Compassion

For All of Us

Supporting holistic development of mind, body, and spirit. Accessible for all.
Building a compassionate, healthy, and safe world. Partnering with our community.

Mindfulness

A 6-week series of learning and practice

Mindfulness training teaches the skills to live in the present moment, with an open heart and curious mind and reminds us that the have the ability and option to choose how we respond to our life and the world around us. Join us this fall for an engaging, practical and supportive course.

 Mindfulness Course Registration

Mindfulness in Education

Mindfulness in schools allows children and adolescents to learn how to pay attention to what is going on in their lives, giving them the skills to manage their emotional and physical experiences, they are empowered to make healthier choices for themselves and act empathically and compassionately toward others.

Mindfulness Program

Wellbeing In Nature & Community (WINC) Project

The WINC Project works to increase connection and engagement with outdoor spaces to build and support mental health and wellbeing for all people.  Join us for fun, educational, and interactive gatherings outdoors. All programs are led by local mental health providers and outdoor enthusiasts. 

WINC Project

Compassion

It motivates us to step up and ease the physical, mental, and emotional pains of ourselves and others.
It is 
accessible to each of us at anytime.

Our beliefs about compassion and how to nurture and live a compassionate life begins by recognizing that inside of life, there are obstacles: loneliness, grief, sickness, suffering, inequity, and misfortune. It’s easy (and somewhat natural) to want to avoid or escape these situations.  However, if we can recognize these situations as part of the human experience, and not as a failure or something that we have done wrong, then we are able to be loving and present with ourselves (and those around us) during these difficult moments. If we can begin to shift our perspective and work first to transform our suffering into love, kindness, and self-care, then we are able to heal ourselves from the inside out. This bearing witness to our own misfortune is the essential platform for being able to understand and be available for others and their own suffering. This is compassion; the realization of our own suffering which allows us to understand the suffering of others and motivates us to work to help ease their pain.

Inside of our work at Dharma River, we hold space for the difficulties that arrive inside of individuals, families, groups, and communities, with deep compassion. We act by creating generative spaces that support the interconnectedness of life and the inherent humanity of our shared existence. It’s big work, but work we believe makes for a better, more compassionate, healthy, and engaged world.

Online Classes - Events

Support Our Work

Donating to Zen Garland Order Dharma River Community, a non-profit organization, grows innovative local, regional, and online programming that nurtures holistic human development and community compassion!  What does that look like?  It can be many different things: mindfulness programming in schools, camps for youth, family resilience education, Self-Care for Caregivers, Living Calm in the Chaos, Interfaith work...

Help imagine the ways we can connect as a local community and build a more compassionate and wisdom-based world.

Make a Donation

Let's stay in touch!

Our newsletters and updates will keep you informed of local and regional classes, workshops, and retreats as well as online study opportunities, blogs, information, and inspiration to continue nurturing, healing, and caring for yourself and the world. (We do not share your information with anyone else.) See you soon!

Find Us

686 W. 5th St., Winona, Minnesota

(507) 961-5665    |    info@dharmariver.org

Get in Touch with Us

Ask us questions. Share ideas. Send us a message.

Set up a time to meet with us. Tell us your story.

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