WE ARE CREATING AN INTERNATIONAL BUDDHIST MEDITATION CENTER

What we are interested in is teaching the practice of meditation, demonstrating how our daily activities can be used as an intense practice, leading us to have more awareness and calm. It is nothing more than the teachings of the Buddha applied to our lives.

Mainly:

- Calm meditation (samatha pubbangamam),

- Insight meditation (vipassana pubbangamam)

You will learn how this practices can change your life radically, gaining self-control, calmness and recovering the natural freedom of your mind.

There is a noticeable increasing need of getting back to earth but also a need of getting back to ancient practices to refocus and calm the mind. In the middle of this reborn inner hunger, we seldom notice a need of simplicity. We also look for the latter.

Say hello to the actual practice and say good bye to the classical retreat where nobody teaches you the very foundations and the most detailed daily practices that lead you to calm and clarify your mind.

WHO WE ARE

- I'm Dario. Italian-spanish. I have been practicing meditation since I was around 15 years old. Since then, I've been studying and getting to know a whole lot of techniques and practices, I've also been a member of the Buddhist Theravada monk community for two years and the Zen community for some years. I've also been a practitioner of the ancient Tantra. I have a degree in Philosophy (Rome, Italy) and have specialised in language analysis. I have also studied, physics and analysis of the scientific method.

I started teaching meditation when I was 25 years old.

Currently I am a photographer and video maker - activities I make my living from.

- I'm Valentina. I was an opera singer. I have a degree in Music (Alessandria, Italy) and a Master in Music Event Organisation (Milan, Italy). I have studied Reiki and Tibetan Bowls and Ayurveda. I've been practicing meditation for many years now. I know mantra meditation and other practices but mainly I practice calm and insight meditation.

Meditation have always been an important part of our inner grow, until it became the whole main part of our lives.

We believe in a very simple and essential way of life.

THE PROJECT

What we are trying to do, is to create a peaceful and environmentally aware center, where people can have the opportunity to retreat, and learn in detail the practice of meditation.

To do this, we need to buy a land with a forest, where we can find a small old building to be renovated and to be kept as the "headquarter".

We also need to build wooden platforms and here's why:

Retreats are design around very simple requirements: you bring your tend and you will find a wooden platform where to settle it, without disturbing the natural environment.

The images below are only examples:

We'll also need a shed to be able to cover ourselves in case of adverse weather. This shed/roof will also be needed as a central place to eat, practice meditation and talk.

The image below is only an example:

During the retreat days you will also eat our plant-based food from our own grown vegetables; this is why we'll need to invest in the creation of a vegetable garden, to produce the necessary food and create canned goods for the winter.

WHERE?

The project doesn't have boundaries. This means that we are not thinking about any country in particular. The only starting point is Europe.

By now we’ve been visiting several properties in Italy and Switzerland, as possible sites.

We find very interesting the north of Italy, since it can help people coming from France, Switzerland and Austria. But this is just an idea.

Through our life experience, we have learned that meditation naturally leads to reconnect with nature. Because of this, we have called this project the Be-Project, that stands for Back to Earth Project.

Nature, the earth where we live and meditation are thoroughly linked.

You can visit our web page here: www.be-project.org.

In this page you will find the retreats program in near future. As for now we'll be publishing the progress of the project.

OUR ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITMENT

From the very moment we'll buy the land we get the commitment of taking care of it by preserving the place as we got it.

The same meditation practice teaches the importance of respecting things as they are. In fact, as it is already clear, the project intervention over the land is minimal.

This is another reason why we called this project the Be-Project!

HOW IT WILL WORK

We strongly believe in donation based retreats, away from any commercial scheme so that they can be accessible to everyone.

Donations are only used to pay the cost of maintaining the place and organising the retreats (food, water and cleaning).

Let's create this project together!

For everyone's sake and, of course, for your own.