A personal story & basic curation

I’ve spent the last four years splitting time between studying meditation and bodywork in Asia and solitary retreat in the mountains of Northern New Mexico. During my time in solitude a friend gave me an old android with a few GB of recorded talks.  As I sifted through these at a rate of a half hour or an hour a day I was amazed at how potent and helpful it was to stream these voices of wisdom into my life. Now that I’m back in New York City I want to offer these voices to you.  

This is a list of some of what I’ve found most useful, and inspiring.  I hope they can offer something to your life as well!

1) Alan Wallace.  He’s brutally clear and no nonsense.  Also smart as hell.  This might be a good place to get basic meditation instructions.  As well as a totally new view on what dharma is all about.

• He led a series of two month retreats in Thailand that are all freely available.  Probably good to listen to one retreat sequentially to start with.  

2) Ajahn Sucitto.  When I found myself at an impasse in my practice Ajahn Sucitto helped me to identify and break some of the striving and harshness that was so poisonous to my practice and my life.  

• Here are some of his talks 

3) Reggie Ray.  A friend introduced his mp3s to me when I was in Myanmar.  His focus on the body makes a ton of sense to me and seems like an excellent pathway into practice for beginners as well as a way to help address blockages along the way.  

• Some of his stuff free here

 4) Ajahn Brahm.  Don’t mistake his jokes or light attitude for flakiness.  This man spent nine brutal years in Thailand studying under one of the greatest masters of the last century (Ajahn Chah) and he has probably attained a level of understanding and practice that is very rare in this modern world.  

Here are a bunch of talks

• Scroll down to the "Meditation Retreat Talks" section (0-19) for a ten day retreat he lead in Malaysia a few years ago. Here he focuses his discussion on practice

• The "31 Inspiring Talks" are some of the talks he gave to his lay community and are more based on how to approach everyday life.

5) Thich Naht Hanh.  Nominated for a nobel prize by Martin Luther King Jr. this man is the real deal.   He helped me start to see how I should relate with everyday reality and activities.  His voice also makes me want to weep, in that tearing right into your soul sort of way.

• There is a massive amount of audio content here TNHaudio.org

Photograph provided by Jared Chambers