The MonasteryX Residency in Northern Thailand
A Monastic Setting for Accelerating Ideas
In March, Charlotte McAdams (co-creator of the Meditation Artifacts Residency at Edge City Patagonia) and I are going to Thailand to run a never-before-seen residency experience. I feel fairly confident this has never been done before because it is so incredibly unique.
To get the details out of the way: this residency runs from March 14 to April 12. That is soon, so act fast if you’re interested. The way Charlotte and I designed this program is centered around committing to a full month of immersion in the residency experience. If you have that month to do something incredible, this is for you.
At the start of the month, each resident is encouraged to pick a project or month-long goal—anything from building a business to writing a book. Residents can continue working on whatever they need to while pursuing that project, which makes the program accessible to digital nomads. Over the month, our accelerator-like structure will scaffold progress toward these goals. Where did we get this structure? I had the chance to peek in on some of the top startup accelerators and innovation hubs in the United States. Those experiences inspired me to “share the wealth” beyond the traditional startup, extending it to other disciplines and domains.
This is the basic idea of MonasteryX.
Pervading all of that ambitious goal-setting and tech-savvy productivity is the calling card of Meditation Artifacts: meditation literacy. We want people to experience meditation as more than a single practice with a single outcome. Instead, meditation is an expansive category of practices, with artifacts across cultures and times. In this residency, we want that to emerge through exploring how meditation shows up in the local context of Rai Cherntawan. At the same time, we are populating the residency with meditation guides and educators from different perspectives. Showing both the diversity of practices and their differences is a core part of how we generate meditation literacy.
For instance, here at the Cherntawan International Meditation Center, the teachers are often Phramaha Santhat or Venerable Vajiramedhi. They teach a practice called vipassana meditation. Many people may be familiar with vipassana through meditation centers started by S. N. Goenka (1924–2013). In contrast to those centers, Phramaha Santhat and Venerable Vajiramedhi teach in the Mahanikāya lineage. The style of teaching and practice is quite different from the Goenka approach, even though they share the name and are both part of the same school of Buddhism, Theravada.
The question I ask people to consider as they read this is: is meditation already part of your process? If not, maybe what has been missing is an honest exploration of how meditation practice shows up across different cultures. Or maybe what has been missing is an opportunity to immerse yourself not only in meditation, but in creation—and to have meditation be a central part of that creative process.
The central promise of MonasteryX is that we will help you develop a deeper understanding of meditation and its relationship to your work. Specifically, we want to connect with people who have felt that meditation was inaccessible because of how it was presented to them. Even though this residency takes place at a Buddhist center, that is just one component of how we understand contemplative practice. When I started Meditation Artifacts, I wanted it to reflect a commitment to honoring and upholding contemplative practice wherever it may be found. That is what you get when you join MonasteryX: a setting where many practices are honored, and where we collectively hone those practices toward a better future for all practitioners.
Nice, best of luck! Very cool. The accelerator monastery
This was an engaging read, Luca. I enjoyed it and appreciate you posting it.