Emptiness, Luminosity, Compassion

A key element of the Buddhist path is that insight into the nature of our own experience can help us to transform suffering and achieve authentic flourishing. And this insight itself needs to be more than just theoretical—it must be experiential. In this seminar, Erric Solomon and John Dunne will guide participants through an exploration of experience through both intellectual inquiry and contemplative practice. We will focus especially on how the nature of experience encompasses both a radical openness to radical transformation that is described as “emptiness,” and a dynamic capacity for connection called “luminosity.” And we will see how this view, when experienced through meditative practice, unfolds through compassionate action in the world.   

Key Themes:

• Inquiry & Practice: Understand the Threeforld Framework—View, Meditation, Action- as a roadmap for integrating theory and experience.
  
• The View of Emptiness : Through experiential and philosophical methods, explore how various notions of “emptiness” open the possibility of radical transformation.    
  
• The Dynamics of Luminosity: Drawing on cognitive models from the Buddhist tradition, learn how the radically open nature of experience is rooted in the capacity for dynamic connection.
• Contemporary Connections: See how the Buddhist account of experience challenges or resonates with contemporary perspectives in cognitive science, contemplative research, and consciousness studies.
  

Format:

• Two Sessions: Each day we will have two sessions, one in the morning, one in the afternoon, that include both theoretical inquiry and contemplative practice.
  
• Evening Meditation: Short guided sittings that focus on experientially integrating insights from the day.

Learning Objectives:

1. Develop a clear understanding of how emptiness and luminosity are fundamental to the nature of consciousness
   
2. Cultivate experiential familiarity with meditative exploration of emptiness and luminosity.
   
3. Learn to apply the philosophical and experiential insights to daily action in the world.
   
4. Appreciate the dialogue between Buddhist contemplative traditions and contemporary science and philosophy in understanding the nature of experience.

Who Should Attend:
Practitioners, scholars, and anyone interested in deepening their understanding of Buddhist theories and practices for cultivating insight into the nature of experience.

We look forward to exploring the landscape of consciousness with you in this rich, dialogical, and practice-infused seminar.