Thank you to Professor Rita Gross for the incredible month of teachings she offered in her Tricycle Retreat, Buddhist History for Buddhist Practitioners. As with all Tricycle Retreats, the teachings will remain available on tricycle.com as part of our Wisdom Collection after the retreat is over, so if you haven’t joined yet, it’s not too late!

Beginning September 5th, Gaylon Ferguson, a senior teacher in the Shambhala Buddhist lineage and professor at Naropa University, will be leading a Tricycle Retreat titled Natural Bravery, in which he will discuss fear and fearlessness as a path to awakening. Ferguson introduces these teachings in his piece from our Fall 2011 issue:

The retreat I call “Natural Bravery”—based on ancient wisdom traditions of bravery and compassion that are now more valuable than ever—outlines a step-by-step approach to engaging fear as a direct path to transforming ourselves and our world. The aim of this path is wise and joyful living in deep harmony with others and the natural world.

Genuine spiritual practice offers a way to face both our inner and outer worlds and to bring these two related realms into living, loving dialogue. Making friends with our fear—tasting it, chewing it, becoming intimately familiar with it—opens a doorway. We can develop an inner strength and confidence not based on the ups and downs of our contemporary world with its 24/7 rhythm of getting and spending. In the midst of outer and inner famine, violence, intolerance, and cowardice, the Natural Bravery approach invites you to walk the path of courage along with our spiritual ancestors, the brave women and men throughout history who have manifested fearlessness in everyday life.

Read the whole piece here.

To take part in this Tricycle Retreats, please become a Tricycle Community Supporting or Sustaining Member.