New to Meditation, Buddhism & Yoga?

Our fast-moving Western lives often create a strong need to experience the greater sense of calm, awareness and inner happiness that can derive from meditation. Time spent meditating gives us the opportunity to experience new depths and heights in ourselves, as we grow in confidence and awareness. Meditation is one of the main tools we have to contact and realise our inner potential.

Yoga is another such tool - as we become more aware of our physical experience we can gradually transform ourselves, letting go of hidden tensions in our mind and body.

Buddhism is a path of spiritual development. The experience developed within the Buddhist tradition over thousands of years has created a resource for all those who wish to follow a path - a path which ultimately culminates in Enlightenment or Buddhahood. The basic tenets of Buddhist teaching are straightforward and practical: nothing is fixed or permanent; actions have consequences; change is possible. Thus Buddhism addresses itself to all people irrespective of race, nationality, or gender. It teaches practical methods (such as meditation) which enable people to realise and utilise its teachings in order to transform their experience and to be fully responsible for their lives.

There are around 350 million Buddhists and a growing number of them are Westerners. They follow many different forms of Buddhism, but all traditions are characterised by non-violence, lack of dogma, tolerance of differences and, generally, by the practice of meditation.