Grounded Awareness: Beginning (and Deepening) Meditation Practice

Part 1 of “Meditation for an Evolving World: Integral Practice for Inner and Outer Transformation”

What does it mean to be truly present in an age of constant motion and noise? How do we find stillness—not by withdrawing from the world, but by meeting it more fully? And what might meditation look like when it honours both ancient wisdom and the complexity of the 21st-century psyche?

Many of us are drawn to meditation because we sense the possibility of a deeper way of being. Yet modern life often fragments our attention and erodes our capacity for presence. This opening session is an invitation to come home to the immediacy of awareness itself—simple, grounded, and awake.

We’ll explore the essential foundations of mindfulness and insight meditation, guided by the clarity of Buddhist practice and illuminated through the lens of Integral Theory. Rather than treating meditation as a technique for escape, we’ll approach it as a way of inhabiting life with openness and compassion—a practice that matures as we “wake up” and “grow up” together.

The evening will include a short talk, experiential meditation, and space for reflection and dialogue. You’ll gain practical tools for establishing or refreshing your own practice, along with an understanding of how meditation fits within a larger map of human development and transformation.

This gathering welcomes both newcomers and experienced practitioners — anyone curious about how meditation can be lived as an integral, embodied, and contemporary path of awakening.

Teacher/Facilitator
This session will be led by Christopher Lawley, who has been practicing and training in the universalist Namgyal lineage of Vajrayana Buddhism and Western Mysteries for close to 2 decades with the Clear Sky Center sangha and Planet Dharma. Christopher is also steeped in Integral Theory and uses it to inform how he works with individuals and groups. He is also on the organizing committee of the Integral Conference of North America (ICON) which will be taking place in May 2026 in Denver, Colorado.

Dāna - Pay from the Heart
Everyone is welcome to participate regardless of financial circumstances. Please join us and offer whatever your situation allows. There will be a bowl at the door.
Learn more about dāna (the Pali word for generosity) here.