We all come into the world skilled in the art of meditation. It’s a natural inheritance; but usually (without noticing) we let it slip away. With a little practice we can easily recover that skill, and deepen it. In the process we may become better centered in our lives, more present and at ease in our interactions, better balanced, happier, and easier to be around.

This experience (not so much a course as an unfolding) invites you to become acquainted with your own mind: its potential for full attention, and gracefully being with things just as they are. Basic tools will be offered, and then practiced. We’ll also consider what sorts of difficulties interfere with well-being and ease in our daily lives. We’ll explore gentler ways of occupying our worlds.

JC (Chuck) Hotchkiss is fascinated by learning: his own and everyone else’s. He has spent his life exploring various modes of learning in academic contexts (Williams College, Goddard College, Boston University School of Education) and less conventional ones (MIT’s Creative Photo Lab, San Francisco Zen Center’s mountain monastery: Tassajara). He investigates creative process, meditative practice, and all varieties of inquiry; and he helps others to walk such paths for themselves. He is interested in the interchange among all these ways of knowing, and especially in discovering what works best for any individual, right in the middle of her, or his, own unfolding experience. Life, he thinks, is a laboratory for learning, and every question is lots more engaging than any answer.

He has taught creative process and meditative practice, and braids those two complementary ways within his own life. He is a priest and teacher in four lineages of Zen Buddhism, and is devoted to the sorts of exchange which come alive over shared tea. He is, most of all, at home in the woods, and considers that to be an ideal realm for learning - for everything. He seeks, simply, to be available.

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