Community Meditation is non-profit network of meditation groups. We bring mindfulness and wellness into people’s lives through courses, meditation sittings and group discussions, both in-person and online. By sharing the benefits of meditation and mindfulness, we support the evolution of a wise, caring, and healthy world.
Our network has existed for over a decade and although our roots are Buddhist, we draw on many wisdom traditions as well as contemporary wellness, psychology, and neuroscience. Community Meditation is completely volunteer-based and guided by a council of experienced teachers.
Community Meditation is a Canada Revenue Agency Registered Charity No. 73107 5719 RR0001.
Your donations, either one-time or with a monthly subscription, help us to pay rent, insurance and other basic expenses. We are a volunteer organization and all of our costs are covered by donations and course fees. Online Canadian donors will receive an annual tax receipt for the full amount of their donations in each calendar year.
One-Time Donation Monthly Donation
NOTE: For monthly donations, use the Qty button to adjust the amount in units of $5. For example, a Qty of "3" is 3 x 5 = $15.
All online sessions, except our short morning sessions, include a 20-minute silent meditation. New to meditation? Instruction is available.
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Click here to join on Zoom @ 8:45 AM ET
Looking for a mindful start to your day? We're launching silent group meditations from 8:45 to 9 AM ET, Monday to Friday. There is no meditation instruction available in these sessions–if you'd like instruction, email hello@communitymeditation.net.
Click here to join on Zoom @ 7 PM ET
Please join Brenda, Gordon, and Jim for 20 minutes of silent meditation followed by a reading of Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life With the Heart of a Buddha by Tara Brach. Everyone is welcome, and there's no need to have or be familiar with the book.
Our most habitual and compelling feelings and thoughts define the core of who we think we are. If we are caught in the trance of unworthiness, we experience that core as flawed.
– Tara Brach
Click here to join on Zoom @ 7 PM ET
Join Kaye-Lee, Gloria, and Marian for 20 minutes of silent meditation followed by the reading and discussion of "The Hessian Soldier" in Tracy Cochran's book Presence: The Art of Being at Home in Yourself. You don't need to be familiar with the book. Everyone is welcome.
I could have been this ghost crouching in this basement. My heart, open to this unknown being trapped between two worlds. It was the subtlest inner movement. I was paying attention to my own experience, and then I noticed I was noticing him. Real or not, he had been trapped here for hundreds of years, not belonging to this world.
– Tracy Cochran
Click here to join on Zoom @ 7 PM ET
ONLINE
Please join Lauren, Adam, and Sandi for an evening of contemplation and connection. We will be sharing some videos on playfulness and joy. How do we create the right conditions to embrace lighthearted play?
Our session will begin with 20 minutes of silent meditation.
Embracing a playful mindset can enhance our well-being, foster creativity, and deepen connections with those around us.
– Jessica Perkins
IN-PERSON – OWEN SOUND
Do you have a particularly critical inner voice with a penchant for beating up on...you? You're not alone. In fact, it's practically an epidemic in the Western world. Join Ken to explore writings by Kristen Neff and Judson Brewer on the causes–and resolutions–to this kind of harsh self-talk. Our session starts with a bit of hanging out, followed by 35 minutes of sitting and walking meditation, and then a discussion on the topic of negative internal chatter.
...beating yourself up for finishing only three of the five items on your to-do list is going to make you less likely to finish those last two items.
– Charlotte Lieberman
Click here to join on Zoom @ 7 PM ET
ONLINE
Please join Debbie, Daniel, and Stephanie to discuss Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche's Just Be: The Key to Transformation, in which he talks about our habit of not being present. Our session will begin with 20 minutes of silent meditation.
In our fast-paced society, we are constantly doing — thinking, planning, achieving. We fill every spare moment with stimulation, often losing ourselves in thoughts of the past or worries about the future. In this monthly teaching, Mingyur Rinpoche reveals why we’ve lost touch with the present moment and why learning to “just be” is the true key to transformation.
– Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche
Click here to join on Zoom @ 7 PM ET
ECODHARMA
Join Debbie to explore how Barbara Leckie's work, Loving the World, could address the climate crisis and help us make sense of changes to come. She encourages us to look at our stories about climate change and bring love into our response. Our session will begin with 20 minutes of silent meditation.
Friday EcoDharma sessions are designed for those experiencing anxiety or grief relating to environmental issues. The aim is to bring mindfulness and Buddhist practices to our distress, and to build community.
Now, as many people seek to understand and respond to the climate crisis, they are again experiencing a sense of personal loss and a larger sense of not having the conceptual tools to make sense of this moment. How does one love the world in difficult times?
– Barbara Leckie
Click here to join on Zoom @ 10:15 AM ET
ONLINE
Join Debbie as we start Ethan Nichtern's latest book, Confidence. In the introduction, titled "The Eight Worldly Winds", we'll examine how we get pulled around emotionally and mentally by the dynamic worldly duos: praise/criticism, pleasure/pain, high reputation/insignificance, and success/failure. We'll sit for 20 minutes of silent meditation. There's no need to be familiar with the book.
Exploration of each pair of these winds offers insights into what makes our self-regard so fragile and offers practices we can adopt when they inevitably blow through our lives.
– Ethan Nichtern
Writing on Mindful.org, Diana Winston offers a 12-minute guided meditation to work with the voice of our inner critic:
I want to talk about the concept of self-compassion. Self-compassion is different from self-esteem. There seems to be this epidemic of self-judgment in the world, where people are often self-critical and have a lot of self-hating voices in their heads. Self-compassion is not the build up of self-esteem, because the build up of self-esteem tends to lead people to needing a lot of external validation to feel ok. Instead, self-compassion is the idea that even with all of our flaws, we can still care about ourselves, that we can make mistakes, that we can screw up, that we can have problems, but we’re still fundamentally a good human being. We can connect with that understanding and have compassion for ourselves, even with the flaws that we have.
Click here for the article and guided meditation.
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Ken, Sandi, and the Community Meditation Team
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
We started this meditation network to help you bring more clarity, balance, caring and joy to your life and your community.
The truth that many people never understand, until it is too late, is that the more you try to avoid suffering, the more you suffer.
― Thomas Merton
