Days
Hours
Mins
What’s Love Got To Do With It? The Path of the Bodhisattva
April 30 - May 04, 2025
David Nichtern
Duncan Trussell
Rebecca D’Onofrio
René Fay
Susan Layden
Brittaney Valentino
Noel Coakley
Seth Freedman
Sometimes the concept of compassion evokes images of passivity or over-accommodating kindness. In reality, compassion encompasses a dynamic spectrum, including the courage to confront challenges and make difficult decisions for ourselves and the greater good.True compassion can also begin with connecting to ourselves—recognizing and meeting our own needs so that we can approach others from a place of wholeness. It’s about cultivating emotional self-regulation and learning to drop out of the constant churn of the mind and into the wisdom of the heart.Join us for Dharma Moon’s 2nd Annual Meditation Retreat - where we’ll explore practical tools and Buddhist teachings on the bodhisattva path - to help awaken our hearts and lay the ground for personal and social transformation.This 5-day in-person or online retreat will explore what it actually means to be a bodhisattva, bridging the ancient wisdom of these teachings to make them accessible, relevant, and applicable to our modern lives. Through talks, group discussions, extended meditation practice, and community, we’ll unpack what it really means to embody the bodhisattva path today.Comedian Duncan Trussell will join David Nichtern and the Dharma Moon teaching team for engaging talks and thought-provoking panel discussions.Surrounded by the natural beauty of the Catskill Mountains, this retreat will be an opportune chance to step away from the busyness of daily life and immerse yourself in practice, amazing food, and community.During this retreat, we will lay the groundwork for and introduce the practice of tonglen, a meditation practice that dials down our sense of self importance and dials up our concern and empathy for others.We will also address the notion of “compassion fatigue” and ways in which we can create a sustainable practice that feels energizing rather than heavy-handed and depleting.Topics Covered During the Retreat:ScheduleWednesday, April 30
ABOUT THE TEACHERs
David Nichtern
David Nichtern is the founder and CEO of Dharma Moon - a mindfulness-based education platform and global community. He is a senior teacher in the lineage of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. This tradition combines a contemporary, secular approach to meditation with the ancient practice...
Duncan Trussell
Duncan Trussell is a comedian, the host of the Duncan Trussell Family Hour podcast, and co-creator of The Midnight Gospel series on Netflix....
Rebecca D’Onofrio
Rebecca D’Onofrio is the Programming and Operations Director of Dharma Moon. She also serves as a senior teacher, providing training and mentoring support to the teaching team, and is the co-presenter of the Metta (Loving-Kindness) Meditation Teacher Training. Rebecca has been ...
René Fay
René is the Community Director for Dharma Moon. They are a certified mindfulness meditation teacher and death doula, they studied comparative religion and gender studies, and they earned their black belt at 17. René’s career has a long and extensive history of advocacy, with ...
Susan Layden
Susan Layden is a senior teacher with Dharma Moon, serving as the coordinator of the 100 hr Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Training program. She has been a close senior student of David Nichtern for over 10 years. She received her 100 hr meditation certificate from David Nichtern...
Brittaney Valentino
Brittaney Valentino is an E-RYT 500, YACEP and mindfulness meditation teacher and owner of Rooted Nest LLC, a yoga and meditation company based in Wilmington, DE. She is also the co-founder of Embodied Mind LLC, a mindfulness-based consulting company. Along with offering online a...
Noel Coakley
Noel Coakley has over 30 years of experience as a dharma teacher and practitioner, primarily as a student of Yungdrung Bön and Tibetan Buddhist and lineages. For the past 14 years, he has worked as a licensed psychotherapist, specializing in integrating contemplative practice wi...
Seth Freedman
Seth Freedman is Dharma Moon's Marketing and Communications Director. A long time student of meditation, he has worked in the field of mindfulness and meditation for over a decade and has built online platforms, created programming, and run marketing for many of the leading teach...
MENLA
DONATE NOW