Writer ▲ Teacher ▲ Yogi ▲ Scholar
Welcome to the website of Stephen Cope, Scholar-in-Residence at the famed Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and founding Director of the Kripalu Institute for Extraordinary Living.
Stephen’s Latest Book:
The dharma in difficult times.
My Dear Friends: COVID has changed the world forever. I think we all sense this. Our lives going forward will simply not be the same—in ways of which we’re not even yet aware.
Here is the question I’m asked most frequently: How do our yoga traditions inform our response to our current dilemmas? Where in the great treasure trove of yoga scriptures do we find wisdom that speaks directly to our time?
UPCOMING EVENTS
Woodstock Book Fest: Embracing the Dark and the Light
March 23, 2024 at 1:30 pm - 3:00 pm.
Come Home to Yourself: A Summer Yoga And Meditation Retreat
August 4, 2024 - august 9, 2024, study with stephen.
Stephen is well-known in the world of contemplative practice as a teacher who combines intellectual rigor with the powerful direct practices of hatha yoga and meditation. Most students find this to be a very potent combination. He is trained in many styles of meditation and yoga, but his primary interest is in teaching and developing the subtleties of Kripalu yoga and mindfulness meditation. He also regularly teaches loving kindness meditation—or “metta” meditation—with his friend and mentor, Sharon Salzberg, one of the founders of the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, and an internationally recognized teacher of metta meditation.
In addition to weekend-long programs at Kripalu, Stephen often teaches shorter programs, and gives dharma talks at venues around the country. Please check the full teaching schedule for details.
Stephen’s primary interest is in translating the wisdom of the ancient contemplative scriptures into a form that is engaging and useful for mainstream readers.
Most American yoga practitioners are not likely to really read the ancient scriptures of yoga—like the Yogasutra, or the Bhagavad Gita. And even if they do read them, none of these documents can really be well understood without the help of a commentary. Every generation creates its own commentaries on these scriptures, of course. Stephen’s writing combines narrative and exposition in a way that makes these often-obscure early texts come alive.
Soul Friends
Most of us will have many friends throughout our lifetimes—friends of all shapes, sizes and callings. For most of us, these connections are still vividly present…
The Great Work of Your Life...
One of the greatest archetypes of the yoga tradition is the jivanmukta —the soul awake in this lifetime. The soul awake.
The Wisdom of Yoga: The Spirit of the Strivers
An excerpt from the prologue of Stephen Cope’s book, The Wisdom of Yoga: A Seeker’s Guide to Extraordinary Living .
Waking Up Is Hard to Do
“In the process of falling apart these clients had been forced to discover a richness of inner resources they had not known existed.”
Interviews, press, videos and more…
Pacific Coast Center for Spiritual Living Book Talk: The Dharma in Difficult Times
2023-12-01T15:58:19-05:00 December 1st, 2023 |
Jake Warinner Podcast: The Dharma in Difficult Times
2023-12-01T15:42:32-05:00 November 13th, 2023 |
The Aliveness Podcast: Connecting With Your Dharma And Opening Your Heart In Difficult Times
2023-07-28T12:35:11-04:00 July 28th, 2023 |
Stephen Cope, Scholar in Residence
Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health PO Box 309 57 Interlaken Road Stockbridge, MA 01262
Web: Contact Stephen
Recent Books
Stephen Cope featured on Psychology Today
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The "night sea journey" is the journey into the parts of ourselves that are split off, disavowed, unknown, unwanted, cast out, and exiled to the various subterranean …