Saturday, June 27 | 9:30 am - 5:30 pm ET
Sunday, June 28 | 9:30 am - 1:30 pm ET
In-person & Online | $195
Presenters: Robert A.F. Thurman, John Campbell, and guest teacher Patty McRae
PLEASE NOTE
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Single-day tickets are not available for this event. Recordings of both days will be available to registered participants who are unable to attend one of the days.
- The workshop requires a minimum of 10 participants in order to run — please register in advance.
1,200 years ago, the meditation master Shantideva called the mind altruistically dedicated to awakening the “supreme substance of the alchemists.” Like lead magically turning to gold, Shantideva describes the transformation of our normal lives into the boundless bliss of enlightenment due to a simple, fundamental shift in worldview. Join us for a joyful and immersive weekend of yoga, meditation, and dharma teachings with Robert Thurman, John Campbell, and guest Patty McRae to explore the uplifting and transformative practices of Vajra Yoga™, which brings together practices and perspectives from the Buddhist and Hatha Yoga traditions to offer prescriptions for connecting with an authentic, joyful nature grounded in compassionate creativity.
Alternating between lecture and practice formats, students learn to experience yoga’s physical and mental interventions as methods to engage a “vajra body” of channels, drops, and subtle life-energies—the super-subtle anatomy beneath and within our ordinary body, speech, and mind. It is an opportunity to experience yoga as the Indo-Tibetan “inner science” for enhancing physical and mental resilience, and accessing serenity, clarity, and sanity.
Scholar-practitioners of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism Bob Thurman and John Campbell will address yoga’s core insight—that consciously redirecting intention and behavior can bring relief from the suffering states of frustration, fear, and addiction rooted in self-preoccupation. In practice sessions, John is joined by Patty McRae in leading Tibetan and vinyasa-based yogas, pranayama, mantra, and meditation sessions through which participants can experience the immediate benefits of psycho-physical ease and longer-term positive shifts in worldview and engagement with the world.
Finally, Patty will lead Yoga Nidra sessions and introduce participants to the extraordinary world of dream, sleep, and clear-light practices—the pinnacle of yoga’s transformative methods.
Weekend sessions include:
- Dharma talks and guided meditation with Robert and John, drawing from Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, the Hatha Yoga Pradipika, and the sutras and tantras of the Buddha, Nāgārjuna, and other great masters, offering participants an experiential entry into the shared inner sciences of Indian and Tibetan wisdom traditions.
- Pranayama, Hatha, and Tibetan Healing Yoga for opening the body to vitality, balance, and the spacious freedom of embodied awareness.
- Sanskrit sound meditation.
- Yoga Nidra and the introduction to nocturnal practices of dream and sleep.
A Living Wisdom Tradition
This immersion offers a rare opportunity to study with two exceptional teachers and to deepen your practice within a supportive, wisdom-centered community rooted in lineage, inquiry, and embodied understanding.
All levels are welcome. Practices will be accessible and adaptable, with modifications offered to support those with injuries or physical limitations.
Tentative Schedule
Saturday, June 27
- 9:30–11 AM: Welcome Program: Dharma Talk with Bob & John — The Nature, Meaning, and Purpose of the “Vajra Body”
- 11:15 AM–12:30 PM: Workshop with John — Tibetan Healing Yoga and Pranayama
12:30 - 1:45 pm Break
- 1:45 - 4 pm: Dharma Talk w/Bob and John: Using maps of the body to navigate to the source
- 4 - 5:30 pm: Yoga Nidra with Patty McRae
Sunday, June 27
- 9:30 am - 12 pm: Workshop w/ John: Vinyasa-based Yoga, Tibetan Healing Yoga, and Pranayama
- 12:45 — 1:30 pm: Workshop w/John: Bija Mantra and Meditation practices
TEACHER BIOS
Bob Thurman is a professor emeritus, author, and teacher widely regarded as one of the leading Western experts on Tibetan Buddhism. The first American ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist monk by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Bob has spent decades making the Buddha’s teachings accessible to modern audiences. A former Jey Tsong Khapa Professor at Columbia University and co-founder of Tibet House US, he has written extensively on Buddhism, politics, and culture. Named one of Time Magazine’s 25 most influential Americans, he was awarded India’s Padma Shri in 2020 for his work preserving Buddhist heritage. Through his scholarship and activism, Bob continues to be a vibrant bridge between ancient wisdom and contemporary life. To learn more visit https://bobthurman.com/.
John Campbell has been practicing yoga and meditation for over thirty years. In 2002 he became one of the few instructors worldwide to be recognized as a Certified Teacher by the Ashtanga Yoga Research Institute in Mysore in southern India. He currently runs the Vajra Yoga program for Tibet House in New York City. A scholar of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, he received a PhD in Religion from Columbia University. He has been a Fulbright Fellow and taught at Columbia University and the University of Virginia, where he co-founded the Contemplative Sciences Center. He is a translator of Sanskrit and Tibetan texts from the yogic and tantric traditions of India and Tibet. His publications include The Esoteric Community Tantra by Vajradhara with the Illuminating Lamp by Chandrakirti (2020), the first in a series of commentaries on the Guhyasamāja Tantra co-translated with Prof. Robert Thurman. He is a native New Yorker and lives with his wife, three children, and various cats and dogs in Newburgh, New York.
Patty MacRae (E-RYT 500) has been practicing yoga since 1998. She completed her YA 200-hour TT with Val Schneiderman at the Yoga Shala of Ridgefield, CT. After some years of teaching and founding a seasonal yoga school in Maine, Patty completed her 300-hour Vajra Yoga certification under the guidance of Michele Loew and Tenzin Robert Thurman through Tibet House US. During that time, Patty also completed 200+ hours of Yoga Nidra teacher training with Michele Loew.
While undergoing the Vajra Yoga program, Patty simultaneously completed a Master’s degree from CIHS in Integral Noetic Sciences with a concentration in Dreamwork and Anomalous Experiences. She wrote a thesis exploring the intersections of dreams, contact phenomena, and altered states of consciousness. In addition to teaching yoga, Patty works to support private clients through transformative experiences and anomalous phenomena, offering a bridge between ancient somatic practices and modern consciousness studies through lenses including dreamwork, tarot, astrology, journaling, art, and Jungian psychology.
Patty's teaching style seeks to guide each student to their inner knowing of the multidimensionality of their existence and their authentic Self. This gnosis comes from practices that attend to the physical and subtle bodies, using asana, meditation, pranayama, mantra, visualization, and stillness. Her classes are deeply influenced by the discipline of the Ashtanga Vinyasa tradition and the profound wisdom of Vajra Yoga and Tibetan Medicine.
