IMS Online Schedule

In this retreat we will explore the nature of awareness, or consciousness, which is at the heart of sentient life. Awareness is always with us, revealing the phenomena of our experience, yet we may not have learned how to use it as a focus in meditation. As we deepen our connection to this mysterious capacity for knowing, it becomes a powerful pathway to inner freedom and liberation.

This retreat is offered in two formats. A full hybrid retreat and an audit-only retreat. Each format offers a different program experience. If you would like to register for the Audit-Only Retreat format, click here.

In this retreat we will explore the nature of awareness, or consciousness, which is at the heart of sentient life. Awareness is always with us, revealing the phenomena of our experience, yet we may not have learned how to use it as a focus in meditation. As we deepen our connection to this mysterious capacity for knowing, it becomes a powerful pathway to inner freedom and liberation.

This retreat is offered in two formats. A full hybrid retreat and an audit-only retreat. Each format offers a different program experience. This registration page is for the Audit-Only Retreat format. If you would like to register for the Full Hybrid Retreat format, click here.

This online retreat experience will be a livestream of the onsite Your Life Is Your Practice: Insight Meditation Weekend Retreat with Narayan Helen Liebenson. Meditation instructions and Dharma talks will be broadcast live from the IMS Meditation Hall. There will also be an opportunity to submit questions to Narayan.

In a conversation with his attendant (the Cula-sunnata Sutta), the Buddha describes his own meditation on emptiness and how we, his students, can find our way to its complete understanding.

Throughout the Sutta series, we will explore narratives about and discourses by the Buddha, which have been passed down for over 2,500 years, and directly apply them to practice in our modern lives.

This program is open to beginning and seasoned meditators alike. All are welcome. This program will include dharma teachings, meditation instructions, and opportunities for Q&R

It hardly seems that any of us are able to make it through a day without being emotionally triggered. It could be a tragic or anger-inducing news story, a disagreement with family or friends (or even a stranger!), a comment or article on social media, a stressful situation at work… the list is endless. Often emotions turn our lives into a roller coaster ride of reactivity which can have the effect of turning our meditative  practice into an escape clause rather than the source of our inner strength. It is possible, however, to engage our meditative practice in a more proactive way by cultivating several awakening emotions. They are considered awakening emotions because when present, they bring clarity and wisdom.

During our day together we will explore these awakening emotions, how to distinguish them from non-awakening emotions, how to cultivate them, and how to recognize their impact upon our practice.

This will be an online Vipassana retreat that will emphasize quieting the mind, opening the heart, and developing clarity and depth of practice. Traditional meditation instruction will be combined with a spirit of lovingkindness, with silent sitting, walking, and Dharma talks.

This program will be appropriate for both new and experienced meditators.

Using neuroscience, the Four Noble Truths, The Brahma Viharas, and Buddhist psychology, this program will help you uncover the hindrances and pathways to your own financial well-being. Since we often bring less mindfulness to financial matters than we do to other areas of our life, it is an arena in which we have surprising opportunities for transformation. Through interactive exercises, buddhist practices, and the power of a supportive community, we’ll learn how to access your money wisdom, mitigate the comparing mind, cultivate a mindset of “Enough” and a mind that inclines toward generosity, lessen our allegiance to old patterns and beliefs, learn how to reframe these beliefs, decrease money anxiety, and make wise spending, giving and earning decisions.

Regardless of your financial advantages or challenges, it’s possible to shift from fear, confusion, and avoidance, to clarity, confidence, and engagement. Together, we will loosen our inherited beliefs, gain new perspectives, and experience the paradox that letting go offers a path toward abundance. (“Letting go is the path to abundance.”Joseph Goldstein) This program invites you to explore your authentic relationship to money, independent of cultural and familial conditioning, and to apply the exercises to your real-life decisions within a spacious, non-judgmental container.

Over decades, we have been delighted to walk the path of awakening with other women through the annual women’s retreat at IMS. The community of women who have participated in this retreat over time have been a source of inspiration and refuge for us and so many of our alumni. It has been a rich and enlivening journey, and we have been honored to have been part of your lives through this extraordinary retreat. To create even more space for women who wish to join our community, we are now committed to continuing this offering through the addition of an annual online retreat, open to all those who have participated in the women’s retreat in the past and to any new students who feel called to add their voices and hearts to the circle.

In his final days, the Buddha chose to leave us with his most important teachings, and gave us permission to let go of the lesser teachings. Find out what messages mattered most to him before he passed into final Nirvana. During this program, we will explore the Buddha’s words, which have been passed down for over 2,500 years, and directly apply them to practice in our lives today.

This program is open to beginning and seasoned meditators alike. All are welcome. This program will include dharma teachings, meditation instructions, and opportunities for Q&R.

Our vision is to have our teachers share stories about their teachers, to honour our gratitude to the Asian roots of the practice; to give a sense of these teachings being handed down, generation to generation; and to give current practitioners a sense of carrying this precious gift forward.

Extolling the virtuous qualities of meditative development in the Metta Sutta, the Buddha described the qualities of kindness and compassion that manifest in one who embodies his teachings.

Throughout the Sutta series, we will explore narratives about and discourses by the Buddha, which have been passed down for over 2,500 years, and directly apply them to practice in our modern lives.

This program is open to beginning and seasoned meditators alike. All are welcome. This program will include dharma teachings, meditation instructions, and opportunities for Q&R.

While one doesn’t practice the Buddha Way for personal gain, there are benefits to those who do. In the Mangala Sutta, the Buddha describes the blessings that are attained along the path.

Throughout the Sutta series, we will explore narratives about and discourses by the Buddha, which have been passed down for over 2,500 years, and directly apply them to practice in our modern lives.

This program is open to beginning and seasoned meditators alike. All are welcome. This program will include dharma teachings, meditation instructions, and opportunities for Q&R.

Free Audio Program. Open to all. Welcome to The Way of the Buddha, an immersive audio learning experience from IMS Online. For 45 years, IMS has been a leader in Dharma education rooted in the foundational principles of Early Buddhism. Now, for the first time, our teachers offer the profound insights of the Buddha in a comprehensive practice and study program delivered directly to you in your own online practice space. Each module features IMS teachers from many generations and backgrounds who will guide you on the path.

During this daylong on-demand recording, we’ll dive into the practice of Metta, or loving-kindness, as taught in the Visuddhimagga. Using phrases, images and felt sense, we’ll cultivate the unconditional heart that wishes goodness for ourselves, others, and even those most difficult to love. In developing the natural kindness of the heart, we can trust that we’re building the skills to wisely respond to our own challenges, as well as our collective challenges of these times.

Appropriate for beginning and seasoned meditators alike. All are welcome. This on-demand retreat includes dharma teachings and meditation instructions for both sitting and walking meditation.

A film about the early days of IMS and how this revered Buddhist meditation retreat center came into being. Made in partnership with long-time yogis Eddie and Jan Hauben and filmmakers Joe and Elizabeth Seamans, the documentary offers a behind-the-scenes look at the discovery and creation of IMS’s permanent home—where it sits today—in Barre, MA. It includes personal, heartwarming interviews with co-founders Joseph Goldstein, Sharon Salzberg, and Jack Kornfield, and other early teachers, board members, and staff as well as photos and archival footage from the beginning days of IMS.

This March, we honor Nani Bala Barua (1911-1989), the beloved teacher known as “Dipa Ma”—mother of Dipa. Born in East Bengal (now Bangladesh), Dipa Ma broke barriers as a married householder committed to the path of enlightenment. Following her training in Burma, she settled in Calcutta, where her reputation as a Buddhist teacher and realized meditator quickly inspired other women to begin spiritual training as part of everyday life. Eventually, her mastery and modesty attracted many Westerners as well, including IMS co-founders Sharon Salzberg, Joseph Goldstein, and Jack Kornfield. Dipa Ma is said to have encouraged relationships with people near and far, saying, “They are hungry for the Dhamma, so let them come.” In 1980 and again in 1984, Dipa Ma came to teach at IMS, establishing a connection that remains in our hearts today.

Through personal stories and the transmission of practices held sacred by Dipa Ma herself, Sharon Salzberg lead three sessions honoring Dipa Ma’s life, legacy, and teachings. Together, we will contemplate her influence and bathe in the maternal love that Dipa Ma represented through her thoughts, words, and actions. We hope you will join us for this special IMS event; the first of several explorations into the lineages and legacies that shaped the Insight Meditation Society and that continue to inspire our work and practice.