A wabi-sabi home retreat, November 21

RED LADDER STUDIO NEWSLETTER

Dear Subscriber First Name,

I’ve just got back from a trip to the UK — catching up with friends and family, and leading a retreat at the beautiful Rivendell Retreat Centre. The retreat was called Everyone’s an Artist, subtitled a wabi-sabi retreat.

For years, I’ve been exploring how the Dharma connects with wabi-sabi — the Japanese concept which is both an aesthetic and world view. Like the Dharma, it’s hard to pin down and always opens into something deeper, which makes it endlessly fascinating.

The Buddhist Centre Online has invited me to lead a home retreat on wabi-sabi towards the end of November. Here in Sweden, November has a bit of a reputation for being the gloomiest month of the year, so I’m hoping to reframe the darkness in a wabi-sabi way — as an invitation to slow down, turn inward, and appreciate the quiet beauty of this time.

I’d love you to join me — and please do forward this email to any friends who might be interested. You can read more from The Buddhist Centre below ⬇️

Dhammasiri discovering a doorway to freedom in the garden!

Wabi-sabi and the Three Doorways to Freedom with Vajradarshini

A meditation and reflection retreat
November 21-25

The Buddha taught that there are three doorways to freedom. These doorways open when we turn towards our experiences of impermanence, insubstantiality, and suffering. Known as the lakshanas—the marks of conditioned existence—they can seem uninviting. After all, who wants to look closely at the more painful aspects of life?

Back in the 90s, Vajradarshini came across Leonard Koren’s Wabi-sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets and Philosophers, which begins with these lines:

Wabi-sabi is a beauty of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. A beauty of things modest and humble. A beauty of things unconventional.

Could wabi-sabi mean finding beauty in the lakshanas themselves? If so, perhaps they become easier to embrace. This realisation set Vajradarshini on a path she is still walking today: the path of finding beauty in truth—even in life’s painful truths.

Rooted in Japanese culture, wabi-sabi invites us to cherish the fleeting, the worn, and the understated. It reminds us that life’s most precious moments often lie in simplicity. We are encouraged to notice the magic in everyday rituals— a cup of tea, watching the seasons change, or tending to small creative acts.

Every moment can reveal profound truths. Moments of impermanence, insubstantiality and suffering are like cracks in our everyday world. Through these cracks, we glimpse chinks of light—three doorways into a new reality: signless, wishless, and open.

During this home retreat, we will reflect deeply on these truths with the help of our most cherished wabi-sabi objects—perhaps the socks our mother knitted, or the bowl we once broke and carefully repaired.

What to expect

Join us for 5 days of meditation, led reflections, Dharma teachings, poetry, small and large group discussions and creative Buddhist ritual.

Suggested donation:

£175 / $230 / €205 for the whole retreat, or drop in for £35 / $45 / €40 per day.

Get one ticket and come to any session you wish!

Like all our events, this retreat is offered by donation rather than charging a compulsory ticket price. We want to do this because we never want money to be an obstacle to taking part in a supportive community, and we know many people are struggling financially. The amount we suggest reflects the huge amount of work and love that goes into putting on events we hope will benefit everyone attending. If you can, please donate today. Thank you!

BOOK HERE

Sending a whole lot of wabi-sabi beauty your way,
Vajradarshini

P.S. If you do book, drop me a line and let me know! It’s nice to have people in mind when I’m planning a retreat.

Hello, I’m Vajradarshini — a British Dharma teacher living in the south of Sweden with my Swedish wife, Dhammasiri. Our home, The Guesthouse (named after Rumi’s poem), is a place for creative, down-to-earth Dharma practice. From here, we run retreats and workshops, and I also teach internationally, both online and in person. I’m glad you’ve found your way here.

Links
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