Holidays Got You Down? Try Meditation
The holiday season can be stressful for a multitude of reasons, from a hectic social calendar and overindulgence in food or alcohol to loneliness, ennui, even despair. On the South Fork, however, those feeling blue amidst the Western world’s revelry can look to a tradition from the East.
Instruction in “the nuts and bolts of meditation” is offered on a daily basis at the Kadampa Meditation Center, based in Sag Harbor but soon to relocate to Water Mill, and its classes are now also to be held in East Hampton, Southampton, Riverhead, and Greenport.
The center, formerly the Vajravarahi Meditation Center, is led by Gen Kelsang Norden, a Buddhist nun who has taught Buddhism and meditation for more than 20 years. A native of Bath, England, Ms. Norden came to the center five years ago at the request of Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, the Tibet-born founder of the New Kadampa Tradition-International Kadampa Buddhist Union. Along with avoiding stress, the sessions are intended to help participants enjoy “as much of a meaningful experience as we can,” Ms. Norden said.
“We want to be where people are. For a while, we just consolidated here in one place because people like Sag Harbor, and that seemed to work for us. But now that our sangha” — the community of followers of Buddha’s teaching — “is a bit stronger and we have more people who are able to teach meditation, we’ve started to open more classes again like we have had in the past. . . . It’s nice to go where people are and make it easier for them.”
Classes also cover patience and compassion, she said, “so that people have something they can bring with them, because a basic tenet of Buddhist thought and meditation is that happiness depends upon your mind. It can seem, to many of us, that our happiness is something that is found in a particular situation, or a person or thing. And similarly, that those people, situations, or things could take away our happiness if they change or they’re not the ones that we want.”
Instead, she said, “happiness is an internal thing — it’s an inside job. So we need to do something every day to feed our mind, to nourish our mind, to develop and transform our mind so we have more happiness from within, more peace of mind, centeredness, and good qualities so that we can bring that with us into our day.”
Weekday lunchtime sessions at the center, which typically draw up to a dozen participants who attend by donation, offer a calming interlude to a busy or stressful day. On Monday, Ms. Norden’s class focused on the breath as a means to draw in positive energy and dispel negative thoughts and emotions. On another day, Maddie James, a Colorado native who came East in 2009 to dance, led several participants in a 30-minute meditation on compassion.
“The synergy between ballet and meditation was undeniable,” Ms. James said. Having first arrived on the South Fork representing a New York City fitness company, Ms. James said, “I started to get very involved at the center, volunteering and attending classes and retreats. It didn’t take long to see how my daily meditation practice was having a meaningful impact in my life.”
“Maddie has made an amazing contribution to our community,” Ms. Norden said. “She’s an example of one of many people who are very sincere and recognize the benefits of meditation in their daily life, and Buddhist thought and practice. We’re very lucky to have her around.”
The center’s Sunday morning class, “Practical Wisdom for a Peaceful and Positive Life,” has 20 to 30 participants, according to Ms. Norden. Fifteen or so attend its twice-weekly study class, which is called “Meditation on the Stages of the Path.” Both combine meditation and instruction on Buddhist thought. These classes are free for members; for nonmembers the cost is $15.
On Sunday at 11 a.m., the Kadampa Center will hold a program called “Letting Go of the Past and Creating a Better Future — the Blessing Empowerment of Buddha Vajrasattva.” An empowerment, Ms. Norden said, “is a traditional Buddhist blessing ceremony,” a guided meditation in which one makes “a special connection with a particular Buddhist deity,” in this case the Buddha of Purification. The event costs $30.
Ms. Norden will also lead “Meditations for a Peaceful Mind at the Holidays” at the Tracy Anderson studio in East Hampton on Monday evening from 6:30 to 7:45, and again on Dec. 12. The same instruction will be given on Sunday and on Friday, Dec. 11, at Ananda Yoga in Southampton, as well as in Riverhead on Dec. 7 and 14 and in Greenport on Dec. 5 and 12.
Meditation, Ms. Norden said, improves the quality of one’s mind and fosters love, compassion, tolerance, patience, and other emotions that are especially useful in stressful situations. “We can’t be happy whilst we’re too self-obsessed, or whilst we lack compassion,” she said, “because those minds that replace where compassion would be in our heart are minds like resentment, over-entitlement, deluded pride, anger, jealousy. Those are the bases of our suffering. That’s why we find life so unpleasant, dissatisfying, why we create so much trouble for ourselves and others. We need to love others more than we need to be loved by them, because that is an incredibly strong and powerful inner quality that benefits us as much as it does anybody else.”