The Divine Presence Within – Online Weekend Retreat at Home – 10 to 12 May

There is no other One;
There is no other presence other than the presence that I am.
The ‘I am’ that I am is the ‘I am’ that you are.

Everything inside our self and outside our self shines with being, shines with divine presence, shines with ‘I’. To consider a ‘divine presence within’, therefore, we must ultimately address a question: within what?

If we turn our attention to divine presence itself, notions of ‘within’, ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ no longer retain the meaning they lightly hold at the relative level. Continuing in this exploration, we come to recognise that there is just the one and only being, or presence, from which everyone and everything derive their seemingly independent existence.

The separate, finite self houses no separate, infinite presence within itself. The separate self is an appearance within divine presence, or God’s being. The only being there is. God’s being, while temporarily clothed in thoughts and perceptions, seems to become a finite self but never actually ceases to be itself. The more we understand this, the more prayer becomes a traveling inwards through the layers of feeling, sensing and perceiving towards our essential, irreducible being.

Join Rupert and friends all around the world for a weekend retreat, 10–12 May, from the comfort of your own home. Together we will deepen in our understanding and feeling that we all, without exception, share this single, divine being whose essential nature is the peace, joy and unconditional love for which we’ve always longed.

Details
This online weekend Retreat at Home will comprise meditations and dialogues on the essential, non-dual understanding that lies at the heart of all the great religious and spiritual traditions. This simple, contemplative approach, which encourages a clear seeing of one’s experience rather than any kind of effort or discipline, leads us to an experiential understanding of our essential being and the peace and fulfilment that are inherent within it.

The weekend will begin on Friday with a guided meditation. There will be two guided meditations and a Q&A session on Saturday, with breaks in between, and on Sunday there will be two meditations during the day, finishing with a Q&A session. Details of the schedule are below.

Community
The retreat is a wonderful opportunity to connect with like-minded people around the world. There will be a private Facebook group just for event attendees, where you can meet each other and connect before the event. You may also wish to join one of the several Zoom rooms that will be open for a period of time after each session so you can chat, meditate or spend some time together.

Access
All you need to participate is a computer or a mobile device, such as a tablet or smartphone, with a built-in speaker and access to the internet. The platform we use for the sessions is Zoom. Neil will walk you through the sign-in process, which is very simple, and he will email you with the invitation to join ahead of the weekend. All participants also receive audio and video links to stream the recordings of each session, and these will remain active for 30 days. 

To optimise your retreat experience, we recommend a wired connection if possible. If you do use a Wi-Fi connection, close all or most other devices using the signal. For mobile devices, a 3G or higher connection is needed.