Napa Valley Insight Meditation

24/07/2025

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO SYLVIA BOORSTEIN!

“Mindfulness meditation doesn't change life. Life remains as fragile and unpredictable as ever. Meditation changes the heart's capacity to accept life as it is. It teaches the heart to be more accommodating, not by beating it into submission, but by making it clear that accommodation is a gratifying choice.”

22/07/2025

“To be alive in this beautiful, self-organizing universe — to participate in the dance of life with senses to perceive it, lungs that breathe it, organs that draw nourishment from it — is a wonder beyond words.” — Joanna Macy

Joanna Macy, 1929 - 2025

Joanna died peacefully at her home in Berkeley, California, after a period of ill health. She was 96 years old. She leaves behind a cherished legacy as a widely respected Buddhist teacher, author, eco-philosopher, and environmental activist.

21/07/2025

FRESH LEV WHITE - JULY 22 @ NVIM: We're delighted to share that our friend Fresh "Lev" White will be joining us again this Tuesday evening, July 22, from 7:00 - 8:30pm. Whenever Lev can make the trip from Oakland to be with us, it brings such richness to our gathering. For this session, Lev will explore the teachings on allowing grief as a way to support resilience as we try to cope with the complexities of our current moment. To learn more go to: www.napainsight.org.

14/07/2025

Explore the offerings at Spirit Rock this summer!

14/07/2025

Join us this Tuesday, July 15, from 7:00 - 8:30pm as Eve Decker will be our Special Guest Teacher @ NVIM. Her topic for the evening will be: Some Buddhist Responses to Anxiety.

Eve began Insight Meditation practice in 1991, and has attended more than 50 silent retreats ranging in length from 8-90 days. She is a graduate of University of California, Berkeley; the Path of Engagement (social justice and spiritual practice training); and Community Dharma Leader training at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California. Eve has been a great supporter and friend of NVIM for many years and we are excited to have her back with us!

25/06/2025

"If we wish to ensure everyone's peace and happiness, we need to cultivate a healthy respect for the diversity of our peoples and cultures, founded on an understanding of the fundamental sameness of all human beings." - Dalai Lama

05/04/2025

Please join us for a special daylong retreat on Saturday, April 19th, from 10:00am - 4:00pm, to explore the relationship between joy and sorrow from a Buddhist perspective. The focus will be on both inner work as well as our relationship to external world events through guided meditation, contemplative practice, music, and community reflection. This experience invites practitioners to discover how embracing both emotional states can deepen their meditation practice and enhance their capacity for compassion. Led by NVIM teachers Fresh "Lev" White and Forrest Hill, this retreat offers diverse perspectives for navigating our complex world with wisdom and an open heart. All are welcome.

Daylong: The Dance Of Joy and Sorrow

20/01/2025

"Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love." - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

11/01/2025

08/01/2025

“When a journey is in our future, it is never too soon to check out the travel guides and customs, and to learn the language of the world approaching.” - Stephen Levine

Dear Napa Valley Insight Meditation Community,

This coming January, Mike Coughlin will once again be leading a four part, in person, class series entitled Befriending Mortality: Awakening To Life Through Mindfulness of Death. This immersive and interactive journey will explore Maranasati practice, translated as Mindfulness of Death, and will weave together both classic and contemporary approaches to leaning into, and possibly fully embracing, the essence of life’s impermanence. As with Mike's other series, attendance at all four sessions is encouraged but not mandatory. Attending one, two or three is absolutely fine. Although the classes build on each other, they will also function independently. On the topic of our impermanence, Nikki Mirghafori expressed that "Mindfulness of our own mortality, of the preciousness of our time, can bring a sense of aliveness. The heart that doesn’t cling just holds everything - all the comings and goings - with ease, an open heart, and a sense of freedom.” If this theme feels resonant for you, we hope you will carve out the time in the new year to join us in this process of inquiry, discovery, and letting go.

Each class will be held at the Unitarian Universalist church in Napa on select Thursdays in January and February from 7:00 - 8:30pm and will feature periods of meditation, short Dharma reflections, and time for interaction and discussion. This series is suitable for both experienced and beginning practitioners and will be offered on a sliding scale of $10 - $20 per class. No one will be turned away due to lack of funds. Class dates: Jan 16th, Jan 23rd, Jan 30th and Feb 6th. To register, simply email me at mike@napainsight.org and write, “Please register me for Befriending Mortality.” That’s it. Plain and simple.

Fostering Mindful Awareness, Compassion and Community

22/08/2024

REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN: THE FIVE SPIRITUAL FACULTIES - SEPT 14TH, 9:30AM - 4:00PM.

On Saturday, September 14th, NVIM will be hosting a daylong event with Matthew Brensilver from 9:30am - 4:00pm. The theme will be The Five Spiritual Faculties and this promises to be a rich and engaging day of practice.

Matthew teaches at the Insight Retreat Center, Spirit Rock and Insight Meditation Society. He was previously program director for Mindful Schools and for more than a decade was a core teacher at Against the Stream Buddhist Meditation Society. Matthew worked as a clinical social worker, serving severely and persistently mentally ill adults. He subsequently earned a PhD from the Dworak-Peck School of Social Work at USC. His dissertation examined the mechanisms of risk and resilience in maltreated adolescents in a large, longitudinal study in South Los Angeles. Before committing to teach meditation full-time, he spent years doing research on addiction pharmacotherapy at the UCLA Center for Behavioral and Addiction Medicine. Each summer, he lectures at UCLA’s Mindful Awareness Research Center on the intersections between mindfulness, science and psychotherapy. He serves on the Board of Directors at both Spirit Rock and Insight Meditation Center.

To register for this event please go to Eventbrite:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/a-daylong-retreat-with-matthew-brensilver-tickets-965332695077

or outreach to Forrest Hill at: forrest@napainsight.org.

09/06/2024

MELVIN ESCOBAR: SEP 11 @ NVIM: We are blessed this Tuesday evening, June 11th, to welcome Melvin Escobar, LCSW, to our sangha. As always, our own house band, Chuck Peckinpaugh, will kick things off around 6:45pm with his unique brand of acoustic musical stylings.

Melvin is a bilingual-bicultural Core Teacher at the East Bay Meditation Center, a licensed psychotherapist, and a certified yoga instructor. He is a graduate of EBMC’s Commit to Dharma program and also received formal training through Niroga Institute’s Integral Health Fellowship. For more than a decade Melvin has served EBMC in a variety of roles, including on the development team for Resilience, Refuge and (R)evolution, a six-month leadership program for People of Color. He is a U.S. born bilingual-bicultural Salvadoran who earned his Bachelor of Arts in Social Work degree from San Francisco State University and his Master of Social Work degree from McGill University. He has walked the path of service for most of his life, drawing on his experiences as a working-class q***r man of color. Having encountered the priceless wisdom embodied in Buddhism and Yoga, he continues daily to learn the revolutionary potential of body-centered contemplative practices for personal and social healing. Melvin continues to offer teachings through organizations such as Spirit Rock Meditation Center and has published articles in Lion’s Roar magazine. You can learn more about him at this website: https://melvinescobar.com/.