Dipabhāvan Meditation Center

Dipabhāvan Meditation Center is a lay retreat centre in the forested hills of Koh Samui. It is run by the Dipabhāvan Foundation, which says the centre was established in 2004 and which was registered as a foundation in Surat Thani in 2010. It is not a monastery. Its retreats follow the tradition of Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, the founder of Wat Suan Mokkh on the mainland, and the centre describes its teaching as based on his interpretation of the Buddha’s words.

The centre offers silent retreats taught in English. Its site lists three courses: a three-day course aimed at beginners and experienced meditators alike, a week-long Course 1 designed for beginners, and a week-long Course 2 for people with some retreat experience, which has longer sittings. Instruction covers mindfulness of breathing (ānāpānasati), insight meditation and loving-kindness, with daily Dhamma talks on the Four Noble Truths, dependent origination, the Eightfold Path and the five aggregates. The speakers are described as “Dhamma friends” rather than teachers, and include monks and lay people.

The centre offers its retreats as a gift of Dhamma. Participants keep the Five Precepts and observe silence, hand in mobile phones on the first day, and follow a timetable that begins at 4.30 a.m.

Booking is by an online form or by email, and the site says courses often fill, so it asks people to cancel if they cannot come. On registration day everyone first goes to the foundation’s office near the main road before continuing up to the retreat centre on the hill. The site gives dress rules (loose clothing covering the knees and upper arms) and a packing list. Check the booking page for the current course dates.

Wat Suan Mokkh on the mainland, Buddhadasa’s own monastery, runs ten-day English-language retreats in the same tradition.