By IMS Staff Writer Carol Greenhouse Jack Carter spent a month as a facilities department volunteer at IMS in December of 2016. Previously a registered nurse in the emergency department at New York City’s Mount Sinai-Beth Israel Hospital, Jack sat a dozen retreats at IMS and spent three months in residence at the Forest Refuge before filling out IMS’s volunteer application. Volunteering for a month seemed like a good way to take his involvement to the next level. And it was. “I had a nice little room and did minor carpentry repairs, painting projects, and cleaning, as well as tagging along wit ..read more

IMS Teen Retreat Tuesday, June 25-Sunday, June 30, 2024 Register here for this in-person retreat. As a teenager, IMS teacher Cara Lai felt a lot of pressure from the adult world to pursue happiness in a particular way: to get good grades, go to a good college, and make a good living. She didn’t get many chances to explore how she wanted to live. She did notice, though, that many adults didn’t seem happy. She tried to avoid that fate by going to art school rather than following an academic path, but that landed her in a desk job in animation. Cool as it was, she says now, it was still a desk jo ..read more

On Wednesday, February 21, IMS Online kicks off a groundbreaking series of conversations with practitioners and teachers who have been seeding the Dharma in the U.S. for decades. Fireside Chats with Sharon Salzberg will feature IMS’s co-founder as the host of informal live talks about practice with members of IMS’s sangha. The hour-long glimpses into the struggles and rewards of a life dedicated to the Dharma will cover subjects like the highs and lows these practitioners have experienced on the mat, how their teachers have influenced them, the challenges they’ve faced in navigating contempora ..read more

Jonathan Rotenberg has worn many hats over his career—executive coach, management consultant, philanthropist, and now aspiring author. Although a graduate of Brown University, where he studied economics, and Harvard Business School, where he earned an MBA, Jonathan began to make his mark on the world when he was just a freshman in high school. In 1977, he started The Boston Computer Society, which soon became the leading international forum where computer companies unveiled their latest and greatest products to the public. Jonathan’s success with BCS was covered everywhere from Time magazine t ..read more

IMS Partners with the Canadian Prairie Sangha to Preserve the Stories of Our Lineage Holders First-hand stories of the Asian Buddhist meditation masters who trained the teachers who now teach insight meditation throughout North America are a precious gift held by a few. A new online series, Lineage Stories, offered in collaboration by IMS Online and five Canadian Prairie sanghas, seeks to preserve the stories of these lineage holders who first taught early Buddhism to many of our senior teachers. For each program, veteran teachers in the insight tradition will offer their memories of the teach ..read more

devon hase loves long retreats. Cumulatively, she’s spent four years in silent practice in the Insight and Vajrayana traditions. She teaches at the Insight Meditation Society, Spirit Rock, and other centers around the world. Along with her life partner nico, devon co-authoredHow Not to Be a Hot Mess: A Buddhist Survival Guide for Modern Life. She continues to spend a good part of the time in wilderness retreat in Oregon, Massachusetts, and elsewhere. For more, visitdevonandnicohase.com In this dharma talk, given as part of the Cultivating Awareness and Wisdom retreat at IMS, devon reflect ..read more

Jeanne Corrigal has been practicing insight meditation since 1999 and is the guiding teacher for the Saskatoon Insight Meditation Community. She is a graduate of IMS’s teacher training program and a graduate of Spirit Rock’s Dedicated Practitioner and Community Dharma Leader Programs. Jeanne is certified with Indigenous Focusing Oriented Trauma Therapy, a certified Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction teacher through the University of Massachusetts Medical Center, and is a certified Life Skills Coach Trainer with more than 20 years’ experience facilitating adult programs. Jeanne is a member ..read more

Roxanne Dault has been dedicated to this path for almost two decades, sitting on long retreats both in Asia and in the West. She is a graduate of the IMS Teacher Training Program and teaches meditation in Canada, the US, and France. A Guiding Teacher at True North Insight, Roxanne teaches in different settings where she lives in Tiohti:áke (Montréal). Her teachings take root mainly from the lineage of Mahasi Sayadaw and are influenced by her love of nature and Indigenous wisdom. She is trained in Somatic Experiencing®, a body-mind approach aimed at relieving the symptoms of ..read more

Cara Lai spent most of her life trying to figure out how to be happy, or at least avoid total misery, which landed her on a cushion for most of her adulthood. She has worked as an artist, wilderness guide, social worker, and psychotherapist, but at this point she’s given up on being an adult in exchange for an all-out mindfulness rampage. Her teaching is relatable, authentic, funny, and sometimes crass, and is accessible for many people. She teaches teens and adults at Inward Bound Mindfulness Education, Spirit Rock, Insight Meditation Society, and UCLA. For more info or to conn ..read more

Introduction to the Insight Meditation Path: A Beginner’s Weekend RetreatSeptember 2 & 3Register here. Matthew Brensilver, MSW, PhD, teaches retreats at the Insight Retreat Center, Spirit Rock, and other Buddhist centers. 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 and adolescents. He subsequently earned a PhD from the Dworak-Peck School of Social Work at USC where he was a Provost’s Fe ..read more