Tools for Trying Times
2020 brought out deep uncertainty, anxiety, depression, and fear that made us more vulnerable to the instability of our minds and our hearts and less able to regulate emotions such as anger, fear, jealousy, delusion, attachment, pride, and envy.
That’s why we’ve created this six-week course (+ 3 Community Meditation and Q&A Sessions) that offers powerful tools to help with stress management and redirect destructive emotions towards the cultivation of a healthy mind. We all need to reset!
Using techniques from a 2500-year-old wisdom tradition, combined with recent discoveries in neuroscience, Survival Kit for 2021 will offer antidotes to the painful emotions and destructive thinking we all are experiencing so we can start this new year on a more positive note.
Who
This course is for all humans who want to navigate 2021 with Generosity, Discipline, Patience, Exertion, Meditation, and Wisdom.
What
By signing up for this course, you will receive:
6-weeks of wisdom & tools to help you integrate your practice into everyday life
3 Community Meditation and Q&A Sessions with Cathy and Phuntsok
Access to our private Whatsapp group where you can connect with like-minded individuals
A resource ‘toolbox’ with recommended reads & resources to help you deepen your practice
When / Where
6 weeks of virtual sessions, so you can learn
from the comfort of your own home.
Day: Tuesdays
Time: 7-9pm ET
Begins: January 26, 2021
Ends: March 2, 2021
Your Guides
Cathy’s work bridges the processes of scientific inquiry and meditation. Having the fortune to work on two Cosmos series with Carl Sagan and Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Cathy found the connection between first-person method of investigating the mind through Buddhist contemplative techniques and scientific methods of observation.
Her career spans the fields of media, wellness and education. Cathy worked in media in Los Angeles, New York and Milan, Italy. Credits include Cosmos with Carl Sagan, media consultant for Dungeons and Dragons, on-air correspondent for RAI Italia, Historical Consultant on the Cosmos series with Neil DeGrasse Tyson, “The Healing Has Begun” with Richard Gere and Jonathan Cott and several productions for PBS, HBO and network television. She also published articles in several magazines as well as for Bantam Books.
Cathy received her Masters Degree in South Asian Studies from Columbia University and developed a curriculum on Asian Humanities for her thesis. She entered the classroom for five years and designed a science vs. religion interdisciplinary program, the Jedi Mind Training curriculum for K-5, Teen Mindfulness Workshops focused on anxiety, stress, depression, implicit bias, compassion, social skills and more, and a robust Professional Development Program for teachers and administration.
She was the Managing Director of MNDFL ED, the not-for-profit arm of MNDFL and was responsible for operations, fundraising, hiring teachers, outreach, as well as teaching in classrooms.
Cathy has been meditating for over 25 years and is a certified Mindfulness and Meditation Instructor from the Compassion Teacher Training at Nalanda Institute and The Path, The Lineage and Holistic Life Foundation Trauma Informed Trainings, the teacher training and advanced teacher training at MNDFL, as well as several courses with Mindful Schools. She is a public speaker, teaches meditation privately and in corporations (Amex, Sony, Simpson Thatcher, Moinian etc.) and at the MNDFL studios in New York. She is on the Faculty of the Contemplative- Based Resilience Training at Garrison Institute, teaches meditation at Sanctuary for Families and Back to Humanity, organizes workshops (like the first NYC training for the Holistic Life Training), is a SEED (Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity) facilitator and a DOE Vendor.
Thupten Phuntsok was born Irnst Norgaisse in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti. He began his formal Buddhist education under the patient guidance of Kyongla Rato Rinpoche for eight years before meeting his main teacher, the late Sermey Khensur Rinpoche Geshe Lobsang Tharchin in 1991. He received his novice vows in 1993 and given the name Thupten Phuntsok and his full ordination in 1994 under the guidance of his heart-teacher Seramey Khensur Rinpoche Geshe Lobsang Tharchin. He eventually registered in Sera Mey monastery, which has been reestablished in South India and studied with several teachers there. He is also a longtime student of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama from whom he has received public teachings both here and abroad. Thupten Phuntsok has been teaching Buddhist philosophy and meditation for over 30 years. He now lives and works in NYC and teaches classes on meditation and Buddhist Philosophy in CT, Staten Island, Brooklyn and Manhattan as well as travels from time to time to teach as a guest teacher in various places such as Singapore, France, Hong Kong, Bali, and Bahamas.
These are the teachers from whom Thupten Phuntsok directly received teachings:
Seramey Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tharchin, main teacher and ordination master
HH The 14th Dalai Lama
Kyongla Rato Rinpoche
Gyalrong Khensur Rinpoche Ngawang Thekchog
Kirti Tsenshab Rinpoche
Gyurmey Khensur Rinpoche Jampa Thinley Thobgye
Lati Rinpoche
Geshe Lobsang Chuzin
Hlarampa Geshe Thubten Rinchen
Hlarampa Geshe Ngawang Dhargye
Hlarampa Geshe Lobsang Dhargye
Dr. Artimus Engle
Dagpo Rinpoche
Dhakpa Tulku Rinpoche
Adzom Rinpoche
Garchen Rinpoche
Jamyang Kyentse Rinpoche
Anne Klein
Swami Rama
Hover to Learn More
Weekly
Teachings
Each class will explore how to deal with unsettling feelings and thoughts through Buddhist tenets and the neuroscience and psychology that support the teachings. Following the teachings, there will be a guided meditation and Q&A period. If you can’t make a session, don’t worry— each class will be recorded.
01. There’s Good News & There’s Bad News
Explore The Four Noble Truths and how to stop the suffering
The Four Foundations of Mindfulness: Body, Mind, Feelings, and Phenomena.
Basics of Meditation: Vipassana and Shamatha (Insight and Concentration)
Neuroscience 101: Since the 90’s, science has proven the benefits of meditation. Changing your mind can actually change your brain! The more you know about what’s going on scientifically in your mind and your body while meditating, the more you will want to commit to the magic of a transformative meditation routine. It works!
Meditation: Body and Breath Meditation
02. Poison Control
What causes our suffering? What does it mean to have anxiety? To experience fear? This class will explore the power of neuroscience and positive psychology as antidotes to the three poisons that hijack our minds 24/7:
aversion, ignorance, and craving
Meditation: Mindfulness practice on the Poisons
03. Re-directing Your Mind Towards the Positive
Cultivating Positive Behaviors and Minimizing the Harmful Behaviors through Four Mind States: The Brahmaviharas. Also called the “Four Immeasurables'', these positive emotions represent love and goodwill toward all sentient beings, without limit. We will also explore the near and far enemies of each
Loving-kindness
Compassion
Sympathetic Joy
Equanimity
Meditation: Mindfulness of Emotions
04. The Powerfully Purifying Benefits of
Compassion & Lovingkindness
What is compassion? What is loving-kindness?
With loving-kindness, we cultivate benevolence and warm-heartedness that purify our hearts and help to counteract feelings of hatred and anger.
With compassion, we add suffering to loving-kindness and cultivate the ability to care. This activates our connection to others and, in turn, erases feelings of isolation and loneliness.
Meditation: Compassion as Antidote to Apathy and Metta as Antidote to Ill Will.
05. The Antidote to Jealousy & Imbalance
What is Sympathetic Joy? What is Equanimity?
The power of Sympathetic Joy is being happy for someone else, no matter how hard things are for you. This is a powerful antidote to jealousy and pride.
Equanimity is our groundedness, our roots that remain steadfast no matter how strong the wind. From this place of balance, our loving-kindness, our compassion, and our sympathetic joy will arise.
Meditation: Sympathetic Joy and Equanimity Practice
06. Tools for Tonglen:
Sending out Love & Taking in Suffering
Tonglen means “taking and giving” in Tibetan. Loving-Kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity are all present in this ancient, very powerful practice. As an antidote to selfishness, the restriction and sometimes negative influence of our ego, Tonglen connects us to a much bigger reality and interconnectedness without losing ourselves.
Meditation: Tonglen | Taking and Giving
Pricing
$500
Pay full price &
help support our scholarship
$350-475
Times are tough.
So, we created a sliding scale.
*If you need more financial assistance, please reach out
Dont have PayPal?
Venmo @Cathy-Trentalancia
Scholarship
*No spots left*
Instead of money, we will be exchanging a different type of energy — time.
If accepted, you will be asked to assist with the course.
Want to apply?
Got Q’s?
Do I have to know how to meditate to take this course?
Absolutely NOT! Survival Kit 2021 is for all levels of meditators - curious beginners to someone with a daily practice looking for deeper instruction and community.
Can I sign up after the start date or make up a class?
Of course!
All classes are recorded and a link will be mailed to you, so no worries about signing up late or missing a class.
Will there be homework?
We ask that everyone take time to sit every day and practice the meditations taught in the weekly class. But don’t worry, you won’t be graded!
How will this course help start
or support my meditation practice?
They say that wisdom will set you free!
The more you know about the transformative power of meditation,
the more you will commit to a daily practice.
A few things you will learn are:
What’s actually happening in your brain and body during meditation
How meditation is proven to alleviate stress, depression, anxiety, and insomnia - among other benefits
Neuroscientific proof of how meditation lowers the reactions of the amygdala
and increases the emotional regulation of the prefrontal cortexHow changing your mind actually changes your brain
Skillful responses to triggers rather than reacting
That staying present is your key to freedom and power