Waking Up with Serenity, Insight & A Boundless Heart

Waking up with Serenity, Insight and a Boundless Heart 

Ten-day (9 night) with seven-day (6 night) option, silent meditation retreat, Aug 29-Sept 7, 2025 

Onsite at Mt Carmel Retreat Centre (near Sydney) with online option (for a limited number of participants)

This dana based onsite and online (hybrid) meditation retreat will invite participants to realise the peace, freedom, security and genuine happiness of the awakened heart-mind.  Participants will be invited to cultivate serenity with stillness, and insight with enquiry and seeing clearly. This retreat will also invite participants to cultivate the heart with four boundless divine abodes: warm benevolence, compassion, appreciative joy and equanimity.

It will be led by Malcolm Huxter and co-led by Lisa Brown (see below for details). 

The daily schedule will include:

6:15 – 7.45am Embodied mindfulness with morning yoga and yoga nidra with Lisa
9.00 -10.30am Morning instruction and guidance /workshop session mostly with Malcolm
10.30-11.00am Tea break
11.00 – 12.30am    Periods of silent meditation in a group or individually. After the first weekend, small group and or individual Dharma meetings with Mal
12.30 - 2.30pm Lunch and rest
2.30 - 6.00pm Periods of silent meditation in a group or individually with a tea break. After the first weekend, small group and or individual Dharma meetings with Lisa
7.00 - 8.00pm Dharma talks and discussion with both Mal and Lisa
8.15 – 9.00pm   Silent or guided meditation/possible chanting

General aims of the retreat:

•    To begin to discover stillness and inner quietude with guidance in the cultivation of serenity
•    To explore the cultivation of insight with mindfulness
•    To develop 7 factors awakening: mindfulness, enquiry, energy, joy, tranquillity, concentration and equipoise   
•    To wake up to the reality of non-clinging 
•    To provide the opportunity to experience the development of the four boundless divine abodes (benevolence, compassion, appreciative joy and equanimity).
•    To free oneself and others from psychological suffering.

Who is this retreat for?
This silent residential retreat is for anyone who has had prior experience with meditation and wishes to enhance and practise her, his or their skills. The retreat may also be suitable for therapists, educators, program leaders and as it may partially fulfil CPD requirements for some professions and meditation teacher training programs.

The fees. In accordance with Buddhist traditions, there are no fees for the teachings and guidance on this retreat as it is dana based. Dana refers to the economy of generosity where the teachings are given freely and those who receive the teaching have the opportunity to reciprocate with a financial gift that they feel reflects their appreciation. There is a registration fee of $100 for onsite, and an online registration fee (a sliding scale depending on need) of $150, $250 & $350 to cover administration costs for 6 night and 9 night registrations.

The meals and accommodation fees for onsite participation are as follows:
6 nights =$1214
9 nights =$1655
These fees will be directed to the venue and cover meals & accommodation. They will also contribute towards the teachers’ accommodation. Payments can be made in instalments to be completed by August 15, 2025. 

The Venue for onsite participation:
Mt Carmel Retreat is a peaceful and semi-rural sanctuary of 300 acres with birdlife and walking trails, 45 minutes outside of Sydney, near the Minto train station. https://mtcarmel.com.au/ All spacious bedrooms have their own bathroom and toilet. The venue will require that all participants comply with whatever COVID regulations are in place in NSW. 

BEFORE YOU REGISTER, PLEASE READ THESE MEDITATION RETREAT HEALTH WARNINGS: Link to meditation retreat health warnings

BEFORE YOU REGISTER FOR PARTICIPATION, PLEASE READ THESE CONDITIONS OF ATTENDING RETREATS OF OVER 4 DAYS DURATION: click here for conditions for attending retreats

Malcolm Huxter (MAPS, AABCAP) is a clinical psychologist in private practice. He is the author of “Healing the Heart and Mind with Mindfulness.” Routledge 2016. http://www.amazon.com/Healing-Heart-Mind-Mindfulness-Ancient/dp/1138851353

A practicing psychologist for over 30 years, he has been guiding in Buddhist meditation practices such as mindfulness and the 4 divine abodes to the general public, a range of cultures, clinical populations, therapists and other professionals since 1991. He is a certified mindful self- compassion (MSC) teacher as well as Cultivating Emotional Balance (CEB) teacher. He began training in Buddhist meditation practices in 1975, living in Thailand as a Buddhist monk for two years in the late 1970’s. As well as Theravada, he has trained in other Buddhist and spiritual traditions. For more details about Mal go to Mal's website

Lisa Brown (AAPi, IYTA, AABCAP) is a Registered Psychologist, Insight Dharma Teacher, Yoga Teacher, certified Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction Teacher (Brown University, USA) and trained Mindful Self-Compassion Facilitator. As an Adjunct Lecturer at Charles Sturt University Lisa taught mindfulness and retreats for post-graduate students and has a deep interest in the conjunction of western science, Buddhadharma and earth-based wisdom traditions in health, healing and trauma recovery. Lisa currently works in private practice, facilitating groups, retreats and workshops on Gumbaynggirr Country, Coffs Harbour.

Website: Lisa's website

For more detailed information about the retreat, email malhuxter@gmail.com or phone 0431768299 (Australia)
or Lisa Brown on lisa@mindful-wellbeing.com or 0400491477 (Australia)

PLEASE NOTE MALCOLM MAY BE UNAVAILABLE TO REPLY TO  QUERIES FROM  APRIL 11 - JULY 26 2025