Jenny Wilks has practised Buddhist meditation for many years and has an MA in Indian religions. She has taught on retreats and dharma gatherings since 2005, is a regular teacher at the Barn retreat centre at Sharpham in Devon, and has been teaching at Gaia House since 2008. Jenny trained as a clinical psychologist; she leads mindfulness-based therapy groups in healthcare settings and for the general public and teaches and supervises on the MBCT diploma course at Exeter University.
This is the third talk in a 3-part speaker series titled "Pathways of Skillful Action". Jenny Wilks talks about how, according to Buddhist ethical psychology, the mind is the source of speech and action, and that there are three specific skillful qualities of mind to be cultivated.
This is the second talk in a 3-part speaker series titled "Pathways of Skillful Action". Jenny Wilks talks about the importance of skillful speech in our practice of ethics, and about four kinds of skillful speech, which, according to the Buddha, involve avoiding false, divisive, harsh or meaningless speech. Jenny also discusses cultivating the opposites of these types of speech.
This is the first talk of a two-part talk titled "Mindfulness, Insight, and Compassion." According to Jenny Wilkes, "mindfulness" is becoming such a commonly used term that its depth and liberating potential may be underestimated or misunderstood. The Buddha's teaching on establishing mindfulness (the Satipatthana Sutta) invites us to cultivate mindfulness both "internally" i.e., a deep awareness of our inner experience in order to cultivate liberating insight; and "externally" i.e., an open-hearted awareness of others in order to cultivate an ethical and compassionate response. The two-part talk explores how together these can support our mindfulness practice so that it becomes, as the Buddha described, a "direct path to awakening."
This is the first talk in a 3-part speaker series titled "Pathways of Skillful Action". Jenny Wilks provides an overview of what we mean by ethics, and how the Buddha's list of ten paths of skillful action expand on the traditional five precepts and encompass body, speech, and mind. This talk focuses on the body and the first 3 precepts.
