Victor von der Heyde

has been practising meditation for thirty five years.  He's spent over two years in total in silent retreats and has taken dharma teaching roles since the mid 1990s. He was co-founder of Sydney Insight Meditators and of the Bodhgaya Development Association. He also trained in Gestalt Therapy and worked for years as a counsellor.

He writes: These days my passions in teaching and practice include exploring environmental ethics - how we treat animals, how we respond to climate breakdown - and the ways that we get often stuck with particular concepts of self and world. And stuck with particular meditation practices. My intention is to open up freeing and soulful possibilities for people.



Teaching schedule Late 2024 - 2025


 
4 NovemberBluegum Sangha:  An Introduction to Soulmaking Dharma - Part 3


14 November: : Visible and Invisible Roots: Responses to Climate Breakdown, Genocide and the Fraying of the Global Rules-based Order.  Golden Wattle Sangha


24 February - 3 March 2025: High Country Walking Retreat, Charlotte Pass, Kosciuszko National Park, teaching with Suzie Brown.


16 March 2025:  Sydney Insight Meditators , Cheltenham. Morning of Practice with shared lunch at the Hut of the Happy Omen
 

16 March - 1 June 2025
: Seeing That Frees: Ways of Looking, Dependent Arising and Emptiness Practices 12 week online course on Sunday eveings


13 July - 28 September 2025: Seeing That Frees: Ways of Looking, Dependent Arising and Emptiness Practices
 
 

1 - 8  October2025
:
Insight and Soul-making Dharma, week-long retreat, The Gathering Place, Dickson, Canberra








Audio recordings

Talks on Dharma Seed


2024

Visible and Invisible Roots

Sometimes our world feels fresh and beautiful, other times when we take in some of what's happening in the wider world (genocide on our watch, climate breakdown, a fraying of the global rules based order) the outlook appears bleak. What's happening could be seen in terms of collective numbness, or in terms of moral deterioration or moral injury. In what helpful ways might we see our actions when the outlook appears bleak?

10th October 2024, Canberra Imaginal Practice Retreat. 


2023

Recordings from Canberra Seeing That Frees retreat on DharmaSeed


2022

Being part of a sacrifice
We’re part of a culture that is sacrificing a stable climate and the well-being of future generations for short term gain, short term convenience and pleasures. There's ongoing questions as to what values we hold and what we do to honour those values. The talk outlines the the beginnings of run-away climate breakdown, the range of felt responses, failure of the collective imagination, behavioural denial, ecological debt and how facing that can be a type of awakening, the sense of sacredness, other dharma perspectives, and questions about responses.
8th December, High Country Walking Retreat

What is a beautiful life? What does it mean to live a beautiful life, and are we called to the possibility of a beautiful life, of making our life into something beautiful?
6th December, High Country Walking Retreat


Rockhampton Samadhi and Insight workshop, 16 - 17 July

Samadhi and Insight: Introduction
27 mins
Body field (energy body): guided meditation
27 mins
Further comments on samadhi, intro to metta
12 mins
Metta to phenomena: guided meditation
32 mins
Samadhi and the sense of push and pull
11 mins
Tightness in meditation, not being hard on yourself
4 mins
Using imagery with breath practice: guided meditation
20 mins
Fabrication and anicca
22 mins
Anicca: guided meditation
31 mins
Anicca contemplation
16 mins
Welcoming and allowing practice: introduction
11 mins
Welcoming and allowing: guided meditation
28 mins
Anatta: guided meditation
28 mins

Dharma and Climate: being part of a sacrifice, how could we respond?
We’re part of a culture that is sacrificing a stable climate and the well-being of future generations for short term gain, short term convenience and pleasures. There's ongoing questions as to what values we hold and what we do to honour those values.
16th July 2022, Association of Engaged Buddhists, 33 mins


2021

Buddhism for our time and the Secular School 16th August 2021, Bluegum Sangha


2019

Climate Breakdown and the Dharma - Part 4, 8th September 2019, Heart Insight Group, Brisbane, 26 mins (Minimising harm and effectiveness in social and political movements and actions).

Climate Breakdown and the Dharma - Part 3, 1st September 2019, Heart Insight Group, Brisbane, 21 mins (Covers dukkha in relation to what’s happening to the earth, views that are behind the crisis, age of separation, human supremacy, a commitment: letting go of unhelpful views, climate change nihilism, climate awakening.)

Climate Breakdown and the Dharma - Part 2 (Felt Responses), 5th August, Bluegum Sangha, North Sydney, 33 mins

Climate Breakdown and the Dharma - Part 1, 9th June 2019, Heart Insight Group, Brisbane, 36 mins

Friendships, Influence, The Dependent Nature of our Views and Sense of Entitlement, 18th April, 2019, Golden Wattle Sangha, Bondi Junction, Sydney, 19 mins


2013

Ethics, Climate Change and Practice  2nd April, Bluegum Sangha, 44 mins.



Essay

Climate Change, Ethics and the Field of Greed (2013)



 




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