I am looking so forward to Compassion Cultivation Training (CCT) class beginning on Wednesday September 27th at 11:30. Class will run from 11:30-1:00, beginning on September 27^th and ending on November 15^th. The location of the class can be found below.

Christ Episcopal Church, 509 Scott Street, LR, AR, 72201

Map

The class will be held in the Parlor Room. I will send out another reminder email Monday with a little more information about the exact location in the building and parking etc. Each CCT is typically  2 hours. To accommodate bust schedules, these classes will be 1 1/2 hours, so I will hit the ground running to take advantage of all of our time together.

If you have not completed the “agreement form”, please so so.

I truly love teaching this class. I was one of the first persons certified through Stanford’s Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education to teach this curriculum and have been offering the 8-week course since September 2013. In addition, I teach shorter Mindfulness and Compassion workshops throughout the region.

There is no need to bring anything to class other than yourself, and maybe something to write on and with. I am happy that the time has almost come for us to meet and look forward to sharing CCT with you. I hope that you will find this to be a meaningful experience. This will be my 12th cycle, and the experience becomes a little deeper for me each time. Please let me know if you have any questions before class begins.

For anyone who is interested, I highly recommend Thupten Jinpa’s book A Fearless Heart.

Browse the CCARE website there are many good resources there.

 

Below is a presentation Thupten Jinpa gave last November at the International Symposium on Contemplative Studies on “The Psychology of Compassion Meditation.”

 

 

Here is a basic overview of CCT (From Stanford’s CCARE website):

 

Here is an excellent lecture by Richie Davidson on Contemplative Neuroscience:

 

 

Here is a lecture by Kelly McGonigal about Compassion and Resilience.

 

 

Below is a wonderful Conversation on Compassion with Dr. Doty and Thupten Jinpa. He gives a lot of insights into his own history and the development of the CCT program:

 

 

And here is another Conversation on Compassion with Sharon Salzberg:

 

 

 

Below are a few other recent resources with Thupten Jinpa:

• Teachings from Tibetan Buddhism: On Course for Compassion– article at UTNE.com
• ABC News: Interview with Dan Harris
• Sacred Stream video broadcast: Mind Training Techniques for the West with Thupten Jinpa, Ph.D.

 

One thing about resources: There are a ton of them out there. If they peak your interest, please take a look. If you find them overwhelming, they are by no means necessary. For those who are research minded, I am attaching a few CCT research articles,Take a look if you are interested.

And a note on “meditation:” This is not exclusively a meditation course. There are short guided meditations each week that are a large part of this curriculum, but no meditation experience is expected and there are many ways to engage with the class content. This curriculum is “secular” and presupposes no particular spiritual orientation. If you want to jump in and practice a few “basic” mindfulness meditations, here you go:

 

Thupten Jinpa: Settling the Mind (streaming)

 

Gitchel: Guided Breathing Meditation (15 Minutes) Sept 19, 2016

 

Gitchel: Short Guided Breathing Meditation (5 Minutes)

Downloadable file

 

Compassionate Mindfulness of Breathing

 

During the class, you will be provided with a CCT workbook and other handouts as well as a secure website that will contain the guided meditations for the class and other resources. The audio files can either be streamed or downloaded. I have tried to make everything as “user-friendly” as possible

Again, I look very forward to seeing you on Wednesday the 27th.

Please let me know if you have any questions.