Opening to the Unconditional Love and Wisdom of Our Buddha Nature

This online meditation retreat draws on Tibetan Buddhism to explore buddha nature, the basic space of our being that is undivided from awareness, warmth, love, compassion, and wisdom. It is offered through the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies in Barre, Vermont, and held on Zoom over two days. It suits Buddhist practitioners and people of any faith who already have a contemplative practice and want an accessible way to cultivate unconditional love and wisdom.

What to Expect

The teaching holds that these capacities are always present beneath surface consciousness, though often hidden by habits of thought and reaction. The retreat adapts a pattern of practice from Tibetan Buddhism, with some help from modern psychology, in three modes:

- Receptive: generating a field of care that opens access to unconditional love and wisdom from the depth of awareness.
- Deepening: letting those loving qualities help the mind settle into their source, the non-conceptual openness, simplicity, clarity, and compassionate warmth of buddha nature.
- Inclusive: coming from that depth to recognize others in their depth and include them in the same openness and compassion. This also strengthens the ability to see the empty, constructed nature of the reactions to others that block compassion.

Each session follows a simple format: Dharma talks that introduce guided meditations, large-group question and answer, and small-group discussion. A meditation handout is provided.

The schedule runs on US Eastern Time, with a morning and an afternoon block on both days:

- 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM
- 2:30 PM to 5:30 PM

Recordings can be streamed by participants for eight weeks afterward, which helps if you are in a distant time zone or want to revisit a practice.

Before You Go

This is a retreat for intermediate and advanced practitioners. Participants are expected to have at least two years of regular spiritual practice, from any tradition.

Please read ahead if you can. The recommended preparation is How Compassion Works by John Makransky and Paul Condon (Shambhala, 2025), or as much of it as you can manage. Awakening through Love by John Makransky is offered as an alternative. The books are not included.

Included are the live sessions, the meditation handout, and eight weeks of access to the recordings. The teacher is not paid through the registration fee, and participants are encouraged to offer dana, the traditional practice of generosity.

If your plans change, contact the center right away. Cancelling before the program starts earns a full refund minus an administrative fee. Fees are nonrefundable once the program has begun.