Departures and Dissolution: A meditation on death and dying

Buddhist philosophy shows that coming to terms with death is essential to living life fully, yet in the Western world, we are so often socialized to avoid discussing or even thinking about death.

In this 3-hour experiential and reflective workshop, we will journey together into this unique and powerful way of bringing insight and wisdom into our own eventual experience of death.  

This workshop offers a place to explore and develop skills around

• understanding our own relationship with dying 
• a deeper understanding of people we have known who have died 
• caring for loved ones who may be entering into the death process. 

During this workshop we will be using a traditional text from the Bardo Thodol , Great Liberation Through Hearing, sometimes and more commonly known as the “Tibetan Book of the Dead”. You will be guided through Buddhist practices focused on mindfulness of death often referred to as Maranasati meditation.

This workshop offers an experiential moment for those who may wish to explore the intersection of Himalayan Buddhist spiritual formation and their respective caregiving modalities. There is no expectation that participants need to have any understanding of Buddhism to actively engage in this workshop. 

This workshop aims to give participants:

• A deeper appreciation of the impermanence of life.
• An increased sense of gratitude for each moment.
• An enhanced appreciation of human vulnerability which allows us to practice greater compassion for self and others.
• A diminished anxiety about death, which also helps us support others during their dying process and in their grieving. For our own death, this can help us die in a state of peace rather than agitation.
• An intercultural awareness of how death is viewed or approached in other cultures and traditions.

Participants will enhance their own awareness of their feelings about death and potential obstacles they might encounter when working with people approaching death, bereaved friends and family members and the self.

The facilitator, John Bradley, will guide participants through the practices and meditation. After the formal meditation, participants will discuss their experiences in pairs and then return to the large group to discuss the activity. (The group will be max. 20 participants.)

Who is this workshop for:
This workshop is designed for adults (18+) who are curious to explore their feelings about death, their relationship with dying and are interested in exploring how they can best support others in the dying or grieving process as well as be with their own experience of impermanence. 

Please note: the Maranasanti meditation practices and inquiring into death and dying can stir up deep and strong emotions and existential questions. Your facilitator is experienced to hold this process safely, but we recommend this workshop only to people who feel currently well-resourced for such an experience. You will be provided with guidance and support in how to navigate your experience, but in order to actively participate in the workshop you are expected to check in with your capacity on the day to ensure you are resourced for this experience and for a discussion on it afterwards. 

What to bring:

• Pen or pencil• Yoga mat or thin mattress• A sheet/ blanket• A pillow

Accessibility
This workship is located on level 1, upstairs and is accessed via 2 flights of stairs (14 stairs, each flight has 7 stairs).

About the facilitator:

John Bradley has recently retired from Monash University where he was the acting director and director of the Monash Indigenous Studies Centre. He has undertaken research for the last 46 years in the south west Gulf of Carpentaria in the Northern Territory. He is deeply interested in matters to do with knowledge production and understanding in cross cultural spaces. His work crosses disciplinary boundaries exploring knowledges and areas of incommensurability. There are important decolonising principles behind his research. He has been a senior Anthropologist on a number of land claims and has also worked in matters to do with Native Title, and cross-cultural land management issues more generally. He has also played an active role, working with Indigenous communities and family members, in developing programs for the preservation of Australia’s Indigenous languages and their associated cultures.

He is also an artist who has held several successful exhibitions where much of his more recent work repurposes material found in recycle bins and skips. He also paints and sculpts in wood and bronze. His art is inspired by his Buddhist practice and matters associated with impermanence. He has been fortunate to have been taught by some of the great teachers in the Himalayan Buddhist world. His interest in regard to death and dying are informed by these teachings, their associated practices, and also by his own real-life experiences and journeys.

In 2020 John presented his exhibition Mandala, Dancing in the Bardo at Echuca's Foundry Art Centre. The first time that a three dimensional representation of the Tibetan Book of the Dead has been seen in the Southern Hemisphere.  See more about the exhibition here