Going for Refuge as an Evolutionary Leap

This class will explore the basic foundational premise of Buddhist philosophy, exploring one of the most profound yogic practices for beginning the process of inner-alchemy. We will consider why we would seek to explore Buddhism in the first place, and consider the value of understanding our own humanity. We will lay the groundwork for understanding what it means to enter the path towards enlightenment through the concept and practice of “going for refuge,” within the context of Buddhist approaches to freedom through a contemplative and experiential insight into the realities of suffering, impermanence, and non-self. The practical importance and day-to-day implications of Buddhist training will be the focus of this discussion.

Cost: Suggested Donation $10-$20
No one will be turned away due to lack of funds!

John Allen Gibel

John-Allen Gibel is a yoga teacher and filmmaker who’s early fascination with the spirituality of India and would lead to a life of training and diligent practice across various traditions and with many extraordinary teachers from the system of Ashtanga yoga, as well as Tibetan Buddhism. In his yoga classes, he synthesize the techniques of vinyasa-based movement for cultivating the harmonization of body, speech, and mind with the foundations of mindfulness, intuition, and sensitivity developed through meditation. He incorporates a knowledge of functional anatomy into his classes, emphasizing the principles of myofascial and neuromuscular therapies. John-Allen believes that yoga should be challenging, accessible, and ultimately liberating. Postural yoga and breath practice, in its highest expression, is skillful means for cultivating the calm abiding meditative awareness that gives rise to innate transformational insight into the spiritual meaning of our own humanity. Yoga, when applied with sincerity, can divest us of our artifice, the tethers of the ego, and open our hearts to the raw potentiality of our role as compassionate wisdom-beings in the world. John Allen lives in Tarapoto, Peru and is currently integrating his studies of yoga with the practices and techniques of Amazonian vegetalismo.