Bearing Down on Practice

Insight Myanmar · Sep 7, 2026 · 2h 9m

Episode #602: “The things that I was devoted to for liberation became the weapons that were used to harm me. The community that was a refuge became the thing that exiled me.”

Amma Thanasanti, a meditation teacher, former Theravāda nun, and founder and spiritual director of Awakening Truth, spent more than two decades in the Ajahn Chah lineage before a conflict over women’s authority led to her expulsion. Her path had begun at UC Santa Cruz in 1979, where Jack Engler’s teaching convinced her that spiritual life would become the center of her life. Retreat practice, encounters with teachers…