VIBING VAJRASATTVA
Vibing Vajrasattva
With vibraphonist Chris Dingman
And co-facilitators Dina Percia & Doc Kelley
Featuring a four-week incubation period of practice, a daylong invocation ceremony, and follow-up group and individual integration.
Winter Session
Brooklyn, New York
Please submit your interest by completing the form below. Thank you! Registration closes December 31st!
Vibing Vajrasattva is a sonic-based approach to enacting sādhanā ("instructions for practice") that begins with an online (or in-person) four-week incubation period of practice, and culminates with an in-person daylong invocation of the deity, that is followed by online group and individual integration. This three phase approach, what we have dubbed our Third Eye System,™ is inspired by the Vajrayāna Buddhist Mahāsiddha model in ancient India and Tibet. These, largely autonomous practitioners, were remarkable for their diversity of composition (coming from all walks of life and occupations), and their tradition of periodically coming together as a sangha to hold space for the ganachakra; a sensory rich invocation of the deity that is believed to have included antinomian behaviors.
This program is not intended to substitute the traditional Buddhist preliminary (ngöndro) practice of reciting 100,000 Vajrasattva mantras. There is no empowerment or refuge ceremony for this program. And it is open to both Buddhist and non-Buddhists alike.
TIMETABLE
INCUBATION (in-person or online)
Mondays: January 6, 13, 20, & 27
7pm-9 pm EST
@ Sparrow Funeral Home, BKLYN
INVOCATION (in-person only)
Saturday or Sunday: February 1 or 2
10am-7pm
Location TBD
INTEGRATION (in-person or online)
Mondays: February 3 and February 10
7pm-9pm EST
@ Sparrow Funeral Home, BKLYN
Vajrasattva (rDo-rje sems-dpa’) practice is a tantric meditation done for the purification of karma. As a Mahayana practice, it is undertaken with a bodhichitta aim to purify all our karma in order to reach enlightenment as quickly as possible in order to be best able to help all limited beings (sentient beings). On an ultimate level, Vajrasattva practice is non-conceptual meditation on voidness (emptiness). On a provisional level, it entails repeated recitation of a hundred-syllable mantra (yig-rgya), accompanied by opponent states of mind and complex visualizations.
-- The Berzin Archives
ABOUT THE VIBRAPHONE AND VIBRAPHONIST
The vibraphone is a percussion instrument that looks like a xylophone but has aluminum bars instead of wood. The vibraphone player uses one or two mallets (beaters) in each hand to strike the bars. Underneath each bar is a tube or “resonator” with an electric motor that helps create a unique resonance. In the hands of sonic shaman Chris Dingman, the vibes become a powerful tool for subtle bodywork that is incredibly intimate--but without physical touch.
Chris Dingman is a New York-based vibraphonist and composer. Chris Dingman is known for his distinctive approach to the instrument, which is at once sonically rich and conceptually expansive. In his captivating solo performances, he casts an enveloping atmosphere, creating layers of simultaneous sound that take listeners to a transcendent place. Chris has worked with the legendary artists Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter and many other of today’s jazz and world music luminaries. Based in NYC since 2002, Chris had been documenting his solo improvisations privately for many years. When his father entered hospice care in 2018, he created the 5-hour extended album Peace. This led to an ongoing evolution of his solo music and his critically acclaimed albums Journeys Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. Chris actively tours and has performed worldwide. He has been profiled by NPR, the New York Times, AMNY, and many other publications. He has received fellowships and grants from Chamber Music America, New Music USA, South Arts, and the Thelonious Monk Institute.
ABOUT THE CO-FACILITATORS
Dina Percia holds a Masters of Arts in Holistic Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in Somatic Psychology. As a psychotherapist, she has worked with adults, adolescents, and children in community mental health agencies focusing on complex and developmental trauma. Having trained as a palliative care doula at Mount Sinai Hospital, an end-of-life doula with Peaceful Presence Project, and an abortion doula with Bay Area Doula Project, Dina is called to support those traversing expanded and liminal states of consciousness; the bardos of life and death.
Doc Kelley is a scholar of Buddhism and a part-time professor in religious studies at Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts, The New School University. He is also the co-founder of Psychedelic Sangha and lives in Brooklyn, NYC.
Doc received a Ph.D. in Religion from Columbia University, where he studied Indo-Tibetan Buddhism with Robert A. F. Thurman. Before attending graduate school, he was a “dharma bum” who traveled Asia and practiced Buddhism initially at Kopan Gompa in Kathmandu and later at Sermey Monastery in India. He did his first Heruka-Vajrasattva retreat at the FPMT Tushita Dharma Center in Dharamsala in 1997.
REGISTRATION PROCESS
Please submit your application and complete our intake interview before registering here. Click here to start the registration process.
SLIDING SCALE TUITION
Benefactor $550
Regular $350
Scholarship $250
REGISTRATION & WAIVER
By registering for Vibing Vajrasattva, you agree to the following ...
REFUND POLICY
There are no full refunds. Instead, if a registrant cannot attend and we are notified 30 days or more before the event, we will give that person credit for a future Psychedelic Sangha offering.
GENERAL LIABILITY WAIVER
By registering for Vibing Vajrasattva, I understand that practices and invocation may pose some natural risks, for which I accept full responsibility. Furthermore, I agree not to hold Psychedelic Sangha, its facilitators, or its organizers legally or morally responsible for any injury or mental discomfort I experience under any circumstance.
Therefore, I hereby waive any and all liability claims against Psychedelic Sangha, its organizers, and facilitators for any and all injuries which I might suffer during, and/or as a result of, my participation in the retreat and program of study. I also assume all responsibility and liability for any injuries I might suffer, or cause, during, and/or as a result of my participation in the retreat, and its surrounding areas.
Furthermore, I absolve Psychedelic Sangha, its organizers, and facilitators of any and all responsibility for future injuries I might suffer or cause as a result of my participation in the retreat, and its surrounding areas.
I realize that the online teachings will be recorded and viewed by both in-class and asynchronous online Psychedelic Sangha Vajrasattva students, and I give my permission for the recording to be used for those purposes.
By executing this waiver, I state that I am in good physical and mental health and know of no reason why I should be unable to fully participate in all event activities in which I partake.
