Jonathan Foust's most recent Dharma talks (Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) “Ask Me Anything” – Tara responds to your questions, with Jonathan Foust, her husband and known meditation teacher, as interviewer.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) “Ask Me Anything” – Tara responds to your questions, with Jonathan Foust, her husband and known meditation teacher, as interviewer.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) Drawing on the principles of Open Focus and Metta Meditation, you'll be guided through a systematic inquiry into the 'felt sense' of space in and around your body as well as the feeling of gratitude, appreciation, kindness, compassion and joy.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how and why somatic awareness is key to liberation. You'll learn the role of the body in this spiritual practice, how awareness of the body can help you feel more whole as well as how awareness of the body can reveal penetrating insights into the nature of reality.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how to work with the realm of feeling tone in your practice. You’ll learn why the body is so instrumental in liberation practices, what you can learn by deepening attention to sensations, a review of three primary anchors and the kinds of energy experiences that can arise when you relax and pay attention.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This final evening talk of a weeklong retreat explores mindfulness through the lens of the hero’s journey. You’ll learn about the call to inner practice, how to work the trials and challenges that arise, the process of opening to insight and the reflection on your return home.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) In this fifth morning of a week-long meditation retreat, you’ll be guided through a centering body scan, directed to an anchor of your choosing with options to more deeply investigate challenges that arise and toward the end of the meditation you’ll be invited to rest in presence and turn your attention toward awareness itself.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores what happens when you deeply relax and pay attention to your moment-to-moment experience. You’ll learn about the process of settling attention in the here and now, how to recognize the characteristics of what is changing and the subtlety of how you are relating to change and how to reflect on being aware of awareness itself. This talk is from the 2019 IMCW Spring Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) In this third morning of a week-long meditation retreat, you’ll be guided through a centering body scan, directed to an anchor of your choosing with options to more deeply investigate what is present, particularly emotions. Toward the end of the meditation you’ll be invited to rest in presence. These instructions are from the 2019 IMCW Spring Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This guided heart meditation explores the practice of bringing gratitude and compassion deeply into the felt-sense of your body and systematically offering well-being and best-wishes to others. This meditation is from the 2019 IMCW Spring Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) In this first morning of a week-long meditation retreat, you’ll be guided through a centering body scan and directed to an anchor of your choosing. You’ll hear occasional reminders to help support your practice of arriving and settling in the here and now. These instructions are from the 2019 IMCW Spring Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how you can more consciously respond to suffering within and around you. You’ll learn how non-judging awareness awakens not only wisdom but your capacity to sense suffering and respond not just with empathy, but with wisdom and skill. This is the final evening talk of the 2018 IMCW New Year’s Retreat

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) After a short introduction on techniques for amplifying wholesome states, you’ll be guided into a meditation reflecting on sympathetic joy - cultivating your capacity to find pleasure in the joy, well-being and success of those around you. You’ll then explore a particular practice including a body scan where you’ll deeply feel the space inside the body and reflect on gratitude, appreciation and well-being. This experience is from the afternoon Guided Heart practice in the IMCW 2018 New Year’s Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) In this guided heart meditation from the fall IMCW retreat, you’ll explore two separate practices: 1. Investigating ‘wholesome states’ when they arise can be a powerful way to increase your capacity for kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity. You’ll be guided into the ‘felt sense’ of a positive state to explore particular qualities that can deepen its presence and significance for you. 2. In the second experience, you’ll be guided into feeling or imagining space in and around the body infused with a quality of loving kindness. (Note: If you feel spacey, ungrounded or the experience feels like it’s ‘too much,’ open your eyes or move to another technique.)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how the more intimately you are aware of your experience in your body right now, the more clearly you can see into the nature of realty. You’ll learn why in this practice your body is your ‘home base,’ how your ‘issues are in your tissues,’ how to work with challenging issues when they arise and how awareness of your body can reveal insights into three essential characteristics of reality.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) In these morning instructions from the third day of the IMCW Fall Retreat, you’ll practice arriving fully and intimately in the senses and notice the quality and movement of thoughts, reinforcing a sense of who you are as the one who is aware.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the transformational power of awareness. You’ll learn what happens when you bring awareness to the body and to the formation of thoughts and beliefs, what happens when you suspend effort yet remain aware and some key practices that help you cultivate the practice of being aware of awareness itself.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores why intimate awareness of your body is a portal into seeing clearly into the nature of reality. You’ll learn how to fully arrive in the Here and Now through conscious relaxation and receiving sensations as they arrive, how to work with challenges as they arise and what you may discover when you embrace this practice. This talk is from the 2018 IMCW Spring Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the art and practice of cultivating kindness (metta) for yourself and others. You’ll learn why the practice is so critical to the development of heart and mind, the importance of improvisation and customizing your practice so it resonates for you and you’ll be guided through a variety of techniques that can help you open and sensitize your capacity for kindness and compassion.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) These morning instructions, from the final morning of a five-day retreat, offers guidance for concentration (focus), mindfulness (flow) and resting presence (letting go).

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This guided meditation explores a unique exploration of ‘open focus’ meditation and loving presence where you feel and imagine space in and around the body filled with kindness and compassion.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the importance of embodied awareness in waking up to who you truly are. You’ll learn how the body is the perfect vehicle for seeing into the nature of reality, how your entire experience arises from the field of the body and strategies for intimately engaging in the body not just in meditation practice, but in your life.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how to be awake in the world. You’ll learn how to determine your progress on the path, how an awakened accepts this life with full responsibility, actively investigates the shadows and cultivates a world of new possibility. This talk is from the 2017 IMCW Fall Retreat

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) After a short introduction on this technique you’ll be guided into an open focus meditation with an invitation to explore loving presence and spacious awareness. This meditation is from the 2017 IMCW Fall Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the lenses through which you view your world. You’ll learn the distinctions between energy and feeling, thoughts and thought-forms as you can expand your capacity to see clearly and with an open heart.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This meditation focuses on gathering awareness in the here and now, guides you to an anchor of your choice and to practice awareness of change. This meditation is from the 2017 IMCW Fall Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the relationship between awareness and energy. You'll learn the importance of body-centered awareness and some techniques that can help you navigate the inevitable challenges that arise in meditation and in your life.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the five mind states that make presence difficult or impossible. You'll learn how to recognize these states and rediscover your true nature.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores four things to remember when deep in practice. You’ll learn about these powerful and inter-related inquiries: What am I feeling right now? How more fully present can I be right now? What am I noticing right now? Can I be with this … right now?

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This short talk and guided meditation explores “open focus” and reflects on the limitless qualities of compassion, kindness, joy and equanimity. You’ll learn about the Open Focus technique and as you sense through your body, you’ll investigate the immeasurable qualities of the heart. From the 2016 IMCW Fall Retreat

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This short talk and meditation explores the power of forgiveness. You’ll learn the steps for cultivating forgiveness and be guided through a forgiveness meditation. From the IMCW Fall Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the difficult energies that arise in life and how to work with them. You’ll learn strategies for recognizing and working with five mind states that when in full force, make it impossible to be present. This is the first talk evening talk of the IMCW Fall Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) You’ll be guided through a reflection on spacious awareness (open focus meditation) and a reflection on the immeasurable qualities of the heart. From the IMCW Spring Retreat.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how you can naturally integrate the paradox of the ‘doing’ and ’surrender’ practices in meditation. You’ll learn how concentration practice dramatically cultivates not only your capacity to observe all that changes without judgement, but also how you can intimately investigate challenges that arise and ultimately, how to surrender into effortless awareness.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the importance of finding a form of livelihood that truly resonates for you. You’ll learn how Johnny Paycheck’s classic country song “Take This Job and Shove It” ties into Buddhist psychology, a model for changing your relationship to work and what can happen when you substitute the word ‘work’ with the word ‘service.’

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores guidelines for wise and skillful speech. You’ll learn why not to use auto-correct on your phone, the impact and criteria for wise speech, questions you can ask yourself before speaking, a powerful communication model and what’s possible when you pay attention to the relationship between your mind and what you say outloud.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores the importance of clear and conscious intention. You’ll learn about the difference between a goal and an intention, how intention is related to karma, three main intentions you might keep in mind and how the spirit of an intention is to bring you back to the here and now.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how you can increase your capacity for self-compassion. You’ll learn what gets in the way of coming home to yourself, a comparison of strategies, techniques for accessing self-compassion as well as what it means to embrace the awakening of heart and mind. (Apologies to Lou Reed.)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC)

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) Short orientation and a guided meditation that moves from concentration to mindfulness to an inquiry into release and surrender.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) From the afternoon Metta meditation at the 2015 IMCW Fall Retreat. Brief instructions and orientation and three guided meditations on shifting your relationship with pain. You’ll explore the zones of pleasant, unpleasant and neutral sensation, a loving kindness body scan and using mindful breath, offering compassion to your body.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) The first evening talk of the 2015 IMCW Fall Retreat, Jonathan talks about the process of settling in and working with the natural challenges that arise in cultivating non-judging awareness.

(Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC) This talk explores how you can dramatically enhance your capacity to see clearly. You’ll learn about the nature of sustaining attention on non-judging awareness and the liberating practice of recognizing and naming the weather patterns of the mind.