*During the COVID-19 pandemic, we’re meeting online every Monday at 7:30pm EST
CEC Monday Night Zoom Room: https://zoom.us/j/799184864, passcode = 00000 (five zeros)

Many people, especially busy urban dwellers, feel overwhelmed and undernourished. They struggle alone with their challenges and are only rarely able to discuss – let alone practice – deep matters of belonging and connection and embodiment.

The vision of The Consciousness Explorers Club (CEC) is to provide a fun and accessible venue where people can discuss these things as they emerge from perspective-altering spiritual and psychological and social practices. Our members go on mind-body adventures – together and independently – and then share their insights and discoveries and inspiration with the community.

Details

With calls for social distancing to curb the spread of COVID-19, CEC is offering virtual meditation sits and discussions via Zoom for the foreseeable future. Please join us Mondays at 7:30pm(EST) to meditate in community and cultivate some connection in these physically distant times. If you live outside of Toronto and have always wanted to check out CEC, now’s your chance!

CEC Monday Night Zoom Room: https://zoom.us/j/799184864, passcode = 00000 (five zeros)

Cost is $10-20 sliding scale, or PWYCThe CEC is a nonprofit – funds go to pay teachers and support the costs of programming. For online sits, the CEC gratefully accepts donations via e-transfer (within Canada) or Paypal, sent to consciousnessexplorersclub@gmail.com. You can also sign up to be a monthly supporter via our Patreon page.

For this month’s offerings, read our current newsletter.

 

What do we do?

The evening rolls out in two parts:

  • Part one is 35-minutes of sitting meditation practice (from 7:30 – 8:30pm)
  • Part two is 30-minutes of interactive discussion ending with breakout rooms (8:30 – 9pm)

We experiment with different solo meditations, from restful absorption to creative visualizations, mindfulness-style noting (of various mind-body components), loving-kindness, sound meditations, choiceless awareness and many others. You don’t need to follow any of these techniques if you don’t want to – some people prefer to stay with their tried-and-true regular practice.

A wise teacher, and a wise center, needs to offer a whole range of skillful practices, because people come along at different stages of their inner development, with different temperaments, and with different sets of problems.” -Jack Kornfield

The CEC is passionately nonsectarian – both humanistic and contemplative traditions are represented. That said, we do have an uber-meditation consultant: the Buddhist teacher Shinzen Young.

If you are interested in our schedule of explorations, sign up for our mailing list to receive our monthly newsletter.

Jeff Warren
President, The Consciousness Explorers Club

Contact us: consciousnessexplorersclub@gmail.com

 

 

 

NOTE: Meditation is a compliment but not a substitute for professional psychological and medical health care. There are risks in any psychological or spiritual method. Those risks increase for people who are experiencing significant distress or dysfunction. Please inquire if you are unsure whether or not meditation is appropriate for your situation.


Location: online via zoom: https://zoom.us/j/799184864 passcode: 00000 (five zeros)
Date: Monday, March 6, 7:30pmEST

By entering experientially into a pre-existing narrative, our imagination naturally embellishes beyond the source text – interior fan-fic if you will – showing us more than we consciously put into it. Tonight we’ll explore this technique using a text from a well-known fantasy novel as our seed story.

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Location: online via zoom: https://zoom.us/j/799184864 passcode: 00000 (five zeros)
Date: Monday, March 13, 7:30pmEST

Tonight we open our ears and notice what else opens too. Together we’ll ride the waves of a curated soundscape, using music as a conduit into the imaginarium of our consciousness.

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Location: Dufferin Grove Park, south fire pit
Date: Sunday, March 19th, 3-4:30pm

Say farewell to winter with another CEC fireside meditation at Dufferin Grove Park! Come for the mindfulness, stay for the marshmallows…

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Location: online via zoom: https://zoom.us/j/799184864 passcode: 00000 (five zeros)
Date: Monday, March 20, 7:30pmEST

Here’s a mindf*ck for you: nothing’s real. Not really anyway. Your brain’s basically making it all up. Your eyes take in light beams, your ears pick up air vibrations, skin sensors detect pressure and temperature… It’s the squishy ball in your skull that decides it has meaning.

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Location: Mosaic Yoga, 225 Sterling Road #Unit 23
Date: Friday, March 24, 7:30pmET

Join the CEC founder Jeff Warren for a Friday night meditation expedition into our March theme of “Imagination”. Or maybe into some other place the consciousness calls!
We’ll be meeting live at our Mosaic Yoga studio home, and streaming via zoom for our faraway friends.

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Location: online via zoom: https://zoom.us/j/799184864 passcode: 00000 (five zeros)
Date: Monday, March 27, 7:30pmEST

This Monday evening’s consciousness exploration will send us on a journey into the world of song. We’ll use our body instruments and let our voices assist in releasing tension held in our bodies. Can we experience a deepened relationship with a song and feel it in a new way?

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Location: online via zoom (link provided with registration)
Date: Friday, April 21 at 7pmET - Sunday, April 23 at 2pmET

Join our online meditation retreat weekend to awaken the springtime senses!

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Location: online via Zoom, link provided upon registration
Date: Saturday, May 6th, 1-4pmET

Join Sharon Salzberg, one of the world’s leading experts in meditation, to learn practices for living with a more spacious, open sense of possibility, creativity, connection, and joy. Her new book Real Life: The Journey from Isolation to Openness and Freedom teaches us that through meditation we can use our difficulties to steer us onto a path toward an authentic, flourishing life—living in a way that allows us to find the wholeness that lies within. This virtual interactive workshop will develop tools needed for this journey to expansive freedom.

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Location: Five Oaks Centre. 1 Bethel Road Paris, ON N3L 3E3
Date: Thursday, August 31, 2pm - Sunday, September 3, 2pm

Consciousness Explorers Club legendary summer retreat is back! Actually, this is not a retreat – this is an ADVANCE!

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