What is SanghaSeva?
SanghaSeva organise "meditation in action" retreats in the UK, India and Israel. Our retreats integrate time for quiet meditation, with time for offering ourselves to others.
Whether we are planting trees on deforested land, openly listening to people's suffering or massaging the stiff limbs of a healed leper, Love and Wisdom can come through.
We aim to explore living fully through service; bringing together the wisdom of our meditation practice with the love that connects us all. 
This is not just an attempt to 'do good', but stems from a deep wish to bring compassion and love to the suffering on this earth. At the same time, and from the same depth, we acknowledge that we are a part of everything and therefore growing, learning, receiving and evolving through the process of giving.
SanghaSeva was born from the heart to give back to the world. To take the love, compassion and wisdom cultivated on the meditation cushion and spread them. Rather than waiting until we are perfected, we can use the form of giving, of interacting and engagement to help others and ourselves. In the words of Pema Chodron: 'we work on ourselves in order to help others, but also we help others in order to work on ourselves.'
In our retreats we are called to explore our balance of being and doing, to investigate what is really helping, and to expand our boundaries. To widen our circle of friends and what in life we can let into our hearts.
In this way we feel we are offering a continuation of the deepening of meditation, of being open in life, to life, in all its joy and sorrow.
These retreats can challenge us at times, and because of this they can be very fruitful. We find the very skills of loving patience that help us to connect and stay steady with ourselves in meditation, allow us to be fully with others, with the world. And as we become more intimate with others we can find new depths of intimacy with ourselves.
The name SanghaSeva is made up of two words: sangha is a community of spiritual friends, and seva means service.
Although we can each do service work separately we are drawn toward developing an active sangha, nourishing each others practice, and encouraging each other in giving so that we become more than the sum of our parts.
Transforming an idea into reality can take many forms. We aim to offer opportunities around the world for practicing dharma in action, on both social and environmental projects. We are also happy to support and encourage more ideas and initiatives, that we may be a nursery for positive actions. If you would like more information about any of our projects or help and support creating your own please contact us.
Group Photos |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
About the Facilitators
On SanghaSeva work retreats we choose to have facilitators rather than leaders or teachers. A facilitator will hold the structure of the event to allow all of us to find our own way as individuals and as part of the group.
Our Facilitators
Zohar Lavie
Zohar has been practicing meditation in different traditions since 1995. This journey has taken her from the meditation cushion into exploring further ways of expressing truth and love and in 2004 she cofounded SanghaSeva. She now spends most of her time facilitating retreats that offer service as a spiritual path around the world. Since 2006 she has been teaching on silent retreats and Dharma gatherings in India, Europe and Israel.
Nathan Glyde
Nathan began meditating in 1997 and began teaching on silent meditation retreats in 2006.
From a continued exploration of meditation on silent retreats grew a deep love of silence and the power of stillness. The realisation of the potential of every moment to become a moment of awakening provoked an exploration of meditation in daily life activities. An urge to offer retreats that offer deep connection in an active life led to the initiative in 2004 of SanghaSeva.
Kirsten Kratz
Kirsten has been practising Insight Meditation since 1993, and has been facilitating and co-leading Dharma events in England and in Europe since 2000. She has also been assistant-teaching retreats at Gaia House since 2008. One of her particular areas of interest is the exploration of the nourishing and expression of our Dharma understanding outside of a retreat environment. In 2006 Kirsten began facilitating on SanghaSeva retreats.
Rob Burbea
Rob has been practising and studying Buddhist meditation and Dharma since 1985 with a variety of teachers in England and in the USA. He has been teaching since 2004 and is currently Resident Teacher of Gaia House and a member of the Teacher Council. He is a cofounder of SanghaSeva.
Chris Cullen
Chris has been practising Insight Meditation since 1996, and has recently starting teaching. He is a graduate of the Community Dharma Leader Program at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in the US, and trained as a Dharma teacher with Christina Feldman. He teaches at a secondary school in London and is cofounder of the Mindfulness in Schools Project. He is Chair of London Insight and has been involved in SanghaSeva since 2010.
Ian Davidson
Ian lives in, and co-runs, Moulin de Chaves; a meditation retreat centre in France. His full time commitment is to spiritual practice and making retreats available for those who wish to do them. Ian has facilitated the TFL reforestation work retreat in Scotland every year since 2005. His practice began in a monastery in Thailand 12 years ago and he is a student in the Ridhwan school, diamond approach of A.H. Almass.
Caroline Jones
Caroline has been practising meditation since 1989. She started teaching in 2006, and now teaches at Gaia House and internationally. She has also covered periods at Gaia House as resident teacher.
Site Map
Welcome to our website, here's what you can find on the site.
To read about retreats around the world that you can join, go to Coming Up.
To find out more about continual activities you can get involved in, or other ways and opportunities to attune your life to your hearts wishes, read Daily Life Matters
To gather a clearer picture of what we are doing you can read the feedback of participants and facilitators in Past Actions.
Check out Links, Talks and Books for more information about meditation retreats and service work organisations around the world, talks from SanghaSeva facilitators and a list of helpful books.
Please also let us know of any organisations you think we would like to know about, or significant books that have touched you or been useful to you. We will be happy to share your recommendations to others through this page.
At Gifts that Keep on Giving you are offered the chance to give a present to a friend and stranger simultaneously. In this way you are helping people in genuine need.
Or to see more photos visit our Photo Album.
Still can't find what you are looking for, search SanghaSeva.org from here.
| Tweets by @sanghaseva |
Making a Change through Social Media
On the right is a live time line feed from SanghaSeva on Twitter.
We keep the page there and our SanghaSeva Page on FaceBook updated with information about our retreats. We try to post once a day during our retreats to share the experience.
Throughout the year we also post links and photos connected to engaged spiritual activities happening in the news or on the web.
You can also find us on:
Google Plus
Blogger - Daily Life Matters
You Tube
Picasa - Web Albums