Preparing for a New Jewish Year
A Six-day Jewish Meditation Retreat Sponsored by the Awakened Heart Project
with Sylvia Boorstein, Norman Fischer, Joanna Katz and Jeff Roth
In-Person at Santa Sabina Center in San Rafael, CA Or
Online with Zoom
August 21st – 27th, 2023
We have all been moving through life, adjusting to new ways of living and interacting. Opportunities to come together in person as well as on-line are precious opportunities. A contemplative practice is helpful in keeping our heart/minds awake, attentive, and as open as possible. A period of intensive contemplative practice can help us take stock of what we have experienced in the current passing year as we prepare to enter the month of Elul on the last day of the retreat, with the Jewish New Year coming thirty days later.
A Jewish meditation practice can give you the tools you need to open up your heart/mind - developing wisdom and cultivating the qualities of compassion and kindness during this preparation period for the High Holy-days, through being present to each moment as it is now. Learning to pay sustained loving attention to your own experience, and the feelings arising in the present moment is the key.
This retreat is designed to show experientially how a regular Jewish meditation practice can help cultivate awareness in all aspects of daily life. Being at home will provide an opportunity to integrate the practice experience with life at home, creating a model for using contemplative practice to remind us of the possibility of bringing our awareness to every moment of our lives.
We will have a full day schedule, which we found to be valuable in sustaining and deepening the practice. Participants will have the opportunity to enhance their skills in a range of meditative techniques. These include concentration techniques, contemplative prayer chants, mindfulness/heartfulness meditation and a contemplative blessing practice.
The week will culminate with a celebration of Shabbat.
Information about the Retreat
This will be a hybrid retreat – We will have an in-person presence at Santa Sabina, as well as a live zoom connection. We are limiting the number of attendees to 45. This will be divided between single rooms, double rooms and commuters.
For Zoom Attendees: the schedule will be on Pacific Daylight Time, with some creative adjustments to make it work for people on the East Coast and in other time zones. There will be two teaching periods of 45 minutes each day from Sylvia, Norman, Joanna and Jeff, as well as complete practice instructions each day and chanting liturgical practice.
If you have questions, please email Brian Arnell.
Registration Information
This retreat will follow a hybrid model, it will take place both in-person and on Zoom.
The fee for the August 21st - 27th, Jewish Meditation Intensive on Zoom is $360.00.
People attending the retreat on Zoom, can pay the full amount, or make a deposit of 1/2 the $360.00.
The cost of the August 21st - 27th Jewish Meditation Intensive In-person, is:
Single rooms are $1,400.00.
Double rooms are $1100.00.
Commuters are $930.00.
Please make a deposit of 1/2 the retreat fee to reserve your spot.
To register for the "Preparing for a New Jewish Year" retreat please click on the "Register Now" button below.
Faculty Biographies
Sylvia Boorstein has been teaching meditation retreat since 1985. She is a founding teacher of Spirit Rock Meditation Center and a psychotherapist, wife, mother and grandmother who is particularly interested in seeing daily life as practice. She has led numerous retreats and training programs for rabbis and Jewish educators.
Norman Fischer is a Zen priest, teacher, poet and former co-abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center. He is also the co-founder of Makor Or, a Jewish meditation center in San Francisco. He leads Jewish meditation sessions around the country. He is an author and the founder and spiritual director of the Everyday Zen Foundation, an organization dedicated to adapting Zen Buddhists teachings to Western culture.
Rabbi Jeff Roth is the founder and Director of The Awakened Heart Project for Contemplative Judaism. He was the co-founder of Elat Chayyim where he served as Executive Director and Spiritual Director for 13 years. He is the co-leader of the Jewish Mindfulness Teacher Training program and has facilitated of over 190 Jewish meditation retreats. He is the author of, Jewish Meditation Practices for Everyday Life and Me, Myself and God from Jewish lights Publishing.
Rabbi Joanna Katz attended the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and was ordained in 1988. She has worked as a Chaplain in College, Hospital, Psychiatric and Prison settings. She is a Board-Certified Chaplain and an ACPE Certified Educator. In 1992 Joanna co-founded Elat Chayyim, the Jewish Spiritual Retreat Center. She is a student of Eastern and Western contemplative practices and teaches meditation regularly. She lives with her family in the Hudson River Valley of New York.