31/08/2026
September NEWSBYTE 2026
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All Past Tips
For calendar and assistant opportunities, see below.
Tip o' the Day
Are Grief and Sorrow the same?
Bhante Bodhidhamma
(Difficulty reading text? Press Ctrl +)
Assistants needed for
Weekend Retreats in September
Fri 18 - Sun 21 with Mark Arthur
Apply Here.
Fri 25 - Sun 27 with Carl Fooks
Apply Here.
If you have a devotional heart, download the Buddhist Compass App.
Calendar for Autumn is also open for Applications
Full Moon Celebration Sunday 06 September
Diary
Our house in Bishops Castle is off the market while we repaint and possibly replace ceilings damaged by the leaking water tank in the roof.
Once up for sale again, it is a very good purchase for anyone who wants to live near Satipanya. Bishops Castle has all the amenities, even a Cottage Hospital and there's an active Thich Nhat Hanh group in the town.
But the good news is that we completed the purchase of The Homestead in White Grit on Friday, a Full Moon Day. Slowly but surely, the new order is establishing itself.
Neighbourliness!
My back garden is about 5 meters in length. Looming up over the fence is a broad laural bush which sits directly in my line of vision. I want it cut down to fence level.
My neighbours garden is well over 25 meters long and stretches behind three bungalows. I caught Paul washing his car and asked if the laural could be cut back. He was quick to say yes.
One day, some weeks later, he began cutting the sides to make the laural a little thinner. As I spoke to him through the fence, thanking him, I could feel the annoyance of his wife. It is thinner but growing taller.
I wrote a letter saying that I was willing to pay for it being done and inviting him and his wife to visit and check out my situation from themselves.
He appeared that same day with his dog and in an angry mood, saying he had filled so many bins already and that I need to give him time and that he would cut it but only by two feet from the top. I simply said, I'd be happier with three. I didn't think it was the time to invite him in.
I let it lie a couple of days and wrote again. I apologised for any confusion, but said I was disappointed. I've asked them again to visit at their convenience and to sit in the garden and conservatory to see the situation from my point of view. After all, I argued this was the essence of neighbourliness. I have asked the bush to be cut back down to the fence. I have offered to get the deed done and to buy a sapling for any other bush or tree they may want to plant.
Silence!
Great to be back in the city!
La lotta continua!
I am away soon on my personal retreat to Metta Vihara in South Germany again. This year a little earlier and will be returning mid-November.
Announcements
Daily Life Course: This years on-line course is titled "Rooted in Mud" and looks at the many ways our path to liberation can spring from the mud of deep sorrows as well as the minor miseries of everyday life. The course includes suggested exercises for home practice and the opportunity to share your reflections with other students on the Satipanya Forum. The first run of the 7 week course started mid-May and it will run again in October. For further information or to register please contact Noirin.
Meeting in London: Satipanya London Sangha is a small but growing community of friendly and supportive meditators meeting in person at a peaceful community garden near King's Cross station for group sits and lighthearted discussions.
If you'd like to attend upcoming meetings in London and practice vipassana in the tradition of Mahasi Sayadaw then email Maz and ask to be added to the mailing list.
Regular Online Meetings:
Meditation Hall on Zoom: Join us for your daily meditation - Info.
Satipanya Spiritual Companions: An informal meditation group meets on a monthly basis via Zoom for a full day of meditation. Email Magda for details at [email protected]
Online Study Group: This collaborative online group studies various dhamma topics across multiple traditions — so, not just Mahāsi practice. Carl says: We warmly extend an invitation to any practitioner who would like to join us. Currently meeting on the second and fourth Sundays of each month at 10:20am - around midday. Please contact Carl at [email protected] for further information.
Full Moon Celebrations: Join 20.00 to 21.00 UK time on the Sunday closest to the Full Moon. Bhante gives a short dhamma talk, followed by a 30-min sitting, refuges and precepts and we end by reading and chanting the metta sutta. For date of next Celebration.
Opening to the Impact of the Climate Emergency: Following on from the Zoom with Gwen Sanderson and Bhante Bodhidhamma in 2023, there are two options for ongoing engagement:
• Gwen Sanderson is facilitating monthly Climate and Dhamma Conversations which are held using Zoom. Email Gwen for further information or to register.
• Noirin Sheahan has set up a Satipanya Forum focussing on the Six Maxims (ethical training to prepare for the social and environmental consequences of climate change). Contact Noirin for further info or to register.
Karuna Book: Every morning at puja we call the names of those who are sick or dying, or are having a hard time.
Mudita Book: Every evening at puja we call the names of those who have something to rejoice.
Satipanya Courses
Vipassana as taught by the Mahasi Sayadaw of Burma
The Mahasi Sayadaw of Burma, one of the most influential vipassana insight meditation teachers of the last century, developed techniques to help us maintain moment to moment mindfulness from the instant we awake to the instant we fall asleep.
This leads not only to spiritual insights into our true, unborn-undying essence, but also, equally important, to the purification of the heart. So that we not only become wiser but more caring, generous, joyous and compassionate.
Applying the techniques on this retreat we follow a robust schedule, but meditators can modulate their practice to fit their level of experience, even absolute beginners. The accent is on relaxation and curiosity, rather than striving and concentration. And regular teacher contact, daily Q&A and personal interviews ensures students are supported throughout.
The retreat ends with advice on how to bring the practice into ordinary daily life to enhance our relationships and give spiritual meaning to our work and everyday tasks.
Assistants Needed
N.B. All the courses are serviced by assistants.
As assistant you have the opportunity to serve others. It can be a way of expressing gratitude for the gift of Dhamma. Although the morning is mainly taken up with breakfast preparation and cooking, the rest of day is for practice.
You can see the menus here (PDF).
As an assistant, we do not expect payment of the deposit or make a donation because you have kindly offered your time.
However, your commitment is essential, for the course would be very difficult to run without an assistant and may indeed have to be cancelled.
If you are interested, follow this link: Course Assistant
For info. about retreats and teachers see website: www.satipanya.org.uk
See drop down menus: especially About Us, Teachings and Retreats
Would you like to come and assist on a course?
See calendar on website for up-to-date assistant need.
Satipanya Calendar 2026
Please apply only when you are certain to come.
Are Grief and Sorrow the same?
Bhante Bodhidhamma
I went to Panditarama in Yangon during the winter of the Millennium. There I saw a statue of the Buddha in a mudra, a posture, I had not seen before. His right hand was pointing to his heart. I asked what the meaning was and I was told it symbolised the sadness the Buddha felt at the loss of his two chief disciples, Sariputta and Mogallana. How could the Buddha feel sad? After all shouldn't the virtue of total acceptance of the way things are, prevent such a ‘reaction'.
I know of an elderly lady who could not stop grieving the loss of her son who had died five years before. It was suggested she might be confusing grief with sorrow. By sorrow is meant the sadness one feels at another's misfortune and grief refers to the loss of someone we are attached to. It can be complicated with anger, guilt and remorse, all dependent on the particulars of the situation.
When someone we love dearly leaves us or dies, it leaves an open wound in the heart. Someone whom we depended on to bring us comfort in sadness and joy in success was gone. And so the happiness we felt when we did the same for them. But this comfort and joy and happiness, though quite natural can become dependencies. And that's what we mean by attachment. Now they have gone we lose on two counts and that loss we experience as grief.
If then the amount of grief is believed to be the measure of our love, every time the lady’s grief lessened, she would mistakenly feel her love for her son was also lessening. Guilt would arise and so grief would have to be pumped back up. Because of this misunderstanding her grief would never end. She was asked if her son would be happy to know of her suffering. Would he not want her to accept the situation and to wish him well. She believed in an afterlife, so it was suggested she perform a ritual such as writing him a letter expressing her sorrow at his passing, but that she was ready to accept the situation and wish him well on his onward journey. And then perhaps to read it out at his grave. And then to dispose of the letter in a way that brought closure. Even within a week her grief had gone and she was happy when she remembered the relationship she had with her son.
The Buddha expressed his sorrow at the loss of Sariputta and Maha Moggallana, ‘This assembly, O bhikkhus, appears indeed empty to me, now that Sariputta and Maha Moggallana have passed away.’ But he did not grieve for them. He was expressing his sadness for the Sangha that the two most important teachers had died and for himself at the loss of two close members. (It is reported that Mogallana was murdered by another group of mendicants since he was converting some of their members.)
There is also the occasion when at the end of his days he gave his ‘elephant look’ i.e turning his full body to look at Vesali and remarked to Ananda that this would be the last time he would see Vesali. There is a suggestion of sadness.
What then might sorrow be? When we bring to mind the enormous and growing suffering in the world caused by ideological wars, the climate crisis bearing down upon us, the destruction of nature and disappearance of species, there may arise all sorts of mental states from despair, and in spite of despair a daring to hope, anger and the will to action only to find the crushing acceptance of impotence over the bottomless greed and lust for power of overwhelming vested interests. Yet there may come a time, exhausted, we rest in the solitude of sorrow. For there within that profound sadness there comes the salve of total acceptance. This is the way it is! This is what it is! After all this is the world of Samsara, a swirl of consciousnesses driven by greed, hatred and fake identities. If we stay there in silence long enough within this inner composure, we will find an unexpected solace and a subtle joy arising and a desire to re-engage. For true sorrow does not drown in pitying sadness, but is a catalyst for compassion and cannot remain passive. It demands we move back into the suffering world. And when we do, we find ourselves on firmer ground, no longer wearied by despair, wishful hoping, anger, grief and powerlessness.
Knowing this distinction, makes grief a little easier to distinguish from sorrow. For the grief we feel will equal the measure of attachment. In our vipassana practice, we allow that grief to manifest, but we do not allow the mind to fantasise. We simply sit within the feeling allowing it to discharge and we may find ourselves crying. Grief is a very complex state and may include times of anger, fear and depression. We have to embrace all these mental states with a sense of care and patiently bear them till they exhaust themselves... and they will.
Francis Wells: The Wild Edge of Sorrow – investigates the ‘Five Gates of Grief' and the role of ritual.
Symphony of Sorrow by Henryk Górecki (Polish composer) I find this difficult to listen to. The sorrow is intense.
Górecki's most popular piece is his Third Symphony, also known as the "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" (Symfonia pieśni żałosnych). The work is slow and contemplative, and each of its three movements is for orchestra and solo soprano. The libretto for the first movement is taken from a 15th-century lament, while the second movement uses the words of a teenage girl, Helena Błażusiakówna (Helena Błażusiak), which she wrote on the wall of a Gestapo prison cell in Zakopane to invoke the protection of the Virgin Mary.[45]
The third uses the text of a Silesian folk song which describes the pain of a mother searching for a son killed in the Silesian Uprisings. The symphony's dominant themes are motherhood and separation through war. While the first and third movements are written from the perspective of a parent who has lost a child, the second is from that of a child separated from a parent. Wikipedia
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Metta
Onward
Bodhidhamma
SATIPANYA BUDDHIST TRUST
www.satipanya.org.uk
Directors Jim Tibby Richard Benjamin Noirin Sheahan Mike Regan Gwen Sanderson
Limited Company Number 05924965 Registered Charity Number 1116668
Satipanya Buddhist Trust Satipanya White Gritt, Minsterley Shrewsbury, Shropshire SY5 0JN United Kingdom
T: +44 (0)1588 650752
info: [email protected]
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