Dharma Talks and Sangha Shares

What would it mean to move through daily life with genuine generosity — not as a transaction, but as a way of being?In this talk, Ginger Clarkson reflects on the Zen precept "Do not be stingy," exploring generosity through small moments of kindness, unexpected gestures, and the simple act of paying attention to others.Drawing on Buddhist teachings on dana, a Zen meal chant, the image of Indra's net, and a vivid poem by Rumi, Ginger weaves together personal stories — from smiling at airport workers to her hospice visits with her service dog Amanda — to show how generosity flows in both directions and costs less than we think. She also gently points to what withholding does to the heart, and what opens up when we let go of the impoverished mindset that says there isn't enough to give.About Ginger ClarksonGinger is a Community Dharma Leader certified by Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California, where she studied under the mentorship of Jack Kornfield and completed the Dedicated Dharma Practitioner program with Eugene Cash and other senior teachers.

Every year on the full moon of May, Buddhists around the world celebrate Vesak — the birth, enlightenment, and death of the Buddha, all said to have occurred on the same day. In this talk, Travis Hicks marks the occasion with a walk through the life of Siddhartha Gautama, from his sheltered upbringing in a noble household to his eventual enlightenment under the Bodhi tree.Travis traces the familiar arc — the Four Heavenly Messengers, the failed ascetic practices, the decision to simply sit and not move until he found the answer — but tells it in a grounded, unhurried way that brings the human side of the story forward. He closes with the Buddha's final weeks and last words, which return, as always, to the same simple teaching he offered for 45 years: all compounded things pass away, so practice with diligence.A good introduction for those newer to the tradition, and a worthwhile revisit for anyone who hasn't heard the full story told in one sitting.About Travis HicksTravis Hicks has been practicing Vipassana meditation since 1995 and teaching since 2005. He completed a two-year teacher training program at Spirit Rock Meditation Center under the guidance of senior teachers in the Theravada tradition. Travis brings a warm, accessible style to the dharma, drawing on both classical Buddhist teachings and contemporary psychology. He leads weekly sittings, daylong retreats, and occasional residential retreats for the IMH community.

Alexander technique is a body awareness and reeducation method from the 19th century that embodies many principles that overlap with mindfulness meditation and insight through observation. In this talk Tom connects to define practical application while sitting walking and standing as well as meditating.About Tom LevTom Lev is a teacher and community builder who has evolved from air traffic control to dance to meditation, guided by the conviction that wisdom must be lived rather than understood. His background in dance taught him that presence and empathy transcend words, a principle he carries into all his teaching and work. He focuses on cultivating stillness and emotional awareness as ongoing practices, offering grounded instruction oriented toward helping people live with more ease and kindness. He serves on the board of Insight Meditation Houston.

The body is always here which makes it one of the most reliable anchors for meditation practice.In this first of two talks on mindfulness of the body, Travis Hicks introduces the first of the Four Foundations of Mindfulness and walks through several of its core practices: mindfulness of the breath, awareness of postures, and the body scan.Drawing on the Satipatthana Sutta, Travis explores how the breath makes impermanence tangible, why standing and walking deserve as much attention as sitting, and how bringing awareness to everyday movement, walking to get a glass of water, lying down, even eating, can extend practice well beyond the cushion. He also touches on the body scan as a way of observing the body impartially, without the opinions and attachments we tend to carry about it.A practical and grounded introduction to a practice the Buddha described as leading, on its own, all the way to nibbana.About Travis HicksTravis Hicks has been practicing Vipassana meditation since 1995 and teaching since 2005. He completed a two-year teacher training program at Spirit Rock Meditation Center under the guidance of senior teachers in the Theravada tradition. Travis brings a warm, accessible style to the dharma, drawing on both classical Buddhist teachings and contemporary psychology. He leads weekly sittings, daylong retreats, and occasional residential retreats for the IMH community.

Travis Hicks explores how the Buddha's teachings on reincarnation and samsara show up throughout the suttas, and what they ask of us in daily life.Drawing on vivid similes from the Pali Canon, Travis looks at how these teachings are meant to spark samvega — a sense of spiritual urgency — alongside a deep recognition that in an endless cycle of rebirth, every being has at some point been our mother, our child, our closest friend. He doesn't ask anyone to accept reincarnation as fact, but invites an open mind about what it might mean for how we practice and how we treat the people and beings around us right now.About Travis HicksTravis Hicks has been practicing Vipassana meditation since 1995 and teaching since 2005. He completed a two-year teacher training program at Spirit Rock Meditation Center under the guidance of senior teachers in the Theravada tradition. Travis brings a warm, accessible style to the dharma, drawing on both classical Buddhist teachings and contemporary psychology. He leads weekly sittings, daylong retreats, and occasional residential retreats for the IMH community.

The Noble Eightfold Path is one of Buddhism's most essential teachings — but what does it actually look like in daily life?In this talk, Travis Hicks walks through the Eightfold Path in a practical, grounded way, drawing on his year of Upasaka training with Birken Forest Monastery and two books he has returned to again and again: Bhikkhu Bodhi's The Noble Eightfold Path and Bhante Gunaratana's Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness.Rather than going factor by factor, Travis groups the path into its three main areas — ethical conduct, meditative concentration, and wisdom — and shows how they support and reinforce each other over time. He covers how we speak to others and ourselves, how the five precepts show up in everyday choices, and why livelihood is part of a spiritual path at all. The weekly meditation practice we do together, he reminds us, is just one piece of a much larger whole.This is a good introduction for anyone new to Buddhist teaching, and a useful refresher for those who have been practicing for a while.About Travis HicksTravis Hicks is a certified Mindfulness Meditation Teacher through the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley, trained under Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach, and has completed the Upasika program for dedicated practitioners at Birken Forest Monastery under Abbot Ajahn Sona. He has been offering talks and leading retreats at Insight Meditation Houston since 2017 and has served as its Guiding Teacher since 2025.

Your brain is literally divided in two — and according to one neuroscientist, the wrong half has been running the show. In this fascinating and wide-ranging sangha share, Nick Burlin brings together cutting-edge neuroscience and 2,500-year-old Buddhist wisdom to reveal why we suffer — and why our meditation practice may be the most powerful antidote we have.Drawing on Iain McGilchrist's landmark book The Master and His Emissary, Nick explores how the brain's two hemispheres don't just divide tasks — they create fundamentally different worlds. The left hemisphere narrows, analyzes, labels, and grasps for control. The right hemisphere opens wide, perceives wholes, dwells in the present, and knows through felt experience. Both are essential — but they're meant to work together in a very specific relationship. In modern Western culture, that relationship has been turned upside down, and we are quietly paying the price.Here's the stunning part: the Buddha diagnosed this exact problem millennia before neuroscience existed. The teachings on papañca (conceptual proliferation), impermanence, not-self, and the middle way all point toward the same imbalance McGilchrist describes — and Vipassana meditation, it turns out, is precisely the training needed to restore it.Whether you're a longtime meditator or simply curious about how the mind works, this talk offers a genuinely fresh lens on why we sit — and what we're actually doing every time we return to the breath.About Nick BurlinNick is a Houston area educator who has taught history, government, economics, and philosophy for over a decade. Nick has a deep curiosity about human nature and the human mind and loves being part of the IMH Sangha.

What if the secret to a fearless, open heart isn't one practice — but four, working together? In this deeply nourishing talk, Ginger Clarkson explores the Buddha's four Brahma Viharas — the Divine Abodes of the heart — and shows how loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity don't just stand alone, but actively protect and strengthen each other.Drawing on the wisdom of Nyanaponika Thera, the Dalai Lama, and the archetypal compassion of Kuan Yin, this episode guides you through each of the four sublime states with brief, accessible meditation practices — and reveals why the Buddha taught that we need all four to truly mature and liberate the heart.You'll learn how loving-kindness keeps compassion from tipping into aversion, how sympathetic joy prevents compassion from drowning in the world's suffering, and why equanimity is nothing like indifference. Whether you're new to these teachings or deepening an existing practice, this talk offers both insight and a practical path to living with greater warmth, wisdom, and inner peace.About Ginger ClarksonGinger Clarkson is a Community Dharma Leader certified by Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California, where she studied under the mentorship of Jack Kornfield and completed the Dedicated Dharma Practitioner program with Eugene Cash and other senior teachers. Learn more here.