Jump to content

Which Thai Meditation Retreats Do You Recommend And Why?


rockyysdt

Recommended Posts

Hi Danny-

If it's ok, I'm going to mention the retreat center I am associated with, Karuna Meditation Center in Kamala, Phuket.

The main practice and teachings are from the satipatthana and anapanasati suttas. All teachings are in English by western teachers who are or have been monks or nuns at some point. Personally, I have found the practice very effective and wonderful.

We established the center to allow westerners wanting to do long-term retreat to be able to afford to do so in as western retreat centers can be very expensive because of costs of living, etc. Students can come for any length of time they wish.

You can e-mail our retreat manager for more information or go to our webiste: meditate-thailand.com

With Metta,

Chris

Edited by camerata
Email address deleted as per forum rules.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Wat Paa Baan Thaat isn't accepting foreign monks or lay residents these days, nor do they teach meditation to foreigners.

Before I replied to your post, I wanted to be sure. The following is a partial reply from an e-mail I recieved from a friend who lives in the area and has gone on numerous retreats to Wat Paa Baan That:

I just got a message from my German monk friend at Wat Pa Ban Tad .

They still do ,as in the past welcome serious practitioners for meditation retreats .

Perhaps the key word here is: serious?

They must have changed their policy since I last visited, probably four or five years ago. At that point I talked to a senior western monk - I believe at the time he was the most senior western monk in Thailand - and he said they were accepting no foreign monks or lay residents. More recent visitors had told me they were told the same thing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

They must have changed their policy since I last visited, probably four or five years ago. At that point I talked to a senior western monk - I believe at the time he was the most senior western monk in Thailand - and he said they were accepting no foreign monks or lay residents. More recent visitors had told me they were told the same thing.

I stayed there for a week in 2003 with no problem. the senior monk you refer to died a couple of years ago and they may be less inclined to take foreigners since then.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 9 months later...
I ended up at Section 5 of Wat Mahataad (Wat Mahadhatu) next to Silpakorn University. They run a day program here, 7 days a week. Each day has 3 similar sessions: from 7AM to 10AM, 1PM to 4PM, and 6PM to 9PM. You can stay as much or as little as you want each day. You can also opt to spend the night(s) at the wat. No matter what you choose, these sessions are free of charge. I donated, but they were really low key about it as they didn't even solicit me anything.

Their website is centermeditation.org

They are located in the Old Town section of BK, next to Silpakorn University, which in turn, is right across the street from the Grand Palace.

There is a meditation room set up especially for foreigners. My guess is the instructions are in English (I'm Thai, so I sat in the Thai section). I saw many farungs there, most of them day trippers. The older monk in the front desk speaks good enough English. He would be your first point of contact as you walk in. Bring a "puang malai" on your first day for your teacher.

I attended at least one session almost everyday for 2 weeks, and it's the best thing that happened to me in a long time. I'm now looking forward to a 10-day retreat, hopefully in the near future.

Good luck to you.

For personal reasons I haven't been able to devote time to retreat experience but am now refocusing.

Before taking the plunge into a thirty day retreat (there are many excellent references on this thread ), my initial leaning is towards daily sessions at Wat Mahadhatu in Bangkok, and to take it from there.

Has anyone had recent experience with this Wat, in particular its suitability for farang participants?''

Is there public transport to this location?

Edited by rockyysdt
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

For those inclined towards Dhammakaya, they have a new retreat centre near Phu Ruea National Park in Loei. 5,500 baht including transportation from Bangkok. Their meditation technique is somewhat controversial, though: "The uniqueness of the Dhammakaya meditation is that it is the only meditation technique in the world that teaches about the centre of the body as the natural home of the human mind as well as the inner gateway to enlightenment."

http://www.meditationthai.org/docs/en/index.html

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.




×
×
  • Create New...