Santa Barbara, CA 93105
Life of Practice: Awakening as a Way of Life
A Retreat in Meditation and Embodied Awakening
with Dawa Tarchin Phillips
A 5-Day Non-residential Retreat with Dawa Tarchin Phillips
April 16-20, 2026 · Santa Barbara Bodhi Path
What does it mean to live a life of practice? In the Buddhist tradition, awakening is not a single experience but a path that unfolds through the steady cultivation of awareness, compassion, and wisdom. A life of practice invites us to bring meditation off the cushion and into the body, our relationships, our work, and the rhythms of everyday life. In this sense, awakening is not separate from how we live—it becomes a way of life.
This retreat offers an opportunity to deepen meditation and explore what it means to live awakening in a grounded and embodied way. Through personal practice, guided meditation, Dharma teachings, contemplative dialogue, and gentle embodied practices, we will cultivate the conditions for insight to mature and integrate into daily life.
Together we will explore:
• Establishing and sustaining a stable meditation practice
• Embodiment as the foundation of mindful awareness
• Integrating insight into the activities of everyday life
• Cultivating compassion and wisdom in relationship with ourselves and others
• Walking the path of awakening with steadiness and humility
The retreat will include periods of silent meditation, teachings from the Buddhist tradition, mindful movement and embodied awareness practices, and time for reflection in nature.
Whether you are new to meditation or have practiced for many years, this retreat offers a supportive environment to reconnect with the essence of the path — a life devoted to practice, presence, and awakening.
All are welcome.
Dawa Tarchin Phillips is the resident teacher of Bodhi Path Santa Barbara. Having completed two traditional three-year meditation retreats within the Vajrayana and Mahayana traditions, he is a masterful Dharma teacher, global spiritual leader, and internationally respected mindfulness and meditation expert.
Dawa will be teaching in person for this non-residential retreat at the Bodhi Path center. Retreatants are invited to attend in-person at the Santa Barbara Bodhi Path center or online.
Please note that meals are not included in the registration fee. In-person retreatants are welcome to bring lunch or purchase lunch from a nearby eatery. The social room will be open so that we can eat together.
Limited partial scholarships are available on a first come basis. Please contact sb@bodhipath.org with your interest, commitment, and financial need before March 24th.
The Santa Barbara Bodhi Path Buddhist Center offers a high quality curriculum of instruction in Buddhist meditation practice and philosophy. The Center was founded in 1997 at the direction of Shamar Rinpoche. Since then, hundreds of students have come to learn and practice in a modern, non-sectarian environment focused on authentic Buddhist teachings taught and practiced by authentic teachers. We are a diverse community of practitioners encompassing all ages and levels of practice. Dawa Tarchin Phillips is the resident teacher, and we regularly host visiting teachers.
Life of Practice: Awakening as a Way of Life
A Retreat in Meditation and Embodied Awakening
with Dawa Tarchin Phillips
A 5-Day Non-residential Retreat with Dawa Tarchin Phillips
April 16-20, 2026 · Santa Barbara Bodhi Path
What does it mean to live a life of practice? In the Buddhist tradition, awakening is not a single experience but a path that unfolds through the steady cultivation of awareness, compassion, and wisdom. A life of practice invites us to bring meditation off the cushion and into the body, our relationships, our work, and the rhythms of everyday life. In this sense, awakening is not separate from how we live—it becomes a way of life.
This retreat offers an opportunity to deepen meditation and explore what it means to live awakening in a grounded and embodied way. Through personal practice, guided meditation, Dharma teachings, contemplative dialogue, and gentle embodied practices, we will cultivate the conditions for insight to mature and integrate into daily life.
Together we will explore:
• Establishing and sustaining a stable meditation practice
• Embodiment as the foundation of mindful awareness
• Integrating insight into the activities of everyday life
• Cultivating compassion and wisdom in relationship with ourselves and others
• Walking the path of awakening with steadiness and humility
The retreat will include periods of silent meditation, teachings from the Buddhist tradition, mindful movement and embodied awareness practices, and time for reflection in nature.
Whether you are new to meditation or have practiced for many years, this retreat offers a supportive environment to reconnect with the essence of the path — a life devoted to practice, presence, and awakening.
All are welcome.
Dawa Tarchin Phillips is the resident teacher of Bodhi Path Santa Barbara. Having completed two traditional three-year meditation retreats within the Vajrayana and Mahayana traditions, he is a masterful Dharma teacher, global spiritual leader, and internationally respected mindfulness and meditation expert.
Dawa will be teaching in person for this non-residential retreat at the Bodhi Path center. Retreatants are invited to attend in-person at the Santa Barbara Bodhi Path center or online.
Please note that meals are not included in the registration fee. In-person retreatants are welcome to bring lunch or purchase lunch from a nearby eatery. The social room will be open so that we can eat together.
Limited partial scholarships are available on a first come basis. Please contact sb@bodhipath.org with your interest, commitment, and financial need before March 24th.