• ABOUT ADYA
    ABOUT ADYA

    ABOUT ADYA

    Adyashanti (whose name means “primordial peace”) is an American-born spiritual teacher who has been teaching for 26 years. His teachings include evening meetings, weekend intensives, silent retreats, live internet broadcasts, and online courses. He has taught throughout the US and also in Canada, the UK, the Netherlands, Denmark, Switzerland, Germany, and Australia. More than 30,000 people in 120 countries are connected to his website through free email subscription. He is the author of eleven books.

    Born Stephen Gray in 1962 in Cupertino, California, Adyashanti grew up as an athlete and competitive bicycle racer. At age 19, he became interested in enlightenment, began to meditate, and became fully absorbed in a quest for ultimate truth. . . .

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  • SUNDAY COMMUNITY PRACTICE
    SUNDAY COMMUNITY PRACTICE

    Sunday Community Practice meets live online twice a month for deep spiritual practice and inquiry. Each practice is two hours and includes meditation and a talk by either Adyashanti or Mukti. Check our program calendar to see future session dates and which teacher will be leading.

    Time: 9:00–11:00 am PT. (Preprogram meditation at 8:00 am PT)

    We offer two options for participation:

    Monthly Subscription ($25/month) which includes:

    • Access to two live Sunday online practices each month.
    • Replay video or download audio of any Sunday practice that airs during or after the month you joined. (Note: replays are available within one week of each Sunday practice, and expire after three months.)
    • Monthly subscription is recurring and will be charged on the 2nd day of each month.
    • Cancel subscription for future months at any time by logging in to your account. (Current month is not refunded.)
    • Scholarship applications accepted.

    Single Practice Registration ($15) which includes:

    • Access to one live Sunday practice, to be viewed at the time of the broadcast. (Note: replays are NOT included with this option.)

    REGISTER NOW

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  • SUBSCRIBE
    SUBSCRIBE

    Subscribe to Our Programs

    THE STREAM

    Stream eight AUDIO recordings each month from Adya’s media area and access your selected recordings as often as you like in the same month!

    • Purchase and download audio recordings from your current monthly selections for 50% off.
    • Stream either single talks or broadcasts.
    • $15/month

    READ DETAILS & JOIN HERE

    YOUTUBE MEMBERSHIP

    Membership Programs on Adya’s YouTube channel allow us to make available a selection of full-length video teachings not previously accessible other than by purchasing them in our online store.

    • Basic Membership: $4.99/month
    • Membership Plus: $9.99/month

    LEARN MORE & SUBSCRIBE

    RECEIVE OUR NEWSLETTER & EMAIL UPDATES

    SIGN UP

    Please note: If you already have an account, see “Stay Connected” in your account area to update.

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FEATURED WRITING

What Is a Spiritual Life?

A truly spiritual life is a life dedicated to a series of self-transcending commitments. By self-transcending I do not mean self-denying or self-negating, I mean something that is all-inclusive and not ego driven. I also mean something that is for the benefit of all beings. But essentially self-transcending commitments are doorways into all-inclusive reality, the reality of our true nature that is the fabric of our actual existence. In a sense, spiritual practice is the practice of helping true nature realize itself and embody itself as each of our lives as consciously as possible.

I do not intend this to be understood in a theoretical way, because to say that our practice is the practice of helping true nature realize itself is more of a poetic statement. It is something that you feel and intuit more than something that you believe or hold as a concrete fact. It is a way of understanding and approaching spirituality and spiritual practice from a broad and non-egocentric perspective. True nature is our true nature, and it is also something that we are serving and helping, and it is also serving and helping each of us as well. This is the paradox of spiritual practice that is so important to understand. But this understanding can only grow out of practice like a flower grows out of the ground. We cannot truly understand this paradox abstractly in our conceptual mind, it only grows out of the soil of committed spiritual practice. Which is to say that we must do it in order to understand it. Most things in life are like this, you must do them in order to understand them.

You cannot understand what an apple tastes like unless you eat an apple, or what it feels like to create music unless you are a musician, or what if feels like to give birth to a baby until you actually give birth. There is an old saying that expresses this idea in a different way. It says, “Do not judge someone until you walk a mile in their shoes.” I think that our world would be a much kinder and loving place if we all put this into practice. Such a practice is a good example of a self-transcending commitment. It is a good spiritual practice because it is not egocentric, it is wisdom born of actual human experience. This is something that we need to remember, wisdom is always and only born of non-egocentric human experience. Wisdom is not an abstraction, is not a belief, opinion, or reaction; it is born of experience.

Spiritual practice is so important because it is rooted in experience, meaning that it is something that you do. It is a commitment to doing something rather than merely thinking and conceptualizing. This is why we meditate and bring great awareness to each moment of our lives, and question our beliefs, and inquire, and seek to embody our understanding within the context of our daily lives. It is exacting, humbling, joyous and liberating spiritual practice. It is true nature waking up to itself and embodying itself as this very life. It is who and what we are, and it is also what we serve moment to moment through our commitment to being as awake and loving as we can. My teacher said that we are always being, and always becoming Buddha. This is true wisdom, not too attached to always and already being, and not too attached to always becoming. To experience this is to be like an eternal stable mountain that flows like water nourishing the entire earth. This to me is what the spiritual life is.

Copyright © 2021 Adyashanti.

FEATURED PROGRAM
Sunday Community PracticeMeditation and Talk with Adya
Video Stream

Sunday, June 11, 2023

9:00-11:00 am PT

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FEATURED PROGRAM

Sunday Community Practice meets online twice a month for deep spiritual practice and inquiry. Join with a monthly subscription. Single practice registration is also available.