instructors
TWIM Instructors are dedicated to the principle and meditation practices described in the earliest Buddhist suttas. Each has many years of personal practice, study, formal training, and experience guiding others to practice TWIM. They share in their enthusiasm to help other understand the principles and develop capacity to achieve results with meaningful progress in the stages of meditation to the goal.
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Venerable Obhasa Go>
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IN REMEMBERANCE OF BELOVED TEACHERS
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Venerable Bhante Vimalaramsi Go>
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Teri Pohl Go>
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Why the Buddha Smiled
TWIM classes and retreat courses continue to grow in popularity around the globe. They discover that TWIM is enjoyable to practice and immediately effective. Practicing TWIM dissolves habitual thought loops and painful emotional moods producing in greater tranquility, ease, and relief.
Courses feature one-on-one instructor mentoring to insure clear transmission and adoption for skill development and progress thought the stages of meditation. Retreats and classes vary slightly from teacher to teacher. All TWIM instructors provide the precise methodology and guidance to support progress, develop skillsets, confidence, and knowledge acquired by direct experience as it is discribed in the earliest Buddhist Pali texts.
Courses feature one-on-one instructor mentoring to insure clear transmission and adoption for skill development and progress thought the stages of meditation. Retreats and classes vary slightly from teacher to teacher. All TWIM instructors provide the precise methodology and guidance to support progress, develop skillsets, confidence, and knowledge acquired by direct experience as it is discribed in the earliest Buddhist Pali texts.
Training and Development
TWIM Instructors are dedicated meditation practice, study, social, and moral steadfastness. It is acquired through kindness, compassion, and concern for the welfare of all living being. They choose to teach because they have acquired the knowledge to help others on the path to eradicate unhappiness and suffering in all of its forms.
Common Traits of TWIM Instructors
Common Traits of TWIM Instructors
- Ethical Conduct: They adhere to the ethical precepts of Buddhism, demonstrating integrity, honesty, and compassion in their actions and interactions.
- Deep Meditation Practice: They have a well-established personal meditation practice, often with many years of experience and divers and rigorous training.
- Embodiment of Teachings: They not only teach the Buddhist principles but also embody them in their daily lives, demonstrating qualities like mindfulness, kindness, and wisdom.
- Clear and Skillful Communication: They can effectively communicate complex meditative and Buddhist concepts in ways that are accessible and relevant to students, using various teaching methods to cater to different learning styles.
- Compassion and Empathy: They approach their students with genuine care and understanding, creating a supportive and safe environment for learning and growth.
Origin of the Six Rs
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Venerable Bhante Vimalaramsi was the innovator of the Six R's methodology. The Six Rs is an internal part of TWIM as a distinctive method. Bhante spent decades of intensive meditation. He studied the ancient Buddhist texts and gradually formulated a sequence of actions that eradicates the causes of distractions. I was developed to simplify the actions described in early translations of "Right Effort", key principle in early Buddhist text. Right eEffort discribes not only how to meditate but how to deal with unpleasant mental and emotional states that arise in meditation and daily life.
Bhante discovered that the key of Right Effort was to consciously engage specific actions that replaces pleasant thoughts and feelings with unpleasant thoughts and feelings. He went on to explain that unpleasant thoughts and feelings were rooted in habitual endemic urges or craving as it it commonly referred to in Buddhism. The goal of Right Effort was to learn how to recognize craving and next how to abandon or release it before it triggered ingrained compulsions that would inevitably lead to unpleasant consequences. He taught that craving usually manifests as tension and tightness in the head, neck, and shoulders. Relax was the next step. By noticing tension or tightness in the body and mind, the manifestation of craving is abandoned by relaxing or softening the muscles in the head, neck, and shoulders. After relaxing, he advised smiling. He encouraged little smile on the corners of the mouth. "Smile with your heart, simile with eyes" he would often add. "This is a smiling meditation" he often said. Smile and make it sincere and keep smiling as much as possible. |
Beginning instructions audio clip. (50 minutes)
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On many occasions, Bhante explained that the root conditions and causes of unhappiness were not hard wired in the nervous system. He pointed out that it was a software programming problem that can be reversed with TWIM. He taught that by applying effective meditation principles embodied in TWIM that habitual craving is deconditioned in favor of pleasant and peaceful states of made. Once the mind is composed with stillness in perfect balance, it filly releases. It becomes liberated. Nirvana.
"This is an "all the time practice" --Bhante Vimalaramsi
The Six Rs activates and balances the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) with the central nervous system (CNS). During meditation, the Six Rs may be activated every few minutes for beginners. The PNS becomes activated while resting, meditating, and during sleep. The PNS functions to maintain health with regulation of digestion, heart rate, breathing, the immune system, and overall bodily health. It decreases stress responses by releasing hormones like dopamine while inhibiting hormones, and chemicals like adrenaline and cortisol, trigger compulsions, anxiety, or anger and other stress reactions. The activation of the PNS has a feeling of relief, expansion, warmth, and calm. When the PNS is dominate, the "flight, fight or fornicate" default mode is temporarily offline ready to be triggered by perceived dangers, hunger, or sex.
There is a mental reset when the Six Rs are used in meditation and in daily life. People that use the Six Rs discover that wholesome mental states are the base conditions for emotional resilience and mental agility leading to liberation by direct insight. It culminates in the development and fulfillment of seven key awakening factors. These are the essential conditions for release for craving and the goal of meditation.
There is a mental reset when the Six Rs are used in meditation and in daily life. People that use the Six Rs discover that wholesome mental states are the base conditions for emotional resilience and mental agility leading to liberation by direct insight. It culminates in the development and fulfillment of seven key awakening factors. These are the essential conditions for release for craving and the goal of meditation.
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Applying the Six Rs cultivates brain and heart coherence. It aligns the CNS and PNS in homeostasis. This is the optional functioning for biological conditions. The benefits of heart and brain coherence directly affects behavior:
1. Feeling whole and wholesome. 2. Feeling like you have a place the World 3. Feeling peace an contentment 4. Feeling free of stress 5. Feeling vitality and energized 6. Feeling spontaneous and creative 7. Feeling connected to people and nature 8. Being emotional resilience 9. Being intuitive 10. Being intellectually agile and clear The heart and the brain are deeply connected, and you can sense this connection by practicing heart-brain coherence techniques.Find more about the science and benefits of brain and heart coherence at Heartmath Institute and Alleviant Integrated Mental Health. AMAZON BOOK REVIEWS
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