Flowering Lotus Meditation is a mobile sangha.
We host meditation retreats at multiple locations across the southern United States and strive to create retreat experiences accessible to all.
We bring in experienced Buddhist teachers to teach students, with any level of experience, meditation.
All retreats and other events are based on Buddhist teachings of mindfulness and compassion.
We welcome anyone to attend.
Meditation & Community Across the Gulf South
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Upcoming Offerings
For the Purpose of Awakening
with Acharya Susmita Barua
Join Acharya Susmita Barua for a nourishing evening of meditation, teaching, and discussion. In this class, she will guide us in exploring the Buddha’s teachings on Right View—how we see and understand life—as the foundation for awakening in today’s world.
Drawing from her own experience, Susmita will invite us to reflect on how the Dharma relates to our everyday lives—our struggles, our growth, and our longing for freedom. Together, we’ll look at how moments of challenge and suffering can become stepping stones toward deeper wisdom and compassion.
This gathering is an opportunity to open the heart and mind with curiosity, connect the ancient teachings with our modern lives, and discover how the path of awakening is available to each of us right here and now.
Thursday September 18, 2025
6:00–7:30 PM CDT
Online via Zoom
ALL SCHOLARSHIP
RECOVERY
RETREAT
The Path of Recovery:
Healing the Wounds of Addiction
with Kevin Griffin
Join us for a unique meditation retreat combining traditional Buddhist practices with recovery work. Primarily conducted in silence, the retreat focuses on insight meditation and heart practices, along with interactive exercises, lectures, and meetings. We learn to practice mindfulness in all activities, whether formal meditation, movement, speaking, listening, or eating.
This retreat we will put a special emphasis on exploring “the felt experience,” watching how emotions arise with thoughts, sensations, and social interactions. This focus helps us to avoid craving, aversion, and distraction.
Participants practice Noble Silence outside of the interactive exercises and 12-Step-style meetings. All recovery paths are welcome, whether Twelve Step, Recovery Dharma, substance, process, or relationship-oriented. The intensive nature of the retreat allows for profound personal openings, insight, and transformation. The support of the community carries us through the sometimes challenging, sometimes inspiring
elements of this deep inner work. You must be at least 30 days clean and sober in order
to attend the retreat.
WJ Kelley Retreat Center
510 N 2nd St, Bay St. Louis, MS 39520
Residential Retreat • October 1 - 5, 2025
Radical Kindness: Awakening the Heart of Freedom
with Dave Smith and Mikey Livid
New Year's Eve Retreat
In a world that promotes fear, division, and disconnection, kindness is a radical act and a trainable skill. As the year turns, we'll gather to remember the revolutionary power of mettā—the boundless, fearless love that can meet suffering without turning away or becoming overwhelmed.
Metta meditation practice calls forth the beautiful spiritual emotions within our heart: kindness, compassion, appreciative joy and equanimity. Mindfulness of these qualities strengthens and brings them into fruition. This process guides our thoughts, attitudes and behaviors into the direction of awakening to our full potential.
This retreat calls us into realness, refuge, and responsibility. With honest and authentic teachings, embodied practice, and deep presence, we’ll uncover the simple and profound potential of our human capacity to be free.
All are welcome to attend regardless of prior meditation experience.
*Your registration pays for 5 nights of accommodations and 14 meals. When planning your budget, consider including a contribution of dana (generosity) for the teachers at the conclusion of the retreat.
Payment plans available
WJ Kelley Retreat Center
510 N 2nd St, Bay St. Louis, MS 39520
Residential Retreat • Sunday, December 28, 2025- Friday, January 2, 2026
Arrival & Registration 3:30-5:30 pm Dec. 28
Retreat Concludes 11:30 am Jan. 2
An Imperfect, Impersonal, Impermanent Meditation Retreat
with
Rev. Mikey Livid and Andrew Chapman, LMSW
At the core of the Buddha’s teachings are the Three Marks of Existence: unsatisfactoriness, not-self, and impermanence. While hearing about these unavoidable aspects of life might sound
daunting, putting these truths into practice can be a source of relief. They help us stop struggling against reality and begin giving life full permission to be imperfect, impersonal, and
impermanent.
Our focus during this retreat will be vipassanā, or insight meditation. This is the practice of looking deeply into our direct experience with a mindful awareness. By observing sensations,
thoughts, and emotions as they arise and pass, we begin to see the natural flow of life more clearly. This clarity supports us in meeting ourselves with wisdom and compassion, reducing
suffering and opening space for greater freedom.
The retreat will be held in noble silence, creating an environment supportive of deep practice.
Each day will include meditation instructions, Dharma talks, mindful movement, silent sitting and walking meditation, and group interviews to support your practice.
This retreat is open to both beginners and experienced meditators.
*Your registration pays for 4 nights of accommodations and 10 meals. When planning your budget, consider including a contribution of dana (generosity) for the teachers at the conclusion of the retreat.
St. Mary’s Sewanee
770 St. Mary's Lane Sewanee, TN 37375
Residential Retreat • January 28 - February 1, 2026
Arrival & Registration 4:30-6:00 pm Jan. 28
Retreat Concludes 11:30 am Feb. 1
Weekly Practice Opportunities
Recovery Dharma Meeting
Every Tuesday at 6:30 pm CST Online Only
Using Buddhist Practices and Principles to Recover from Addiction
You do not need to pay to attend this meeting.
Here's the Zoom Link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81433309237
Recovery Dharma is a Buddhist-based, compassionate approach to addictions of ALL kinds, not just substance abuse. We will begin our meeting with a 15-20 minute meditation, followed by a topic discussion. Typically we will begin reading from the Recovery Dharma literature which can be found on their website recoverydharma.org
In our meetings we don’t identify as anything other than our first names. And we do not keep “sober time” We keep this space safe, welcoming, and non-judgmental. All are welcome here.
Weekly • Tuesdays at 6:30 pm CST
Weekly Dharma Basics
and Meditation Practice
Come sit with us every Sunday online. We sit in meditation and and learn about the Dharma together.
Keep a consistent meditation practice and learn about how these ancient teachings are relevant to your life.
Beginner friendly, all are welcome.
Meditation and Dharma Share • Sundays at 6pm - 7pm CST