Talk and Session Descriptions

October 17th, Friday Morning Talk: 10:00am - 12:00pm

Love is the most simple essence and the energy that underlies all of creation. In the simplicity of divine love everything is included and known according to its true nature. In this talk we will explore this quality of love and how the Sufis have held its secret for humanity. Through this love we can return to a way of being that is in harmony with all life.

October 17th, Friday Afternoon Sessions: 2:00pm - 3:45pm

Breath is the most essential, and arguably the least acknowledged, human activity. Physically, breath constitutes the symbiotic bond between all of Earth’s creatures, and spiritually, breath is the bond between every creature and its Creator. It is the awakening of breath that awakens the heart. A true definition of a Sufi is sahib al-anfas, “one who breathes well.”

This is an experiential workshop in the art of listening.   If you go to a temple, you leave your shoes outside.  Just so, you leave your ego and intellect at the door and open to the experience of the sound.  Allow the heart to surrender to the music.  Only then can the musician, the music, and the audience merge into the ocean of sound.  After practicing the art of listening, time will be allotted for questions and answers.  This Session is particularly designed for those already using some form of sound or music as part of their personal or therapeutic practice.

October 17th, Friday Afternoon Sessions: 4:00pm - 5:45pm

This Session will explore the Secret's of Love's Desire.

 

Dances of Universal Peace
Pir Shabda Kahn

We come together to sing and dance our praises in God and to experience our divine nature. Through prayer in motion, cultivating joy, community and peace, we seek to awaken our embodiment of the essence of the Only Being. We will share in circle dances, drawing from diverse religious traditions -- including the practice of sufi zikrs -- which support us in our quest for realization and service.

The Dances of Universal Peace are a body centered spiritual practice using movement, sacred chant and music. Women and men dancing in the same circle are on common ground. We invoke the experience that there is nothing but God and that all manifestation is but the Face of God.

All welcome, no experience necessary!

October 17th, Friday Evening Zikr: 7:30pm - 9:30pm

Songs of the Lovers, the Beloved, and Love's Path of Secret Desire.

October 18th, Saturday Talk: 10:00am - 11:30am

October 18th, Saturday Afternoon Sessions: 2:00pm - 3:45pm

The ancient meditation technique of the Western world, used by the great beings who brought our Western civilization into existence, is known as Incubation. This was the technique for descending to the depths of light inside the dark realms of the dead. But one of the many profound paradoxes of Incubation is that only by sinking into the world of death inside oneself is it possible to discover the source, and the immediacy, and the purpose, of life. In this Session Peter will provide a brief introduction to the mystery of incubation and offer an opportunity to rediscover this simple but profoundly transformative state of being.  

We will share a taste of the group practice of the Qadiri Butchishi order as guided by Sheikh Hamza Al Qadiri Al Butchishi of Morocco, followed by a talk on one person's experience of the Sufi path while living in the world of family, work and community. When our devotion is answered, God says: "... and then I love him. And when I love him I am the ears by which he hears, the eye by which he sees, and the hand by which he grasps, and the foot by which he walks." We understand that the practices are not for us, but for Life itself, and all our interactions are transformed. In this state the Sufi is no longer, and Love is.

Be Still -- Awake
Maata Lynn Barron

We will explore practices that are designed to bring Light into the heart: techniques that have been traditionally used to awaken one to the inner reality of our Being. Through the power of the practice of remembrance, storytelling, praise and forgiveness, you may get a taste of “the astonishing Light of your own Being.”  

October 18th, Saturday Afternoon Sessions: 4:00pm - 5:45pm

This Session will include time for questions, discussion, and dreamwork.

Be Still -- Awake
Maata Lynn Barron

We will explore practices that are designed to bring Light into the heart: techniques that have been traditionally used to awaken one to the inner reality of our Being. Through the power of the practice of remembrance, storytelling, praise and forgiveness, you may get a taste of “the astonishing Light of your own Being.”  

 

Dances of Universal Peace
Pir Shabda Kahn

We come together to sing and dance our praises in God and to experience our divine nature. Through prayer in motion, cultivating joy, community and peace, we seek to awaken our embodiment of the essence of the Only Being. We will share in circle dances, drawing from diverse religious traditions -- including the practice of sufi zikrs -- which support us in our quest for realization and service.

The Dances of Universal Peace are a body centered spiritual practice using movement, sacred chant and music. Women and men dancing in the same circle are on common ground. We invoke the experience that there is nothing but God and that all manifestation is but the Face of God.

All welcome, no experience necessary!

October 18th, Saturday Evening Concert: 8:00pm - 10:00pm

Music is the language of the soul and a concert by K. Sridhar is a profound glimpse into a lifetime dedicated to the expression of divine sound.  It is to Sridhar’s Sufi guru that he gives credit for giving his music a quality described as “an aspiration towards spiritual bliss.” 

October 19th, Sunday Talk: 9:30am - 11:00am

We can see photos of the physical heart, and sketch pictures of hearts pierced by the arrow of longing, and sometimes experience the extraordinary love that seems to come from this part of our body. And of course we all are familiar with the fundamental spiritual distinction between the heart and the mind as different organs of knowing. But how can we know for sure that what we think of, or experience, as the heart is really the heart and is not just a mental idea of what we believe the heart to be? In this talk Peter will raise these basic questions and offer some suggestions as to how we can truly approach the mystery of our heart, which perhaps is not only our heart but also the heart of the cosmos and the living heart of our civilization.

October 19th, Sunday Talk: 11:00am - 12:00pm