Graduate Members' Seminars 2019

After another great year of seminars in 2018, we look forward to presenting a new range of topics and presenters this year plus one seminar back by popular demand! The seminars are designed for current members who have completed or are attending Level 4. The aim of these seminars is to provide a forum whereby members can explore ways of thinking about and integrating meditation into life; fully and consciously.

2019 Seminar Series

Seminar One: An Introduction to MOD. Guest presenter: Dylan DeLosAngeles
Friday 1 March, 5.45 pm– 7.15 pm

Seminar Two: Sub-Total Recall: The machinery of misremembering Guest presenter: Matthew Welsh
Friday 10 May, 5.45 pm– 7.15 pm

Seminar Three: Ten Stages of Meditation Presenter: Ian Nuberg
Friday 30 August, 5.45 pm– 7.15 pm

Seminar Four: An Indigenous History Walk Presenter: Robyn Walden
Friday 8 November, 5.45 pm– 7.15 pm

Seminar One

An Introduction to MOD.

Guest Presenter: Dylan DeLosAngeles

Friday 1 March, 2019 5.45 pm–7.15 pm MOD. at UniSA, North Tce, City

Join us for a tour of several elements of the Waging Peace Exhibition at MOD., South Australia’s newest and boldest interactive science space run by UniSA and located on North Terrace. Exhibitions Coordinator at MOD., Dylan DeLosAngeles, will guide us through several of the exhibits, sharing his wealth of research knowledge and understanding within the field of science. During this tour of MOD. you will be taken through Brand Peace where Dylan will share insights into the research undertaken into South Australians’ perception of peace. In the Games for Peace exhibit you will have the opportunity to play games that promote understanding, build empathy and demonstrate the importance of cooperation for success. Through the tour of the Sleep Ops exhibit you will discover just how important sleep is for our mood, health and performance, and how lack of sleep impairs out ability for good decision making. We will conclude with an optional evening meal at a nearby restaurant.

Seminar Two

Sub-Total Recall: The machinery of misremembering

Guest Presenter: Matthew Welsh

Friday 10 May, 2019
5.45 pm–7.15 pm
Lifeflow Studio

Our memories are amazing things. They allow us to recall facts and events from decades past and serve as a fundamental part of our daily lives – underpinning our skills, relationships and even identities. Given this, we (understandably) trust our memories over most other sources of information, tending to view them as the equivalent of video cameras in our heads – capturing verbatim records of what we see and hear.

Unfortunately, this is not how memory works. Psychological research into memory and related aspects of cognition has demonstrated a variety of unexpected effects that shed light on how the machinery of memory actually works and the implications of this for how much we can trust our memories.

In this talk, we’ll discuss a small number of these memory-related biases, focussing on how availability and confirmation biases affect the information we gather from the environment and how hindsight and outcome biases alter our memories of things that have already happened – creating false memories. Presenter Matthew Welsh is a Senior Research Fellow in Decision Making within the University of Adelaide.

Seminar Three

Ten Stages of Meditation

Presenter: Ian Nuberg

Friday 30 August, 2019
5.45 pm–7.15 pm
Lifeflow Studio

Have you ever felt ‘stuck’ in your meditation practice? You faithfully practice every day (or not!), yet you feel you are not making any progress. If your Tantra feels dry and your Insight work yields no insight, then it is likely that you have not developed a stable practice in calm and concentration. This session will discuss the 10 stages of meditation to develop concentration, calm abiding and equanimity. It follows a traditional Buddhist explanation of the process as presented in The Mind Illuminated (Culadasa 2017). This will help you to identify at what stage you may normally gravitate to in your own practice. From here we can discuss several tweaks to your practice that will help towards achieving some of the higher states. These states are conducive to Insight and luscious Tantric experiences.

Seminar Four

An Indigenous History Walk

Presenter: Robyn Walden

Friday 8 November, 2019
5.45 pm–7.15 pm
East & South Parklands, City

In 2017 we finished the seminar series with this walk and it is back again by popular demand! Robyn Walden has been researching the Indigenous history of the East Adelaide area and devised a short walking tour suitable for interstate and overseas visitors. Great for locals too! Join Robyn as she leads us through sections of the East and South Parklands (Pakapakanthi, Tuthangga and Wita Wirra). The aim of the walk is to give participants an experience of connecting with Kaurna land, through imagination, cultural history and direct contact with the landscape. As this will be the last seminar for the year we will conclude with an evening meal at a local restaurant.

Seminar Fees

Single session ticket $25

Single session ticket conc $20

2019 series ticket (4 sessions) $80

2019 series ticket (4 sessions) conc $60

Concession rate is available to full time students, Health Care card holders and Pensioner Concession cards. Please present your concession card at the first class.

Prerequisites: These sessions are open to current members who have completed or are attending Level 4.