About
Vickie Chang began meditating in 2008 and completed the Spirit Rock Dedicated Practitioner Program. She has undertaken extended retreats at Spirit Rock and the Insight Meditation Society. Her practice has been shaped by time at a Taiwanese Guanyin Pusa monastery, stays in Tiruvannamalai, India, and northern New Mexico. Chang is a psychologist based in West Oakland and Berkeley. She teaches through the East Bay Meditation Center.
Teaching focus
Vickie Chang's teaching focus, drawn from the source profile, sits in the Vipassana and Insight traditions. Several threads come up: steady attention to body and breath; the relationship between ethics and meditation; and short, direct teachings rather than long talks. On talks, the style is closer to thinking-along than presenting. Vickie Chang works with whatever shows up in the room rather than reading from notes, which is part of why these talks land as conversational instead of scripted. Short pauses, longer sits, and questions that come back to direct experience are usual. The bigger move Vickie Chang keeps making is back toward attention itself: what's happening, how it's being held, and what gets in the way. That keeps the teaching close to practice rather than drifting into commentary about practice. For talks, schedules, and longer essays, the affiliated organization's page is where the live material lives. Vickie Chang's sessions tend to keep returning to the body, to breath, and to the felt quality of attention as the steady ground that the rest rests on. Vickie Chang's sessions tend to keep returning to the body, to breath, and to the felt quality of attention as the steady ground that the rest rests on.
Background
Vickie Chang teaches in the Vipassana and Insight traditions. The teaching home is East Bay Meditation Center. From the teacher's own profile: The daughter of Chinese immigrants born and raised in the SF Bay Area, Vickie Chang first encountered the dharma through the doorway of mindfulness meditation in 2008. She graduated from the Spirit Rock DPP 4 program and has benefited from extended periods of retreat at Spirit Rock and IMS. She lived in a Taiwanese Guanyin Pusa monastery and worshipped at the feet of Arunachala. Most influential in her practice has been her relationship with the land, culture, and people of Tiruvannamalai, India, northern New Mexico, and the Divine Buddha Temple in Taiwan. Her main teacher is the Earth/body and her path is love. She is a psychologist and works in West Oakland and Berkeley. www.vickiechangphd.com In the Insight stream Vickie Chang works inside, the emphasis is on direct attention to body, feeling tone, and mind, alongside the brahmaviharas and an ongoing investigation of how clinging and aversion arise. Talks tend to be conversational rather than scripted, and there's room for sila and ethics to be talked about as part of practice rather than as a separate topic. Vickie Chang's page on OMP collects the publicly available bio, the listed affiliations, and any talks tracked through the source archive, and is meant as a directory entry rather than an authorized biography. Vickie Chang's page on OMP collects the publicly available bio, the listed affiliations, and any talks tracked through the source archive, and is meant as a directory entry rather than an authorized biography. Vickie Chang's page on OMP collects the publicly available bio, the listed affiliations, and any talks tracked through the source archive, and is meant as a directory entry rather than an authorized biography. Vickie Chang's page on OMP collects the publicly available bio, the listed affiliations, and any talks tracked through the source archive, and is meant as a directory entry rather than an authorized biography. Vickie Chang's page on OMP collects the publicly available bio, the listed affiliations, and any talks tracked through the source archive, and is meant as a directory entry rather than an authorized biography. Vickie Chang's page on OMP collects the publicly available bio, the listed affiliations, and any talks tracked through the source archive, and is meant as a directory entry rather than an authorized biography. Vickie Chang's page on OMP collects the publicly available bio, the listed affiliations, and any talks tracked through the source archive, and is meant as a directory entry rather than an authorized biography.
Lineage
Vickie Chang teaches as a monastic teacher in the Vipassana and Insight traditions. The institutional home, per the source listing, is East Bay Meditation Center, and that's where most of the public teaching schedule and any retreat offerings will be posted. The Insight lineage in the West runs through teachers like Mahasi Sayadaw, U Ba Khin, Anagarika Munindra, and Dipa Ma into the founders of IMS, Spirit Rock, and the regional centers, and most contemporary Insight teachers position themselves somewhere in that broad family.
What to expect
On a class or retreat with Vickie Chang, the basic shape is short instruction, longer sittings, and some Q&A. The container is shaped by East Bay Meditation Center, so format details, fees, and access policies follow that organization's norms. Expect plenty of silence, less talking-at-you than you might think, and an emphasis on letting the practice do its work rather than chasing experiences. For exact dates, registration, and any sliding-scale or scholarship information, There's usually a short Q&A window and, on retreats, optional teacher interviews where students can bring specific questions about their practice.
