AYUR YOGA ECO ASHRAM IN MYSORE
Yoga & Ayurveda Retreats | Yoga Teacher Trainings
Get the Best Offers
Learn More
Vermont Zen Center Buildings
The Vermont Zen Center complex is three buildings, called the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha Buildings.
There are extensive gardens in both the front and back of the Center. The Zen Center land is private property, but you are welcome to stop by for a visit—we just ask that, before coming, you please call between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. to be sure that we are not in retreat and that someone is at the Center.
Adjoining and behind Zen Center lands is the Upper LaPlatte River Natural Area, extensive walking trails that are maintained in partnership with the Lake Champlain Land Trust. The Vermont Zen Center is a Buddhist community, founded to provide a warm and inviting place for the study and practice of Zen Buddhism. The Zen Center’s mission is to create a peaceful and inviting environment to support those who seek wisdom, compassion, joy, and equanimity within a Buddhist context. The twofold practice of the Center is to overcome the causes of suffering through spiritual development and to alleviate the world’s suffering through outreach activities and the cultivation of a caring attitude to the earth.
The Zen Center was established by Sunyana Graef, Roshi in 1988 with two members who, along with the Graef family, practiced in a room in the Graef’s residence. By 1991 the Center had outgrown its small quarters and moved into a house just down the street. The generosity of members and friends allowed for the purchase of the house and the Center soon began building a meditation room (zendo) and planting gardens.
The Center now has a comfortable site for conducting sittings, sesshins (retreats), ceremonies, study groups, and other activities. A major expansion of the Zen Center was completed in 2003 adding dorms, a large kitchen and a dining room. A second major expansion was completed in August 2011. It added a new meditation room (zendo), a reception room and additional dorms, completing our retreat facility. The former zendo is now a Buddha Hall used for chanting, ceremonies, and other purposes.
The methods of Zen Buddhism practiced at the Vermont Zen Center stem from those taught by Roshi Philip Kapleau, whose teachings were in turn influenced by Zen Master Harada Daiun Roshi’s blend of the ancient sects of Soto and Rinzai Zen.
The foundation of our practice is zazen, which means sitting with one-pointed concentration. Zen practice is expressed in daily life through the attentiveness and awareness which we bring to every single moment. Our sitting practices include both shikan-taza and breath awareness, as is commonly done in the Soto Zen tradition. It also includes koans, or spiritual inquiries, as in the Rinzai tradition. In the zendo we sit facing the wall rather than facing out. Most chanting and liturgical recitation is done in English.
Zen training arises out of the Buddhist tradition but can serve as a valuable adjunct to any religion, calming and centering the mind, and promoting stability, mindfulness, and clarity.
Bathrooms are dormitory style; there are no rooms with private bathrooms. There is an ADA bedroom and bathroom which is usually available. Because the Zen Center is a place of spiritual practice with a focus of silent meditation and introspection, couples do not share rooms.
Please bring or purchase your own vegetarian food (no meat, fish, poultry or items such as beef or chicken stock, foods containing gelatin, etc.). We do not provide coffee, so please bring your own.
From I-89: Exit on I-189 (Shelburne, Route 7). Take I-189 to the end and follow the signs for Route 7 (south). Turn left (south) onto Route 7 to Shelburne Village. Go through the stop light and continue until you come to the next traffic light at Marsett Road. Turn left, then go straight until you cross a small bridge. Immediately turn right onto Thomas Road. The Zen Center is one-half mile down the road on the right, a large cedar-sided house set back from the street.
