in Taiwan in early 2016, connected with Bunan around Tea that Spring, and they promptly began construction on the Sunshine Springs Teahouse, a handcrafted labor of love spanning six years (located five miles west of Boulder).

This workshop is supported by the generous help of the Naropa Tea Club and Boulder Tea Hut communities.

Questions or tech issues? Contact us at naropateahouse@naropa.edu

Contemplation in a Cup: The Japanese Way of Tea at Naropa Tea House on Arapahoe Campus

Location: Arapahoe Tea House

Please join Chado practitioner Andrea Becker for a bowl of tea in the historic Naropa Tea House. Small groups of guests will enjoy a sweet and a bowl of matcha prepared in the Urasenke style.

Reserve your spot! Please note there is a 5-person limit per sitting.

Andrea (Drea) Becker, Writer, Photographer, Chajin, graduated from JKS in 2018 and has been studying chadō for six years. www.dreadoes.com

This offering is supported by Anh Le Ngoc Pham of Rocky Mountain Chado.

Questions or tech issues? Contact us at naropateahouse@naropa.edu

Online Offerings

Activating Sacred Dream Wisdom with Jaime Duggan

Zoom Link: https://naropa.zoom.us/j/97693905761

It is said that everything exists in energy prior to manifestation in physical form and that our world is dreamed into being.  Attention to- and conscious work with– our dreams nurtures our relationship with the Sacred.  The insights and guidance offered through our dreams empower us to play our part in the co-creation of our lives, communities and the world we want to live in.  In this online workshop, we will work with an expansive view of dreaming consciousness, engage in dreamwork practice, and commit to weaving the sacred into our waking world with dream wisdom activations.

Jaime Duggan is a Certified Dream Work Practitioner and holds a Master of Fine Arts in Dance with a secondary emphasis in Ethnic Studies.  She serves as the Graduate Advisor for the Nature-Based Transpersonal Counseling program at Naropa University and has been a student and teacher of various healing arts for over 25 years.  Jaime is passionate about assisting people with awakening to our higher potentials and purposes, and is particularly keen on drawing upon the profound wisdom of dreams and synchronicities.

Loving Ourselves, Loving Earth with Carly Sinn

Zoom Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89679474398?pwd=Dg2Ce06SIIKzxi0XzPanNWvxaLLSQ4.1

Meeting ID: 896 7947 4398 / Passcode: 951766

Drawing on themes from Joanna Macy’s book World As Lover, World as Self, we will write love letters and poems to the Earth and to ourselves, as well as do some embodied practices to help awaken into the interconnected relationship of our bodies with the Earth. Love is the most generative energy of all and guides us into Sacred Activism.

Carly Sinn, third year Masters of Divinity student. Joanna Macy Center campus eco-chaplain. Multi-disciplinary artist, poet, and dancer.

FACULTY FOCUS

We are excited to offer opportunity for community building and  workshops on Contemplative Pedagogy, specifically designed for faculty. All Naropa faculty are invited and encouraged to join. This is a unique opportunity to engage with other faculty around particular topics in contemplative education, Naropa’s unique educational lineage.

8:30–9:00am Faculty Tea

Please get your tea/breakfast in Atrium then meet.

Location: Nalanda 9130 or online!

https://naropa.zoom.us/j/3617516044   

Faculty Focus Workshops 1:45 – 3:00 PM

The Voice is the Sound of the Mind with Lee Worley

LOCATION: Nalanda 9176 (marley floor)

How we speak and how we hear are precious human tools for communicating our vision or intention to our world. Practice in becoming more skillful with their nuances and more fearless in voicing our truth authentically are two aspects of Chögyam Trungpa’s teachings on Mudra Space Awareness. In this brief session we will explore several of his exercises that work with breath, eyes, voice and gesture. Can space, as Trungpa says, become, “a powerful acoustical system”?

Lee Worley is Professor Emerita of both the Theater Studies B.A. and the Contemplative Education M.A. at Naropa University. Under the guidance of its founder, Chögyam Trungpa, she began studying Mudra Space Awareness in 1974 and is currently an authorized Mudra teacher with students in the US, Europe, Canada and Brazil.

A practitioner of Vajrayana Buddhism since 1976, she was appointed by Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche to be one of his four Western Buddhist teachers, or “Mitras” (Spiritual Friends) in the sangha of Nalandabodhi International. She also teaches at Nitartha Institute for higher Buddhist Studies.

Lee has written two books: Coming From Nothing: the Sacred Art of Acting and Teaching Presence: Field Notes for Players.

Solidarity as Holiness and Opposite of Whiteness with Jason Appt

HYBRID!  In person and Online.

Location: Nalanda 9240

Zoom Link: https://naropa.zoom.us/j/2127995989

Jewish activist Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz wrote: “I may be secular, but I know holiness when I hear it. One of its names is solidarity, the opposite of ‘whiteness.’ The more you claim it, honor it, and fight for it, the less it costs.” Yet whiteness also specializes in solidarity. That is, solidarity, organizing, and activism span from right to left, elite to grassroots, state to non-state actors, and selective to collective regarding who gets freedom and justice: nation-states, militaries, police, UN, G7, NATO, BRICS, IMF, WBG, G77, India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC), Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)/New Silk Road, Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), Tricontinentalism, LGBTQIA+, pan-isms (e.g., pan-Indianism, pan-Africanism, pan-Arabism, pan-Islamism), Eurasianism, Eurafricanism, Afroasianism, etc. Join us for an authentic movement-inspired witnessing, moving, and speaking circle on what authentic solidarity, fluidarity, or holiness means to us.

Jason Appt, PhD, is a psychologist, psychotherapist, meditation instructor, and psychology professor at Naropa where he teaches critical mental health studies and transpersonal and decolonial psychologies. Like his teacher, former World Wisdom Chair at Naropa and founder of Jewish Renewal, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, ז׳׳ל, Jason is interspiritual or religiously polyamorous with Judaism as primary partner. He is a student of ancient Near Eastern mythology and history, Abrahamic/Sarahic (Jewish-Christian-Islamic) liberation theologies, and the history of Zionism, colonialism, and empire, including Christian Zionist/restorationist roots of Jewish Zionism. He was born in Cahokia/St. Louis where his family were émigrés from Eurasia or the Russian empire’s Pale of Settlement. Currently settled in the southeastern peninsula of Turtle Island, he is politically and medicinally active in Palestine solidarity work and Native American and Afro-Brazilian churches, and ambivalently makes pilgrimage to al-Sham or the Levant (Palestine/Israel) for spiritual, political, cultural, and ancestral healing purposes.

Online:

Beginning a New: A Relational Practice of Reconciliation and Renewal with Marina Dorian

Zoom Link: https://naropa.zoom.us/j/3617516044

Beginning Anew is one of the many mindfulness practices from Vietnamese Zen master, global spiritual teacher and peace activist, Thich Nhat Hanh in the Plum Village Tradition of Engaged Buddhism. Thich Nhat Hanh (known to his students as Thay) lived a life of sacred activism such that his life was his teaching and his message. After his transition in 2022, the sanghas he created across the world continue his message of peace and unity through practice.  Beginning Anew is a relational practice of right speech, reconciliation and renewal that can be used by people in any relationship with each other who wish to communicate with mindfulness and kindness to navigate the storms and misunderstandings that may arise in relationships. We will honor Thay’s legacy by learning the historical context, three parts of this practice and having an opportunity to begin the process of reconciliation and renewal in our own lives by watering positive seeds in ourselves and others.

Marina Dorian, Ph.D., is a core faculty member in the Mindfulness Based Transpersonal Counseling program, teaching at Naropa University since 2018. She is a psychologist and meditation instructor incorporating mindfulness and compassion in her clinical work, coaching and scholarship. She facilitates annual mindfulness retreats in nature and is a board member at the nonprofit Surprise Farm Retreat Center in Ramona, CA. Dr. Dorian currently teaches diagnostic psychopathology, couples therapy, and mindfulness courses including compassion training. She is meditation practitioner and student of Thich Nhat Hanh and practices with a local sangha in San Diego in the Plum Village Tradition.

Your voice matters!

Practice Day is produced by Mission Culture and Inclusive Community where we are committed to a practice of giving and receiving feedback. 

We rely on your voice to help us shape this event in the future, to be more in alignment with our Community Compass. 

Please take a minute, literally it take less than a minute at the end of each session to provide your honest feedback for each session you attend.  There is only one required question but space for you to write a small book. All your ideas are valuable and will be heard. 

The same link may be used more than once and we appreciate your feedback for every session you attend.

Open the FEEDBACK FORM now!