East Bay Meditation Center

ONLINE: 8 Step Buddhist Recovery Deep Refuge
2024-09-28 10:00 - 11:30, 2024-10-05 10:00 - 11:30, 2024-10-12 10:00 - 11:30, 2024-10-19 10:00 - 11:30, 2024-10-26 10:00 - 11:30, 2024-11-02 10:00 - 11:30, 2024-11-09 10:00 - 11:30, 2024-11-16 10:00 - 11:30 (America/Los_Angeles) and 3 more dates | East Bay Meditation Center, 285 17th Street, Oakland, CA, 94612, United States
Every Saturday from 10AM – 11:30AM PST / PDT ONLINE
Compassionate Dharma Deep Refuge Buddhist meetings focus on ways to heal addiction. Based on the Eight Steps to Recovery developed by Dr. Mason-John M.A (hon.doc) and Dr Groves, we believe this inclusive approach can build a solid foundation for those at any level of recovery and for those who have yet to seek help.
Through these practices we hope you gain a practice that can sustain you in your recovery.
We are a multi-recovery space. Whether you are navigating addiction to substances like drugs and alcohol, or process addictions, such as disordered eating, codependency, or sex and love addiction–you are welcome here.
Advance Registration is not required.
For additional information, please contact: ebmcrecovery at gmail dot com.

ONLINE: Parent-Caregiver Sangha
2024-10-07 20:00 - 21:15, 2024-11-04 20:00 - 21:15, 2024-12-02 20:00 - 21:15
EBMC’s Parent-Caregiver teaching team will be offering a monthly parents’ meditation group for restoration, support and connection.

Parenting often can be challenging…as well as a great practice. We offer a short talk, guided meditation and sharing. We gather to create a safe refuge to share the joys and the challenges of caring for young people by cultivating loving-kindness, compassion, patience and generosity with the support of the sangha. We welcome all parents/grandparents/caregivers of young people to join us. No prior experience necessary.

Meeting time: First Mondays of the month, 8-9:15 PM Pacific Time. On Zoom (closed captions provided).

Click here for more information.

ONLINE: Alphabet Sangha
2024-10-08 19:00 - 20:30, 2024-10-22 19:00 - 20:30, 2024-10-29 19:00 - 20:30, 2024-11-12 19:00 - 20:30, 2024-11-26 19:00 - 20:30, 2024-12-10 19:00 - 20:30
A meditation group for the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, Same-Gender Loving, and Two-Spirit communities. Because that’s such a mouthful, we call ourselves the Alphabet Sangha.
Tuesdays
7:00 – 8:30 pm
Please email: alphabetsangha at eastbaymeditation dot org to request Zoom link to join online.
For more information, visit the ALPHABET SANGHA WEBSITE

ONLINE: Ancestors Welcome Here: Healing White Supremacy (for White People)
2024-10-10 17:30 - 19:00, 2024-10-17 17:30 - 19:00, 2024-10-24 17:30 - 19:00
Ancestors Welcome Here: Healing White Supremacy (for white people)
Thursdays Evenings
October 10, 17, and 24
with Ream and Sara Oakes
Closed Captioning Provided on Zoom

White people*: We need all the help we can get. Working at the level of the body, we will welcome our well ancestors of blood and bone to extend their blessings to us, and to give us their full support and backing in our efforts to end white supremacy in our lifetimes.

We all come from people who lived in interdependence with each other and connection with the Earth. This class invites a reconnection to our lineages through practicing meditation, healing and repair, so that we can know ourselves and our inherent belonging more deeply.

*For self-identified white people. If you identify as white and are committed to racial justice, this class is for you.

For Zoom participation, these are our Universal Access Guidelines:
– Please do not use virtual or blurred backgrounds
– Please keep your camera still when it’s turned on
– Please say your name when you speak
– Facilitators will attempt to read any comments in the chat out loud
– Please mute when you’re not speaking.

Teaching Team

Ream
Community Teacher
Pronouns: They/Them
Ream is a queer organizer and somatics practitioner of European ancestry on unceded Ohlone Land, organizing for economic and racial justice and immigrants’ rights, working for over 25 years in the labor movement and currently as the Strategic Campaigns Director for the United Domestic Workers’ Union. Ream is a graduate of EBMC’s PITA and WAS programs and is a co-founder of the Social Justice Sangha. Ream is a practitioner with Generative Somatics, teaching “Somatics for White Racial Justice Organizers” and holds trauma healing groups with activists and movement leaders.

Sara Oakes
Teen Sangha Teacher
Pronouns: She/Her
Sara began her spiritual practice in the path of yoga and devotional chanting in 2000 when she also started training in dance and the healing arts. She has practiced in the Insight Meditation tradition since 2004 attending regular retreats with teachers in the U.S.A., Europe, India and Myanmar. She is a graduate of both the Dedicated Practitioners and the Community Dharma Leader Programs at Spirit Rock Meditation Center. She has a private practice in Craniosacral therapy, Organic Intelligence, and Somatic Experiencing trauma resolution for people of all ages in the East Bay. Website: LucidHuman.org.

Cost
The teachings are regarded as priceless. So they are offered without a fee. You are invited to support the teachings and our efforts by contributing voluntary donations (the practice of “Dana”) for the expenses of the meditation center and the support of the teachers.
To support our teachers, you may send a financial gift via:
Vemmo: @Ranger18Ream
PayPal: adelante@riseup.net
Please reference “Ancestors Welcome Here”. The teachers will share the gifts.
Other ways to give:
To make a gift to sustain the work of East Bay Meditation Center, you may do so via Paypal: paypal.me/eastbaymeditation or our website: eastbaymeditation.org/dana 100% of our programming is sliding scale and no one will ever be turned away for lack of funds.
Thank you for the gifts of your generosity and for supporting the work of East Bay Meditation Center and our beloved teachers who have volunteered their time.

ONLINE: Kapwa Deep Refuge Group for Filipinx/a/o Practitioners
2024-10-20 09:00 - 10:30, 2024-11-17 09:00 - 10:30
This is a peer-led deep refuge group for self-identifying Filipinx/a/o (including mixed) folks. Together we cultivate a special community space in the intersection of Filipinx/a/o identity + culture + history and Buddhist spiritual practice. We gather to support each other, heal, and walk the Dharma path.

Kapwa Deep Refuge will meet every 3rd Sunday at 9am PST – 10:30am PST via Zoom. The inaugural meeting will be on April 21, 2024.

If you identify as Filipinx/a/o and would like to join, please contact us at: kapwa.deep.refuge@gmail.com

ONLINE: Afrikan Healing and Wisdom
2024-11-03 09:00 - 10:30, 2024-12-01 09:00 - 10:30
ONLINE: Afrikan Healing and Wisdom
With Vimalasara Mason-John, Arisika Razak, and Aleta Toure’
First Sundays, starting November 3rd 2024
9:00 – 10:30 AM PT
Closed captioning provided over Zoom

Join us for EBMC’s first Black-led, Black-Sangha Affinity group held on the first Sunday of every month starting on Sunday, November 3rd, 2024 from 9 AM till 10:30 AM.
Today, those of us living in the USA vibrate to the breath of our Ancestral North Star, highest realm of guidance. Our ancestors are with us, as we step into a seemingly repeated quantum leap of time, during one of the most turbulent election seasons since the presidential election of 1876, and the 1877 compromise which ended Reconstruction. We are in a sentinel moment, echoing the situations described in Martin Luther King’s book, “Why We Can’t Wait”. Like our Diasporan kinfolx, we are questioning our common humanity, as we see the age-old dream of peace, and ecological balance distorted in the deep and seemingly bottomless pool of genocide, war, climate change, ecological devastation, poverty and global health pandemics.
Join us as we bring a timely spoonful of Afrikana medicine to these challenging and difficult times. We’ll add ancestral healing traditions to the simple practice of the breath, sharing meditations, libations, chanting and other embodied practices to remember our resilience, honor our ancestors, and support an inclusive and affirming community for all members of the Afrikan Diaspora.
REGISTRATION
We will continue to add registration for each month!

COST

Here at EBMC, we practice gift economics and our programs are offered freely without set fees. Financial gifts from our community help to sustain our teachers AND our center. Generosity is the Buddha’s first teaching, the lifeblood of EBMC, and an act of sacred reciprocity. We ask that those who have more financial means give more, in order to help balance the giving of those who have less financial means.
To make a gift to sustain the work of East Bay Meditation Center, please do so via our website: eastbaymeditation.org/dana. Consider becoming a monthly donor for any amount! These contributions are especially valuable to our sustainability.
Please also consider giving a financial gift to our teachers as well, who do not receive a salary for their work, and give their teachings freely to all. In this way, we practice sacred reciprocity between teachers and students.
Giving Information:
VENMO: @Arisika-Razak
PAYPAL: arisikarazak@gmail.com
(Please reference “Afrikan Healing & Wisdom” and the teachers will share the gifts with each other)

TEACHING TEAM

Vimalasara (Valerie) Mason-John is the author of the new revised edition of Detox Your Heart – Meditations For Emotional Trauma published by Wisdom books in 2017. She is co-author of the award-winning book Eight Step Recovery – Using The Buddha’s Teachings to Overcome Addiction. She is a TEDx speaker and is the author of eight books including her award winning novel Borrowed Body. She is the curator of Teachings in Uncertain Times, an online retreat by Teachers of Color for Tricycle Magazine February 2017. She is a leading African Canadian voice in the field of Mindfulness for Emotional Trauma and Addiction.

Arisika Razak, MPH, EBMC Core teacher, is the former Chair of the Women’s Spirituality Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies. Previously a nurse-midwife, her teachings incorporate diverse spiritual traditions, women’s health and healing, multicultural feminisms, queer theory, and diversity theory. Arisika has led national and international healing workshops and ritual celebrations for women for over three decades, as well as embodied spiritual workshops for people of all genders. She has co-facilitated workshops with Marlene Jones at Spirit Rock Meditation Center and regularly leads workshops at EBMC.

Aleta Toure’ (Visiting Teacher) Aleta Toure’ bears witness as a vessel for social change through organizing, education and healing arts. She centers healing in monastic lifestyle knowledge though Intentional Communities and Black cooperative movements. Her cooperative serves communities through Black Trauma Anonymous (BTA), Tai chi, Ecstatic Healing Dance and Healing Responders. Aleta spends time within Peace Pagodas, monasteries, hermitages, and dojos which have framed her work through Free Marissa Now, “I am Troy Davis”, University Without Walls and other Diasporic Movements. She leads the 2025 California Reparations Interfaith Healing Walk to bring healing, theory and practice back as a Liberation tool.

ONLINE DAYLONG: Coming Back to Source
2024-11-30 10:00 - 15:00
ONLINE DAYLONG: Coming Back to Source
With Margarita Loinaz
ALL ARE WELCOME
Some meditation experience is recommended

Saturday November 30th
10 AM – 3PM PT
Online only
Closed captioning provided on Zoom

In this daylong, we will hold our hearts with tenderness as we step out of the rollercoaster of hope and fear. Attending to our bodies, we will find ways to recognize the infinitely free essence that is our birthright. This essence is inseparable from the Source of Life itself and provides the qualities and perspective that support our capacity to meet all we encounter.
Being held within the field of our spiritual community, there will be guided meditations with the body that help us enter into a deeper relatedness with all that is. Through unstructured movement, we can come to experience the non-conceptual awareness that is the core of our essence. There will also be direct instructions on recognizing our essence and entering into a deeper silence. Integration through discussion and possible breakout groups will be included to help us see the relevance to all that we are facing at this time.
There will be a 45-minute lunch break during the program.

Cost
The teachings are regarded as priceless. So they are offered without a fee. You are invited to support the teachings and our efforts by contributing voluntary donations (the practice of “Dana”) for the expenses of the meditation center and the support of the teachers.
The ticket prices are listed as different tiers with suggested donations based on income ranges. For those who wish to give more, you may choose an “add-on” to your ticket. For those unable to give, there is an option for that.
Other ways to give:
To make a gift to sustain the work of East Bay Meditation Center, you may do so via Paypal: paypal.me/eastbaymeditation or our website: eastbaymeditation.org/dana 100% of our programming is sliding scale and no one will ever be turned away for lack of funds.
Please also consider giving a financial gift to our teachers as well, who do not receive a salary for their work, and give their teachings freely to all. Giving information for Margarita will be provided during the program.
Thank you for the gifts of your generosity and for supporting the work of East Bay Meditation Center and our beloved teachers who have volunteered their time.

For Zoom participation, these are our Universal Access Guidelines:
– Please do not use virtual or blurred backgrounds
– Please keep your camera still when it’s turned on
– Please say your name when you speak
– Facilitators will attempt to read any comments in the chat out loud
– Please mute when you’re not speaking.

Teacher

Margarita Loinaz, MD has trained in the Tibetan and Theravada traditions. She met her root teacher Kalu Rimpoche in 1977 and is a Dzogchen student of Lama Drimed Norbu. She is a graduate of the first Community Dharma Leader’s Program at SRMC and began teaching in l997 leading the Women of Color Sitting Group in Marin City with Marlene Jones and co-organizing the first People of Color Retreat in 1999. Her current teaching integrates Dzogchen practice with social justice and environmental awareness. As a physician, she served Day Laborers, the Latinx and Homeless communities in San Francisco. She is a grandmother and originally from the Dominican Republic.

ONLINE CLASS SERIES: Finding Liberation in Relationship
2024-12-02 18:30 - 20:30, 2024-12-09 18:30 - 20:30
ONLINE CLASS SERIES: Finding Liberation in Relationship: Accountability, Conflict, Boundaries and Feedback
With Dawn Haney and René Rivera
ALL ARE WELCOME
4 Monday evenings: December 2, 9, 16, 23
6:30-8:30pm PT
Online only
Closed captioning provided on Zoom
In this time of so much conflict, devastation and uprising, how do we bring our practice to our relationships, and how do we find freedom and choice there? Our friendships, partnerships, family and communities can be a source of joy and support, and also of struggle and suffering. In this four week class we will explore concrete practices grounded in Buddhist meditation, somatics, and transformative justice.
We will practice feedback, boundaries, and nervous system regulation, while applying mindfulness to investigate our conditioned tendencies and positionality in power relations. Through turning towards the delight and difficulty in our relationships we will build resource and resilience and create space to be our most authentic selves in our relationships and in the larger world.

Cost
The teachings are regarded as priceless. So they are offered without a fee. You are invited to support the teachings and our efforts by contributing voluntary donations (the practice of “Dana”) for the expenses of the meditation center and the support of the teachers.
The ticket prices are listed as different tiers with suggested donations based on income ranges. For those who wish to give more, you may choose an “add-on” to your ticket. For those unable to give, there is an option for that.
Other ways to give:
To make a gift to sustain the work of East Bay Meditation Center, you may do so via Paypal: paypal.me/eastbaymeditation or our website: eastbaymeditation.org/dana 100% of our programming is sliding scale and no one will ever be turned away for lack of funds.
Please also consider giving a financial gift to our teachers as well, who do not receive a salary for their work, and give their teachings freely to all.
Venmo: @dawnmarissa
Paypal: PayPal.Me/ReneRiveraOak
Please indicate “FLR” in the subject line. The teachers will share the gifts with each other.
Thank you for the gifts of your generosity and for supporting the work of East Bay Meditation Center and our beloved teachers who have volunteered their time.
For Zoom participation, these are our Universal Access Guidelines:
– Please do not use virtual or blurred backgrounds
– Please keep your camera still when it’s turned on
– Please say your name when you speak
– Facilitators will attempt to read any comments in the chat out loud
– Please mute when you’re not speaking.

Teachers

Dawn Haney is a teacher, coach, and consultant, committed to helping communities and organizations learn how to navigate change while attending to dynamics of identity and power. They braid together wisdom from Buddhism, social justice, and psychology traditions, and alchemize this with their own experiences as a white, fat, queer, neurodivergent, nonbinary femme to support individual and community change. A dharma student since 2003, she is a Community Teacher at East Bay Meditation Center, mentors new meditation teachers, and offers DEIA and organizational development consulting to meditation programs and social change groups.

René Rivera is a meditation teacher and restorative justice facilitator working and learning in all the spaces in-between race, gender, and other perceived binaries, as a queer Latinx trans man. René teaches heart-centered, trauma-informed meditation, as a core teacher at the East Bay Meditation Center. He has co-led the first residential meditation retreats for transgender, nonbinary and gender expansive people, and offers classes and retreats for many Buddhist centers and groups. René is a restorative justice facilitator for the Ahimsa Collective, working to heal sexual and gender based violence.
