Podcasts about koans

In this Salon we are joined by  Dr Susan Murphy Roshi from Australia. Susan is a distinguished Zen teacher with a profound interest in the intersection of Zen practice and indigenous Australian concepts of 'care for country'. For 25 years, she co-led walks in Country with the late, highly respected indigenous Elder, Dulumunmun, Uncle Max Harrison, exploring the deep connections between these traditions. Susan's work emphasizes the transformative power of Zen koans in addressing life's challenges, particularly our duty of care for the Earth. Her latest book, "A Fire Runs Through All Things: Zen Koans for Facing the Climate Crisis," reflects this focus, offering a unique spiritual and philosophical approach to confronting the environmental crisis. Her approach encourages a shift in consciousness, moving beyond purely practical solutions to foster a deeper, more compassionate relationship with our planet. In this inspiring conversation with Susan, we explore how Zen wisdom can help us navigate the complexities of the climate crisis and cultivate a more profound sense of interconnectedness with the Earth.

This guided meditation is based on Case 1 from the collection of Koans called The Gateless Gate. The case: "A monk asked Joshu in all earnestness, does a dog have Buddha nature or not? Joshu said “Mu!". The koan question is "What is Mu?" Ryan Eno has been working with Mu since May last year and will explore oceanic or open awareness of Mu. That is, Mu as direct experience of life as it is. It is a gentle and easy approach to Mu, that encourages you to allow whatever arises as you bring your focus back to Mu throughout the sitting.

Bernd Bender, Dharma-Vortrag am 16. März 2025, Zen-Tag im Akazienzendo BerlinIn Zen-Praxis können wir zu der Einsicht kommen, dass unser Bewusstsein die Welt aktiv miterschafft, indem es durch Wahrnehmungen und Begriffe die Realität konstruiert. Anhand des Koans von Mazus Pfingstrose und dem Konzept der wechselseitigen Abhängigkeit versucht Bernd diese kreative Aktivität zu verdeutlichen.

In this talk, Valerie begins with poetry as a portal to the language of koans, a language that uses words to go beyond words. Koans don't just describe or express

February 2025 Sesshin, Day 2 In part two of her overview of working with koans, Jissai Prince-Cherry emphasizes the importance of engaging the heart and mind and the need to feel and live with the koan. Dharma Talk by Ven. Jissai Prince-Cherry.  Automated Transcript The post Tips for Working on Koans, Part 2 appeared first on Rochester Zen Center.

February 2025 Sesshin, Day 1 In the first of her two talks about koan work, Jissai Prince-Cherry also discusses breath practices and shikantaza. Dharma Talk by Ven. Jissai Prince-Cherry.  Automated Transcript The post Tips for Working on Koans, Part 1 appeared first on Rochester Zen Center.

Zachary Smith shares two koans from the Blue Cliff Record.

Happy New Year to you all! We continue our study of the koans from the Blue Cliff Record, with a new batch of them today, beginning with case 13. Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: JANUARY 2025 MONTHLY ZAZENKAI »

A monk asked Hongzhi, “What about the ones who have gone?”Hongzhi said, “White clouds rise to the top of the valleys, blue peakslean into the empty sky.”The monk asked, “What about the ones who return?”Hongzhi said, “Heads covered in white hair, they leave the cliffs andvalleys. In the dead of night they descend through the clouds to themarket stalls.”“What about the ones who neither come nor go?”“The stone woman calls them back from their dream of the world.”As the year comes to an end, I have been spending time with the archetype of the Stone Woman. A character who mysteriously turns up throughout the Chan koan tradition. We find her getting up to dance in the Precious Mirror Samadhi, giving birth to a child at night in the Mountains and Rivers Sutra and calling us back from our dream of the world in this dialogue with Hongzhi.Who is this woman of stone?Perhaps you have met her as the ancient boulders that watch over you during a favorite hike, or the large rocks you used to climb and rest on as a child. Perhaps you've held her hand while walking on the beach or along a river. Or maybe you've encountered her in the stone buildings or concrete sidewalks of your neighborhood.Her stillness and quiet are reminiscent of your own deeply silent Mind.Her pregnant darkness allows all of creation to spring forth. Including you, and me, and each thought, word, expression, desire, feeling and sensation.Koans contain layers of meaning, and while their intention is to aid us in awakening to the profound truth of non-separation—they also have a way of meeting us exactly where we are. So as one year turns into another. Let's take the questioner's inquiries to heart.What about the ones who have gone? They ask—Well, where have you gone? These last 12 months. What/who did you visit? What did you see? What experiences did you seek out? What did you learn from your going?Is there a word, phrase, image—that speaks to your going and learning this last year?Hongzhi gives us this one: “White clouds rise to the top of the valleys, blue peaks lean into the empty sky.”Then we are asked: What about the ones who return?What did you return to? Where did you take refuge?What are places of return for you? Physical, mental, emotional, spiritual? Who do you return to?How have you shared or offered yourself? Who/what are you in service to?Is there a connection to going/learning—and returning?Is there an image, word, phrase connected to returning, refuge or offering?Hongzhi again gives us one: “Heads covered in white hair, they leave the cliffs and valleys. In the dead of night they descend through the clouds to the market stalls.”Lastly the questioner asks, what about those who neither come nor go?What have you stayed with? Whether its sobriety, a relationship, vows, commitments, a creative project, a home, a child—reflect on stayingWhat commitments did you honor? What values did you live by?Reflect on the challenges and joys of staying.What image, word or phrase captures the art of staying for you.Hongzhi says: The stone woman calls them back from their dream of the worldNow, for a moment let yourself be here, let thoughts come and go, body sensations come and go, but really be here at the stillness of your being.Whats it like to be here—here?Be the stone woman.Connect to the stillness and quiet of stone—the unconditioned heartPrajna Paramita—wisdom beyond wisdomThere is something beautiful here, being called back from our dreams of the world, the things we did, didn't do, our learnings.To just be here, right hereAnd let our dreams for the next year be in communion with the dream of the stone woman, the dream of awakening—What is that like?To let your dreams merge with the great dream, your life touch this one unconditioned life.To close, I'll leave you with this poem by Marie Howe. Sending you blessings for the New Year.SINGULARITYby Marie Howe(after Stephen Hawking)Do you sometimes want to wake up to the singularitywe once were?so compact nobodyneeded a bed, or food or money —nobody hiding in the school bathroomor home alonepulling open the drawerwhere the pills are kept.For every atom belonging to me as goodBelongs to you. Remember?There was no Nature. Nothem. No teststo determine if the elephantgrieves her calf or ifthe coral reef feels pain. Trashedoceans don't speak English or Farsi or French;would that we could wake up to what we were— when we were ocean and before thatto when sky was earth, and animal was energy, and rock wasliquid and stars were space and space was notat all — nothingbefore we came to believe humans were so importantbefore this awful loneliness.Can molecules recall it?what once was? before anything happened?No I, no We, no one. No wasNo verb no nounonly a tiny tiny dot brimming withis is is is isAll everything homeI'm Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, budding Astrologer and Artist. I offer 1:1 Spiritual Counseling sessions in the styles of IFS and somatic mindfulness. I also offer astrology readings. Check out my website to learn more.Below you can find a list of weekly and monthly online and in-person practice opportunities. I will be traveling to Oregon in February and will be facilitating three events of varying lengths while I am there (most of which are taking place at Great Vow Zen Monastery.)Weekly Online Meditation EventMonday Night Dharma — 6P PT / 9P ET Join weekly for drop-in meditation and dharma talk. Feel free to join anytime. Event last about 1.5 hours. ZOOM LINKMonthly Online Practice EventSky+Rose: The Ritual of Being Lost on Sunday January 510:30A - 12:30P PT / 1:30P - 3:30P ETRSVPIn-Person in OregonFeb 1 — Sky+Rose Daylong Retreat: The Strange Garden of Desire The strange garden of desire: wandering, dreaming, feasting, tending, destroying.In this daylong workshop each person will explore their singular Strange Garden of Desires, taking a fresh look at what loves, longings, obsessions and obligations live within us.Through parts work, meditation, and practices of somatic expression we will engage our gardens in five distinct ways: wandering, dreaming, tending, feasting and destroying.Feb 2 - 9 — Pari-Nirvana Sesshin: A Meditation Retreat exploring Life, Death & the UnknownFeb 13 - 16 — Emergent Darkness – A Creative Process, Parts Work and Zen RetreatIn-Person in Ohio(See Mud Lotus Sangha Calendar for weekly meditation events, classes and retreats) This is a public episode. 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David Whyte (davidwhyte.com) is the author of twelve books of poetry and five books of prose, including his latest, Consolations II, which further explores what David calls “the conversational nature of reality.”Sponsors:GiveWell.org charity research and effective giving: https://givewell.org (If you've never used GiveWell to donate, you can have your donation matched up to one hundred dollars before the end of the year or as long as matching funds last. To claim your match, go to https://givewell.org and pick PODCAST and enter The Tim Ferriss Show at checkout.)Eight Sleep's Pod 4 Ultra sleeping solution for dynamic cooling and heating: https://eightsleep.com/tim (save between $400 and $600 on the Pod 4 Ultra)AG1 all-in-one nutritional supplement: https://DrinkAG1.com/Tim (1-year supply of Vitamin D (and 5 free AG1 travel packs) with your first subscription purchase.)*For show notes and past guests on The Tim Ferriss Show, please visit tim.blog/podcast.For deals from sponsors of The Tim Ferriss Show, please visit tim.blog/podcast-sponsorsSign up for Tim's email newsletter (5-Bullet Friday) at tim.blog/friday.For transcripts of episodes, go to tim.blog/transcripts.Discover Tim's books: tim.blog/books.Follow Tim:Twitter: twitter.com/tferriss Instagram: instagram.com/timferrissYouTube: youtube.com/timferrissFacebook: facebook.com/timferriss LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/timferrissPast guests on The Tim Ferriss Show include Jerry Seinfeld, Hugh Jackman, Dr. Jane Goodall, LeBron James, Kevin Hart, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Jamie Foxx, Matthew McConaughey, Esther Perel, Elizabeth Gilbert, Terry Crews, Sia, Yuval Noah Harari, Malcolm Gladwell, Madeleine Albright, Cheryl Strayed, Jim Collins, Mary Karr, Maria Popova, Sam Harris, Michael Phelps, Bob Iger, Edward Norton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Neil Strauss, Ken Burns, Maria Sharapova, Marc Andreessen, Neil Gaiman, Neil de Grasse Tyson, Jocko Willink, Daniel Ek, Kelly Slater, Dr. Peter Attia, Seth Godin, Howard Marks, Dr. Brené Brown, Eric Schmidt, Michael Lewis, Joe Gebbia, Michael Pollan, Dr. Jordan Peterson, Vince Vaughn, Brian Koppelman, Ramit Sethi, Dax Shepard, Tony Robbins, Jim Dethmer, Dan Harris, Ray Dalio, Naval Ravikant, Vitalik Buterin, Elizabeth Lesser, Amanda Palmer, Katie Haun, Sir Richard Branson, Chuck Palahniuk, Arianna Huffington, Reid Hoffman, Bill Burr, Whitney Cummings, Rick Rubin, Dr. Vivek Murthy, Darren Aronofsky, Margaret Atwood, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, Dr. Gabor Maté, Anne Lamott, Sarah Silverman, Dr. Andrew Huberman, and many more.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 11/03/24 - Koans often come from literary sources, and MRO founder Daido Roshi brought us this dialogue from Alice's adventures in "Through the Looking Glass" to offer a path of well-being as dharma practice. Even in the midst of conflict, extreme differences of opinion or sudden changes, Shugen Roshi says, we can practice staying within our experience with complete trust. For this election week, we can take up this offering us a way to walk the path and find ways to be of benefit to all beings.

In this episode, we continue to look at koans from the Blue Cliff Record, specifically cases 7 to 12. We do that through the Soto Zen lens, extracting the practical essence from these famous ancient exchanges. Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: November 2024, monthly Zazenkai »

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 10/13/24 - Stepping forward is essential to be truly alive. It's also the only way to learn, both where we are being genuine and true, and where we are stuck. It takes courage to give everything and risk failure, but the only way to get past relying on success or failure is in taking the next step, freeing ourselves from self-clinging. This talk by Shugen Roshi brings forth a koan from Daido Roshi's collection Koans of the Way of Reality, on the 15th anniversary since his passing.

As part of Autumn Ango with the Zen Community of Oregon, we are contemplating a text called the Eight Realizations of a Great Being. A text that some sources say is the last teaching that the Buddha gave. We are working with an interpretation by Thich Nhat Hanh edited by Hogen Bays, Roshi.I want to start this reflection with a poem that was read to me by another Zen Teacher, Daniel Terrango during a sesshin he led here in Ohio a couple of weeks ago. I felt fortunate to get to sit sesshin with him, and to receive this poem. It's one of those poems, at least for me, that I want to pass along.I Was Reading A Poem By David RutschmanI was reading a poem by Ryōkan about a leaf, and how it showed the front and the back as it fell, and I wanted to call someone — my wife, my brother — to tell about the poem.And I thought that maybe my telling about the poem was the front of the leaf and my silence about the poem was the back.And then I thought that maybe my telling and my silence together were honestly just the front of the leaf, and that the back was something else, something I didn't understand.And then I thought that maybe everything I understood and everything I didn't were both actually just the front of the leaf — so that the totality of my life was actually just the front of the leaf, just the one side — which would make the other side my death. . . .Unless my life and death together were really still only the front of the leaf?I had left the branch. I was falling.I was loose now in the bright autumn air.Now the first realization.All the world is impermanent. The earth is fragile and perilous.The four great elements are both suffering and emptiness.In the five skandhas there is no self.Everything that arises, changes, and perishes, is illusive, unreal,and without a master.Thought is the root of suffering, The body a reservoir of desire.Thus, observing and contemplating, one gradually breaks free frombirth and death.Here in both the poem and realization—we are invited to really take up impermanence as a contemplation. In Buddhism impermanence is considered one of the marks of existence. My teacher Hogen Roshi would often say that these marks are part of what make a teaching, a dharma teaching, so he would encourage us to consider them whenever we gave a dharma talk.The marks are:* Impermanence—insight into change, on the minute moment to moment level as well as on the level of our own lifespan, the lifespans of institutions, societies, world systems, the earth itself. This insight is to really see directly that all things are of the nature of change.* No-fixed-self—nothing is fixed, everything is in relationship, not a single thing or being exists independent of others. We interare, our nature is shared.* Dukkah/Nirvana—we suffer when we want things to be different then they are, whether that is trying to get rid of an experience we don't want or trying to get more or hold onto to something that we do want, recognizing this we can discover through practice how to attune to the true nature of things as they are, which is interconnected, not-separate and flowingThe Buddha said: All the world is changing. We can not hold on to a single thing. Even the earth itself, our home is fragile and perilous. The four great elements (water, fire, earth, air/wind) can cause suffering, but are empty in their nature (composed of other parts, interdependent, spacious).How is this true in our experience? All the world is changing. Such a beautiful mantra. The poem I read in the beginning captures the beauty and mystery of a single leaf falling, and how in very real ways this is like our life, we are floating, tumbling, dancing, falling through space. We are really bearing witness to the unreliable nature of the earth itself, how the lives humans built isn't sustainable with the earth's natural balance. And we are seeing the loss and destruction from these great hurricanes. I happen to have many acquaintances, friends and teachers who live in the Asheville area. There has been so much destruction, devastation and loss from the hurricane. Same too in Florida, in Nepal, in parts of Africa and Europe this year. All over the world beings are experiencing devastation, loss, pain and hardship due to Climate Instability—wildfires, smoke, floods, damaged water supplies, loss of housing and infrastructure—this is the world we live in now.And, the Buddha gave this teaching before cars and planes and the industrial revolution. The earth has always been fragile and perilous, there have always been storms, volcanoes, fires, floods. Great forces of destruction rising up from the earth, from the great elements. This contemplation of impermanence is an invitation to really look deeply into the nature of our experience. What happens when we allow the truth of impermanence to be here. What do we notice? How does attuning to impermanence, contemplating impermanence help us face the climate crisis? Does it?I was listening to a podcast interview with Susan Murphy who is a Zen Koan Teacher from Australia. She writes on Zen practice and the Earth. One of her first books is called Minding the Earth, Mending the World and her most recent book is called A Fire Runs Through All Things: Zen Koans for Facing the Climate Crisis.I want to share an excerpt from her book, for I feel it is a powerful meditation on how we contemplate impermanence and turn towards the climate crisis as part of our spiritual practice. She says:The times are always uncertain until we cease longing for certainty, and only then do they become truly interesting. The planetary crisis we're in together is now simply the given the strange, inarguable gift of what is. The fervent half-prayer of “Precarious!” overhears the realization that any escape is futile. Who now in good faith can dispute planetary heating and its appalling consequences and our drift toward civilizational suicide, ruined lands, biodiversity collapse, record-breaking megafires and megafloods, and new pandemics. And then there's our shadow pandemic, too: panic, confusion, and conspiratorial rage, shadowed by dread, anxiety, and depression.The planetary dangers that haunt us make our time an exquisite moment, piercing and inescapable. Also baffling to the point of provoking fresh realizations, hence the description of this time as a “gift” brimming with untested possibilities right along with potentially dire consequences. Dare we celebrate the way it stretches us, this strange privilege of being alive right now? Can we embrace the sheer lunacy of our moment, in which the biggest human “ask” in history up to now has chosen us?A koan scandalizes all suppositions (literal, rational, empirical, neurotic) that hold up the shaky sky of human knowing and fearing, until the leaves blowing in the street, the wave welling over a rock, the eyelashes of the cow all share the same realm as this mind. The shock of this can stoke new depths of fiery, fiercely protective love for the Earth. With luck, this love is fierce enough to protect our home from the worst impulses in ourselves and turn them to good.The ecocrisis of our time raises the question of the true nature of our human presence on the Earth as a koan that rightly exerts an almost overwhelming pressure on our hearts. It cannot be resolved, and the suffering it causes cannot be relieved without breaking through the paradigm that is so relentlessly causing it. Zen koans help us grow skilled in tolerating a precarious state of mind, and not turning away but growing curious instead. That we can't go forward in the usual way becomes the strangely valuable offer of the moment. Not-knowing, in the spirit of improvisation, accepts all offers! And the Zen koan turns every obstacle into the way.Take a despairing reaction like “There is nothing I can do to stop this disaster!” Looking beyond the ideas of “I,” and “stop,” and even the activity of “doing,” can we even dare to look deeply into the crisis and not-know what it is, or that it is so? Perhaps even disaster loses its power of impasse when scrutinized by a trusting form of productive doubt. Can something be done with less doing, using the calm inside the moments that can be created within an emergency when what is happening is met with not-knowing?The way we have framed reality is plainly out of kilter and out of date. Koan mind breaks the rigid frame and makes an ally out of uncertainty, asking it to be our guide in the darkness.Every koan has a bit of the apocalyptic about it, lifting the veil that this dream of a separate self throws over the wholeness of reality. Apocalypse implies destruction of a world, but hiding in that word is the older meaning, that of a necessary revelation, a veil torn away, leaving no choice but to see what is hidden from us in plain sight.Crises shape and transform us all our lives. The limitations that grow apparent to a crawling infant become the seeming unlikelihood of learning to walk. Impasse is the unavoidable opportunity to see beyond expectations, suppositions, and impossibilities as they crumble before our eyes. Crisis, whether at the vast or intimately personal level, is what reveals that there is no “normal,” despite all strenuous efforts to coax one into being. Not-knowing is relaxing into trusting this.…To truly contemplate impermanence invites us into this kind of not-knowing and opens the creative potential of any given moment. Because this is not fixed in place, we are not fixed in place. The world, our minds, our hearts are malleable–are flowing. And these words are just dead words until we really allow ourselves into the inquiry. The living contemplation—what am I? What if anything stays the same? What is my actual experience of change?Zen celebrates responsiveness, a responsiveness that comes from un-fixing ourselves from our fixed beliefs about how things should be, which actually allows us to respond to what is.We suffer impermanence because we expect it to be otherwise. We try to create structures, systems that will be reliable, predictable, and unchanging. We have cultural values that try to hide aging, death, disability, trauma—anything that pokes a hole in the narrative of stability and progress. So much of our systems, and therefore our thought processes, are not built on basic principles of how the world actually is, how life actually is. What would it look like if we lived rooted in this first realization: everything is changing, life is uncertain?What systems or structures or basic principles would we instill in our society if we really embraced the truth of change, transformation, death/rebirth, impermanence? As well as an understanding that we are interdependent, there is no I separate from you, this great earth, the creatures who live here, the plants, animals, rivers and each human being.So how do we practice impermanence? In meditation or in our direct experience outside of meditation we can tune into the constancy of change. Notice, really notice how the sensations in your hand change, if you really look, is there a single sensation that stays the same moment to moment? We can explore the direct experience of what I like to call radical impermanence—by exploring the changing nature of our sensory environment, the components of experience that make up our sense of self. Notice, how long does a single thought last? Can you grab hold of a thought? Do thoughts have a beginning, middle and end? What about emotions or feelings? Sounds?As we explore our experiential experience in this way, a real question can arise—what if anything remains? What continues? This kind of inquiry isn't meant to be done once, but is an on-going practice. How quickly do assumptions and predictions take over and have us believing again that we are permanent, solitary, independent and alone—and that our beliefs are unquestionably true?As I practice with impermanence, I have come to appreciate that change is beautiful, its necessary, the constancy of change allows each moment to arise fresh—never before seen or experienced. When the mind isn't dragging the previous moment onto the present, or reaching out for some future experience where we are redeemed or destroyed—what is this?It is also quite rich and worthwhile to take this contemplation of impermanence into our interpersonal relationships and our connection to life on earth or in this world.Grief, anger, rage, disappointment, sadness, numbness, confusion, despair are all companions of loss. If we learn to sit with and accompany these emotional responses with compassion and curiosity—they become part of the inner/shared journey on the realization of impermanence. They teach us what it is like to sit at the threshold of not-knowing, to find acceptance in the midst of whatever is happening, to find our way back to a love that is greater than fear. Some people are elders in impermanence, for they possess a wisdom that is gained through weathering loss. These people aren't necessarily old in years, but often the wisdom of loss does come with age—as we keep meeting the various uncertainties of life, the crisis points as Susan Murphy calls it, the moments of loss or change, be it the death of a loved one, a natural disaster in our town, war, loss of work, illness, accidents, injury, or living in a body that is aging—as we encounter impermanence with a learning attitude, insight deepens, gratitude grows, the waves of grief become waters we are more familiar navigating and perhaps we deeper our capacity to help others through them.Impermanence presents us with the koan that rests at the center of our lives as mortal beings—what are we? What is this life? What is death? Koans as Susan Murphy says, make us uncomfortable. If reading this first realization makes you uncomfortable, there is something here for you to deepen into, to stay with…We have two prayers in Zen that are prayers of impermanence, reciting them helps us turn towards and embrace the uncertainty of this life—to gain traction or companionship as we move through this changing world.The Five RemembrancesI am of the nature to die, I can not escape deathI am of the nature to have ill health, I can not escape having ill healthI am of the nature to age, I can not escapeAll that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature of change, I can not escape being separated from themMy deeds are my closest companions, I am the beneficiary of my deeds, my deeds are the ground on which I stand.Verse of the Diamond SutraA star at dawn, a bubble in a stream, a flash of lightning in the summer sky,A flickering lamp, a phantom and a dreamSo is this fleeting world…This writing is a draft of the dharma talk podcast you can listen to. At the end of the talk a sangha member offered a stanza from Mary Oliver's In Blackwater Woods as a capping phrase.To live in this worldyou must be ableto do three things:to love what is mortal;to hold itagainst your bones knowingyour own life depends on it;and, when the time comes to let it go,to let it go.I'm Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, budding Astrologer and Artist. In my Spiritual Counseling Practice, I practice at the confluence of spirituality and psychology, integrating mind, body and spirit. I am trained in Internal Family Systems (IFS), Dream Work, Hakomi (Somatic Therapy) and Mindful Eating. Below are some of my current offerings.I currently accepting a couple of new clients if you or anyone you know is interested in Spiritual Counseling.Monday Night Meditation + DharmaEvery Monday 6P PT / 9P ETJoin me on zoom for 40 minutes of meditation and a dharma talk. We are currently exploring a text called The Eight Realizations of Great Beings, which gives us an opportunity to practice inquiry and embodying love as we discover our Awakened Nature together.This event is hosted by the Zen Community of Oregon. All are welcome to join. Drop in any time.Zoom Link for Monday NightSky + RoseWhat is it? An experiment in the impossible task of excluding nothing and loving everything. An alchemy of play, presence and wandering into the shadows, you could say.Sky & Rose is a practice container that will:* Center group parts work practices to explore the fluidity, span and dream of who we are - somebody, nobody, everybody. You will be invited to express yourself vocally and physically, engage your imagination and play outside habituation.* Do interpersonal and group meditation practices of seeing, being and awakening.* Directly explore emotional embodiment & shadow work* Include Beauty, Art & Wonderment as core practice elements Through rituals of imagination, meditation technologies and co-created fields of intentional play, we can slip out, for a time, of confining identities defined by our histories, culture and comfort.Delivered by these practices, we can begin to inhabit perspectives and modes of being that stretch our sense of the possible and refresh our sense of the everyday. You might find yourself wearing Luminosities face or inhabiting Laughter's chest. Together we might try out Venus's view of the very life we live or we might make space to feel Chaos's dance and shake off some rigidity.All of these are just examples of where our wondering and feeling into places of vitality and expansion may take us.We will rebel against the quotidian and respect ourselves too much to only have crumbs of the sacred!It was also be a time to work together with the challenges to living heart forward with sanity and presence within this hyper-fractured funhouse/madhouse world.Sky and Rose is a place for Jogen and i to invite you into practices and explorations of 'soul work' that are not part of the Buddhist tradition but that have nonetheless been sources of growth and joy for us. Our influences in this include Paratheatre, IFS and Voice Dialogue, Hakomi, Process Work, Butoh, Jungian dream work and more.We initiate Sky & Rose as an experiment in embracing Spirit and Soul simultaneously, together imagining and practicing interpersonal liberation, playfulness and spaciousness in this time of deep adaptation.Meets monthly on Sundays from 10:30A PT - 12:30P PT / 1:30P ET - 3:30P ETJoin us for our Opening Ritual + Practice exploringThe Ritual of LiminalitySunday October 27I currently live in Columbus, Ohio with my partner Patrick Kennyo Dunn, we facilitate an in-person meditation gathering every Wednesday from 7P - 8:30P at ILLIO in Clintonville through Mud Lotus Sangha. If you happen to be in Columbus, feel free to stop by. We have weekly meditation gatherings and monthly Saturday offerings as well. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

Im zehnten Koan der Sammlung »Die ganze Welt ist eine einzige Blume« testet eine alte Frau den Mönch, den sie schon jahrelang versorgt. Sie schickt ihm ihre überaus hübsche Tochter, die den Mönch umarmt und küsst. Anschließend möchte sie wissen, wie er sich fühlt. »Verfaulter Stamm auf kalten Felsen. Keine Wärme im Winter«, antwortet der Mönch. Als die Mutter davon hört, rennt sie wütend zur Klause, verprügelt den Mönch, jagt ihn weg und brennt die Hütte nieder. Für sie ist es kein geistig hochstehender Zustand, die Schönheiten des Lebens nicht mehr wahrzunehmen, sondern ein Jammer. Trotz dieses Koans und vereinzelter weiterer Erwähnungen wird im Zen das Thema Sexualität und erotische Anziehung eher ausgeblendet, obwohl es viele Mönche und Menschen bewegt. Eine interessante Ausnahme ist Ikkyû Sôjun, der als eine der populärsten Zen-Persönlichkeiten Japans gilt und für seinen Witz und seine tiefe Zen-Erfahrung bekannt ist. Im hohen Alter verliebt er sich leidenschaftlich in die junge blinde Sängerin Mori. Im Zusammensein mit ihr erlebt Ikkyû, was er als sein eigentliches Erwachen bezeichnet und hält seine Erlebnisse teilweise in Gedichten fest: der Schmerz des Anhaftens aus Lust ist größer als ich dachte Wind besänftigt meine Gedanken diese Lust ist mein endloses Koan ich bin unfassbar glücklich Um für junge Erwachsene den Aufenthalt im ToGenJi zu ermöglichen, bitten wir um eine Spende: Sie finden die Kontodaten/Paypal auf unserer Website https://choka-sangha.de/spenden/ Herzlichen Dank

GBZC member Julie Nelson (sensei) speaks about Zen stories and koans, both classical and contemporary. 

I am just returning from my first in-person Zen sesshin here in Ohio. It was wonderful to practice the familiar rhythm of a silent, Zen-style meditation retreat so close to the place I currently call home. We practiced as the winds and rain from Hurricane Helene blew through South Western Ohio felling tree branches and power lines on the property of the Jesuit Spiritual Center where we were sitting our retreat. Despite a days long power outage on the property, we continued to practice and deepen into our shared vows and sense of interconnection. Our prayers and dedication of merit began to open up and include those living in areas that are affected by the winds, floods and destruction of the hurricane as well as those suffering in other ways all over our world—may they and we find relief from suffering and realize true happiness.Sesshin has this way of amplifying our aloneness and our togetherness. With nothing to do but sit, walk, eat and sleep, we have the rare opportunity to really let-go of or soften the reification of some of the ordinary functions of the mind, such as naming, conceptualizing, narrating, story-telling, etc. One is free to just be. And what is that? Something we are invited to continuously discover. So we sit on the edge of knowing and not-knowing, the precipice of becoming, the mystery of appearance inchoate. Being nothing and everything at once. Stopping for times the need to define or find a foothold in such existential territory. For me, it has been a while since I sat a full sesshin completely as a student. I felt like I had permission to rediscover what this practice is, from the embodied source—ground up. And zazen also had permission to be nothing in particular. There wasn't something to resolve, or fix or some insight to get. In a place of such permission zazen got to be so many things. At times a warm loving embrace, other times a sharpening stone, a quiet refuge, space, a place to explore fears + tensions, to make friends with myself in all its forms and manifestations, a hub of bodhicitta, the entire universe unhinged, rain + wind, a leaf falling, love of the ancestors through our teacher + guide, an iron yoke, a lover…nothing at all.I am appreciating how the practice does practice us, and how over the decade and a half that I have been engaged in intensive practice, there are so many practices that visit me, offering momentary medicine in this process of living. I don't need to take anything with me from moment to moment, I can trust that practice truly does continue. Though I do find myself drawn to creating the conditions to recognize the dharma in all times and places.I left sesshin feeling humbled and full. Daniel Terrango, our teacher and guide kept reminding us that the dharma is generous. Ah, yes. Can you feel it too?Right here is the heart of bodhicitta, a commitment to awaken together with all beings. Right here, all beings are awakening together in the sometimes maddening, sometimes heart-wrenchingly beautiful conditions of our current world-systems.In the teaching realm, I have been exploring a Zen poem called the Sandokai or Harmony of Difference and Sameness. In this dharma talk I zoom out and look at how we encounter difference and sameness in our dharma practice as well as our daily lives. It was rich and enlivening for me to engage in this contemplation, and I would be curious for those who listen to the talk or read the transcript—how it is for you.…I'm Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, budding Astrologer and Artist. In my Spiritual Counseling Practice, I practice at the confluence of spirituality and psychology, integrating mind, body and spirit. I am trained in Internal Family Systems (IFS), Dream Work, Hakomi (Somatic Therapy) and Mindful Eating. Below are some of my current offerings.Monday Night Meditation + DharmaEvery Monday 6P PT / 9P ETJoin me on zoom for 40 minutes of meditation and a dharma talk. We are currently exploring the freedom, spontaneity and love of our original nature through the teachings of the Zen koan tradition. Koans invite us into the mythos of practice awakening, gifting us with the ordinary images of our lives, they help awaken us to the wonder, intimacy and compassion of life as it is!All are welcome to join. Drop in any time.Zoom Link for Monday NightBeyond Mindfulness: Deepening Your Meditation Practice Class SeriesThis workshop style course is designed to provide a map of the meditation path as well as:* Introduce you to the five main styles of meditation (calm-abiding, concentration, heart-based practices, inquiry and open-awareness)* Help you understand the intention of each method and how to practice it* Help you understand how the various methods and techniques fit together and support each other* Provide a fun, non-judgmental learning environment where you can try things out, ask questions and explore* Give you the opportunity to work with a teacher with an extensive background in various meditation techniquesI currently live in Columbus, Ohio with my partner Patrick Kennyo Dunn, we facilitate an in-person meditation gathering every Wednesday from 7P - 8:30P at ILLIO in Clintonville through Mud Lotus Sangha. If you happen to be in Columbus, feel free to stop by. We have weekly meditation gatherings, and are offering a day of meditation in October.Sky + RoseWhat is it? An experiment in the impossible task of excluding nothing and loving everything. An alchemy of play, presence and wandering into the shadows, you could say.Sky & Rose is a practice container that will:* Center group parts work practices to explore the fluidity, span and dream of who we are - somebody, nobody, everybody. You will be invited to express yourself vocally and physically, engage your imagination and play outside habituation.* Do interpersonal and group meditation practices of seeing, being and awakening.* Directly explore emotional embodiment & shadow work* Include Beauty, Art & Wonderment as core practice elements Through rituals of imagination, meditation technologies and co-created fields of intentional play, we can slip out, for a time, of confining identities defined by our histories, culture and comfort.Delivered by these practices, we can begin to inhabit perspectives and modes of being that stretch our sense of the possible and refresh our sense of the everyday. You might find yourself wearing Luminosities face or inhabiting Laughter's chest. Together we might try out Venus's view of the very life we live or we might make space to feel Chaos's dance and shake off some rigidity.All of these are just examples of where our wondering and feeling into places of vitality and expansion may take us.We will rebel against the quotidian and respect ourselves too much to only have crumbs of the sacred!It was also be a time to work together with the challenges to living heart forward with sanity and presence within this hyper-fractured funhouse/madhouse world.Sky and Rose is a place for Jogen and i to invite you into practices and explorations of 'soul work' that are not part of the Buddhist tradition but that have nonetheless been sources of growth and joy for us. Our influences in this include Paratheatre, IFS and Voice Dialogue, Hakomi, Process Work, Butoh, Jungian dream work and more.We initiate Sky & Rose as an experiment in embracing Spirit and Soul simultaneously, together imagining and practicing interpersonal liberation, playfulness and spaciousness in this time of deep adaptation.Meets monthly on Sundays from 10:30A PT - 12:30P PT / 1:30P ET - 3:30P ETJoin us for our Opening Ritual + Practice exploringThe Ritual of LiminalitySunday October 27 This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

This month, accompanying our sangha's book study, we take a look at the first five koans from the famous Blue Cliff Record. We do that through the Soto Zen lens, extracting the practical essence from these famous ancient exchanges. Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: October 2024 Monthly Zazenkai»

Zen and Koans with Henry Shukman Henry Shukman, MA, is the Spiritual Director Emeritus of Mountain Cloud Zen Center in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is a teacher in the Sanbo Zen lineage and has trained in various other meditation schools and practices. He has been authorized to teach Mindfulness by Shinzen Young and is … Continue reading "Zen and Koans with Henry Shukman"

A thousand times at least I asked my Guru to give Nothingness a name. Then I gave up. What name can you give to the source from which all names have sprung? –Lal DedLanguage has a trickster quality. At one moment it limits. We find ourselves hard pressed to find the word that captures a feeling, mind state or emotion. Other times, a single word can invoke so many meanings and associations that we are left with a number of mind tangents or in a conversation with people who have very different images in their hearts.For example—the other day I was working with a colleague to come up with a name for an event that we are collaborating on. They wanted to use the word “vessel”, I said it reminded me of deep sea submarines, they said they thought of a cup or chalice, another friend said they immediately thought of blood flowing through their veins.Needless to say, we scrapped vessel.But, how often does this happen?One of my favorite books as a college student was The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera (who is a Czech writer and somehow captures something I know so deeply in my bones growing up in a large close knit Catholic extended family with Czech ancestry). In the book he defines words according to the different characters, which opens up a reflection on how a single word also contains personal meaning based on our histories. We all have experience with hearing a word, and an image appears in our mind, and suddenly we are in a scene from 10 years ago—smelling the ocean, filled with longing for a lost love or time of connection—or something else.Given our wide range of life experience and associations, how is it that we are able to communicate at all?In spiritual practice, we play the trickster, using language we point beyond concepts to a truth outside of our shared vernacular— a secret language of the innermost heart.Yet, the words themselves can act as traps. We say one thing, and the other side isn't expressed. Our words amount to an incomplete teaching, a partial truth. As practitioners on this path of freedom—we learn to liberate language. To hear beyond the words. To—at times—forget words. Deviating from conventional conceptualizations — playing in pure potentiality. If a tree wasn't a tree, what would you call it?If love wasn't called love, how would you name it?What is the sound you would give to oneness? How would you capture Nothingness?Don't tell me about it, my teacher would say in sanzen, show me!…For the month of September my dharma talks/podcasts will be exploring the relationship between the oneness and the many, or sameness and difference. We will be using the Zen poem by Shitou called the Sandokai, which is translated as the Harmony of Difference and Sameness or the Identity of Relative and Absolute. This podcast introduces the poem and some other teachings from Shitou, just to give you a flavor for his teaching style. On Monday Sept 16, I plan to zoom out and explore the ways sameness + difference show up in our lives + practice, exploring how we can practice integrating the teaching of one + many in our relational lives.Another theme I have been reflecting on lately, and this very much is part the exploration of oneness and many—is the relationship between Spirit and Soul in dharma practice. Almost every retreat I have led in a Zen context, someone asks at some point, where is the joy? And while I have found great joy in simply sitting in the stripped down style of a Zen sesshin. I also know that Joy, Beauty, Art, Wonderment and Ecstasy are potent elements to the unfolding and embodiment of dharma in our lives.Jogen and I have been envisioning a practice space that is both committed to the spiritual practice of waking up, while also exploring together elements of soul work. I am excited to introduce……sky + rose: an emergent, on-line contemplative community braiding Spirit and SoulMeets monthly on Sundays from 10:30A PT - 12:30P PT / 1:30P ET - 3:30P ETJoin us for our first practice session : The Ritual of LiminalitySunday October 27Spirit (sky): indestructible stillness-openness, clarity, perfection beyond the mind's capacity to grasp or reconcile, the felt unity of all this multiplicity, the cosmos in your cup of coffee. Unstoppable, ever-graceful flow.Soul (rose): everything alive as Beauty. Art in the everyday quirks, cares, agonies and curiosities. Tending the need to create, relate, build and destroy. Reconciling Psyche's movement towards wholeness. Answering the call to heal the meanness and alienation that fractures our worlds. Putting on the Altar the dark places and shining light in the shadowy corners of our very human hearts. The love and meaning for the flowers popping up in the cracks.This is a place for kisei and jogen to weave in practices and explorations of Soul Work that are typically not highlighted in the Buddhist tradition but that have nonetheless been sources of vitality, expansion and joy. Here we ask together: What if we lived as if Love were the point?We will:* Create a practice ethos of radical non-duality, a commitment to see into the dream of the self. Grounding in dharma practices of stillness, inquiry and openness.* Center parts work practices to explore the fluidity, span and dream of who we are - somebody, nobody, everybody.* Do interpersonal and group meditation practices of seeing, being and awakening.* Directly explore emotional embodiment & shadow work* Include Beauty, Art & Wonderment as core practice elementsWe initiate Sky & Rose as an experiment in embracing Spirit and Soul simultaneously, together imagining and practicing collective liberation, playfulness and spaciousness in this time of deep adaptation.We will begin with monthly 2 hour online sessions on Sundays. Each month we will have a different theme. The schedule for a session can be found below. We ask each person to commit to coming for the entire session.Opening—Sacred Invocation (10 min)Meditation/Universe Somatic (45 min)Group Shadow Work / Relational Practices (1hr)Closing Dedication ….I'm Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, budding Astrologer and Artist. In my Spiritual Counseling Practice, I practice at the confluence of spirituality and psychology, integrating mind, body and spirit. I am trained in Internal Family Systems (IFS), Dream Work, Hakomi (Somatic Therapy) and Mindful Eating.I also lead a weekly online meditation group through the Zen Community of Oregon and am leading a class series on the Zen Bodhisattva Precepts this Fall. Also if you are interested in workshopping your meditation practice join me in collaboration with Pause Meditation for a 5-week online class series called Beyond Mindfulness. More information can be found below.Monday Night Meditation + DharmaEvery Monday 6P PT / 9P ETJoin me on zoom for 40 minutes of meditation and a dharma talk. We are currently exploring the freedom, spontaneity and love of our original nature through the teachings of the Zen koan tradition. Koans invite us into the mythos of practice awakening, gifting us with the ordinary images of our lives, they help awaken us to the wonder, intimacy and compassion of life as it is!All are welcome to join. Drop in any time.Zoom Link for Monday NightLiving the Questions: 16 Bodhisattva Precepts Class SeriesBe patient with all that is unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves. Do not seek the answers, which can not be given to you, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. And perhaps you will then gradually…find yourself living the answer. — RilkeFar from being a set of rules or doctrine that we must follow, the Bodhisattva precepts act as koans, inquiries that we are empowered to take into our life. They ask us to consider, what does love look like in this situation? In this relationship, how do I work with my anger? Who is it who wants to gossip, or inflate one's self? How can I show up authentically in the world?With the final five grave precepts, pure precepts and refuges as our guide we will explore the heart of what it means for each one of us to live a life of integrity and love. We will explore how each precept touches the personal, interpersonal, global and secret dimensions of our living.Beyond Mindfulness: Deepening Your Meditation Practice Class SeriesThis workshop style course is designed to provide a map of the meditation path as well as:* Introduce you to the five main styles of meditation (calm-abiding, concentration, heart-based practices, inquiry and open-awareness)* Help you understand the intention of each method and how to practice it* Help you understand how the various methods and techniques fit together and support each other* Provide a fun, non-judgmental learning environment where you can try things out, ask questions and explore* Give you the opportunity to work with a teacher with an extensive background in various meditation techniquesI currently live in Columbus, Ohio with my partner Patrick Kennyo Dunn, we facilitate an in-person meditation gathering every Wednesday from 7P - 8:30P at ILLIO in Clintonville through Mud Lotus Sangha. If you happen to be in Columbus, feel free to stop by. We have weekly meditation gatherings, and are offering a day of meditation in October.Earth Dreams is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

Your favorite Stoic podcast is back, as we work our way through Meditations Book 6 which is all about the unself. Marcus makes quite the claim in this chapter that “The only rewards of our existence here are an unstained character and unselfish acts..."But what does it mean to be unselfish? And why is it a reward? To answer these questions we explore some Buddhist tenants and a surgical procedure that will make you question whether you exist at all. Then we move through what Marcus suggest on how to live a happier more selfish existence. Stick around for the Stoic Reimagining, it's um, life changing…Email us: Modernmeditationspodcast@gmail.com

We are emerging from the monthly return of the moon's dark face—where from earth's perspective the sun and moon appear to kiss, an aspect that astrologers refer to as a conjunction. In the Zen tradition, the moon cycles served as markers for the calendar year—with the new and full moons being opportunities for ritual and ceremony around atonement and renewal of vows.In my own life and practice, I have been contemplating the mystery of being, what is often unseen or unacknowledged in the ways we normally move through space and relate to others and the world. In celebration of this New Moon and the Great Mystery, I offer a reflection on the following koan, Zhaozhou's Deeply Secret Mind.Hidden Lamp: Zhaozhou's Deeply Secret MindA nun asked Master Zhaozhou: What is the deeply secret mind?Zhaozhou squeezed her handThe nun responded Do you still have this?Zhaozhou replied: You are the one who has thisI was reflecting the other day about why I started practicing Zen. In my home sangha, the Zen Community of Oregon, we have been having conversations about paths of practice. So, I invite you to reflect as well. Why did you start practicing meditation? And if you practice in a particular tradition, why that tradition?In my own reflection, it seems like Zen chose me. Someone gave me a Zen book and it resonated, then the meditation group I sat with in college was Zen, then my partner in college took me with him to a Zen Temple—at that point I didn't really think about the other meditation traditions and if one would have been a better fit. I just followed the path that was opening itself up before me.When I entered a Zen Monastery for my first retreat, I was greeted by an ambiance that felt ancient. The dark zendo, the temple bells, physical mudras that evoked stillness, gratitude and wonder as the monastery building played with the natural world in a way that the two felt indistinguishable. Though my thoughts frequently played the worries and dreams of this particular person, I had a sense that these stories weren't the whole of who I was. The ancient timeless peace of the monastery was my heart too.It was here that I felt, perhaps for the first time in my adult life, Zhaozhou's hand reaching out and squeezing mine—the monastery + zen forms provided the physical invitation into this open secret.Another way this koan is translated is: The nun asks, What is the inner-most heart?We say Zen is transmitted heart to heart, mind to mind. A few weeks ago I was at Great Vow for a weeklong silent meditation retreat called Grasses and Trees Sesshin. The retreat takes place completely outdoors, we practice with the grounds and forest, the trees, leaves, meadows, birds and bats. During our sharing circle on the last day, someone shared a story of sitting with a spider, and feeling the spider extend one of its legs, as the person held out a hand.Others spoke of touching the earth, a rock, a tree —palm to palm, hand to heart, eyeball to eyeball, soma to soma.When we spend a week, or a day or years or even minutes sitting with another being in silence, in openness, in presence—we know each other in a way that words can't even begin to explain.Think of all the hands you have held over the years. The hands you have squeezed. What was being communicated? What were you sharing? What state of Mind? What quality of Heart?All the time we are holding hands with this sacred life.Tooth brush hands, tea cup hands, peach + apple hands, dirt hands, human hands, dog hands.Sometimes maybe we are saying, I love you, I'm scared, hold me, other times especially with the seeming objects of our lives, it might feel more transactional, or maybe we fail to notice this ordinary intimacy.Chozen Roshi would invite us to take up the practice of Loving Hands. A way of really attending to all the beings, all the life energy that moves through our hands in a given day. How many hand squeezes are we giving and receiving? How many moments of intimacy kiss our lips, and pass us by?Patrick and I have been doing some teaching with a local sangha called Mud Lotus Sangha here in Columbus, OH, and sometimes the question comes up—what is Zen good for?Or another way a similar sentiment arises for folks who have been practicing for a while is, I know what Zen is good for. It helps me feel calm, or less anxious, or more connected.We have the habit of relating to this practice as another thing that we can measure—whether it is working for me, or not. Whether I am getting what I want from this, or not.This koan is reminding us that Zen or our spiritual lives don't work that way. Even sitting meditation doesn't work that way.When we try to measure our spiritual practice, we overlook the mystery—we violate the deeply secret transmissions, we forget about our inner-most heart.Many of you have heard me use the teaching tool of inner, outer and secret. Let's go into that a little bit more in relationship to the practice of Zen, or spiritual practice more generally.So, we have the physical things that we do, maybe that is meditating daily, or once a week, maybe that is doing bowing practice, or chanting or walking meditation, precepts study or some other practice. This is the outer form of the practice. It is important in that it gives us a form, a temenos, a sacred vessel and structure to our practice. This form is helpful. It reminds us that we are practicing. It gives our bodies and minds something to do, to settle into, to trust. This allows practice to deepen and open.Then we have what we are doing with our minds / attention. I call this the inner dimension. This starts with intention, and then the method—how we are actually meeting the changing experiences on an inner level. This could include practicing acceptance, loving kindness or compassion for ourselves, or learning to relate to thoughts as another sense happening. Or beginning to look into the nature of our experience (we call this inquiry). What is the source of thoughts, what are emotions made of? How long does any experience last? All these practices compose the inner dimension—what we are doing with our attention moment to moment.The secret dimension is all that can not be said, what we don't have names for. The physicist David Bohm said that if we used the analogy of the ocean to describe what we know and don't know about the universe, what we know would be comparable to the foam that rests on the surface of the ocean. What we don't know—is the rest of the ocean.The opening lines to the Dao De Jing say it this way:The dao that can be named is not the eternal dao.And so Zhaozhou gives our hands a squeeze. And it's not about the hand or the squeeze per se, but the intimacy. The connection. Not the words intimacy or connection, but the direct, living intimacy. The dissolving of self and other. Releasing the world from our concepts about it. It's the heart at home with itself. The great mystery of being and non-being—simultaneously. I think you know what I am trying to say. There are times in our practice, in our life as practice where we hear the words behind the words. We hear the secret language of a chant, dharma talk, gesture, sound and part of us understands. Chozen Roshi would invite us to listen to the birds so closely, that we could almost understand what they were saying. I think a similar kind of listening emerges in Zen, we hear and learn to speak the language behind the words and forms, the secret language of true intimacy.So we practice Zen in all its forms, we set intentions and put into practice the teachings that help us cultivate mental stability, equanimity, ease, loving kindness, compassion, gratitude, joy.And at times we are touched by the mystery. The great love of being. We sense our shared nature, and the wisdom, openness and clarity of the heart as our own nature. And then, without us even noticing it secret language emerges from our own lips.…. This dharma talk was shared live during the Monday Night Dharma event through the Zen Community of Oregon.I'm Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, budding Astrologer and Artist. In my Spiritual Counseling Practice, I practice at the confluence of spirituality and psychology, integrating mind, body and spirit. I am trained in Internal Family Systems (IFS), Dream Work, Hakomi (Somatic Therapy) and Mindful Eating.I have a few new client openings this Fall if you are interested in exploring Spiritual Counseling with me. Spiritual Counseling can help you:* Companion Grief + Loss* Clarify Life Purpose* Healing Relational Conflict + Inner Conflict* Work with Shadow Material* Heal your relationship with Eating, Food or Body Image* Spiritual Emergence* Integrate Psychedelic or Mystical Experiences* Move Through Creative Blocks, Career Impasses and BurnoutI also lead a weekly online meditation group through the Zen Community of Oregon and am leading a class series on the Zen Bodhisattva Precepts this Fall. Also if you are interested in workshopping your meditation practice join me in collaboration with Pause Meditation for a 5-week online class series called Beyond Mindfulness. More information can be found below.Monday Night Meditation + DharmaEvery Monday 6P PT / 9P ETJoin me on zoom for 40 minutes of meditation and a dharma talk. We are currently exploring the freedom, spontaneity and love of our original nature through the teachings of the Zen koan tradition. Koans invite us into the mythos of practice awakening, gifting us with the ordinary images of our lives, they help awaken us to the wonder, intimacy and compassion of life as it is!All are welcome to join. Drop in any time.Zoom Link for Monday NightLiving the Questions: 16 Bodhisattva Precepts Class SeriesBe patient with all that is unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves. Do not seek the answers, which can not be given to you, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. And perhaps you will then gradually…find yourself living the answer. — RilkeFar from being a set of rules or doctrine that we must follow, the Bodhisattva precepts act as koans, inquiries that we are empowered to take into our life. They ask us to consider, what does love look like in this situation? In this relationship, how do I work with my anger? Who is it who wants to gossip, or inflate one's self? How can I show up authentically in the world?With the final five grave precepts, pure precepts and refuges as our guide we will explore the heart of what it means for each one of us to live a life of integrity and love. We will explore how each precept touches the personal, interpersonal, global and secret dimensions of our living.Beyond Mindfulness: Deepening Your Meditation Practice Class SeriesThis workshop style course is designed to provide a map of the meditation path as well as:* Introduce you to the five main styles of meditation (calm-abiding, concentration, heart-based practices, inquiry and open-awareness)* Help you understand the intention of each method and how to practice it* Help you understand how the various methods and techniques fit together and support each other* Provide a fun, non-judgmental learning environment where you can try things out, ask questions and explore* Give you the opportunity to work with a teacher with an extensive background in various meditation techniquesI currently live in Columbus, Ohio with my partner Patrick Kennyo Dunn, we facilitate an in-person meditation gathering every Wednesday from 7P - 8:30P at ILLIO in Clintonville through Mud Lotus Sangha. If you happen to be in Columbus, feel free to stop by. We have weekly meditation gatherings, and are offering a day of meditation in October. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

Blue Cliff Record Case 39: The Golden Haired LionA student asked Yunmen, “What is the pure and everlasting body of reality?”Yunmen said, “A fence of flowers and healing herbs.”The student asked, “What's it like when I reach there?”Yunmen said, “A golden-haired lion!”I am landing back in Ohio after about two weeks visiting my old homes in Oregon, Great Vow Zen Monastery and Portland. I was at Great Vow for a weeklong sesshin that we call Grasses, Trees and the Great Earth—a unique retreat where we move the zendo outside, and sit in a circle together in ceremony with the Earth, Sky, Trees, Grasses and beings of the forest, meadow creek and pond. I initially gave this series of talks in the heart of the summer, when flowers, healing herbs, tomatoes and blueberries are fruiting on the fences, in the gardens and windowsill pots of our lives. A time of year that tropical astrologers assign to the constellation Leo, the lion—a fixed fire sign, ruled by the Sun. As Leo season ends, and we find ourselves in late summer, returning back to our own inner light, and the work that needs to be done. I offer these talks and reflections on the Golden Haired Lion, Koan Work and the Changing of the Seasons.The ancient greek astrologers saw the sun as the heart of the cosmic animal as well as the heart of the human being. To know one's heart was to connect to the wild, mysterious heart of the cosmos.Lion-imagery crosses cultures. Lions have spoken to the human heart throughout antiquity we see remnants of this relationship today on the lion panel of the Chauvet Cave in France painted 30K years ago, in the image of the lion-headed dakini in Tibet, Sekhmet the Egyptian warrior-healer goddess with a lion head and in the strength card in the tarot. The RWS version of the strength card in the tarot is quite evocative of the imagery from this koan. A woman wearing flowers in her hair and on her dress, pets a seemingly tamed lion—framed by a bright yellow background invoking the summer sun. Who or what are these part lion-part human beings?Animals and nature frequent koans. I always feel like their appearance reminds us that our spiritual lives unfold within these animal bodies, within the place that we live, within our passions and desires. The appearance of a wild animal connects to our instincts. The lion to our sovereignty as well as our magical child.So here we are again. Conversing with a Zen teacher about the body of reality. And again, the teacher points to the flowers. This time blooming together with medicinal herbs on a fence.While the image was probably something in the immediate environment of the questioner. There are always levels of meaning and exploration within a single interaction. The questioner is asking—what is it? What is always present? Is there something that you can say to express the freedom and love of our original nature, how is it—what is it—right, here–right now?Yunmen shares a bit of his mind by naming— the flowering fence, the medicinal herbs.Images of beauty as well as nourishment—medicine. Alive right here in the present. Is beauty medicine? What nourishes your heart? This koan is very much a koan with heart.Earth Dreams is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Have you ever meditated on a flower? Or attended to a flower blooming over the course of days or weeks. Budding, the opening which is a process of contraction and expansion, then the full expression of its open-ness and followed by the falling petals that slowly turn to soil.Flowers reveal nature's beauty in full display. Their sweet smells and arresting appearance attract humans as well as pollinators. Long associated with the heart, they show us something about the tender process of moving towards openness. As well as reflecting to us the nature of cycles and deep interconnection. Flowers are in-bedded in a place, they are relational.In the Buddhist tradition the nature of mind, the pure body of reality, awareness is likened to a flower that is eternally blooming—always present. While simultaneously human life, the life of the world is —seasonal, is changing, is subject to the whims of nature, the turning of the earth, night and day and all the other beings that we share this cosmos with.What's it like when we realize the pure body of reality for ourselves? A golden haired lion.Together we share the great heart of the cosmos, like the lemniscate above the woman in the strength card—we recognize our continual inter-connection, our shared being with animal, earth, flower, night sky. We find and lose and find ourselves in the heart of our being.In Hua-Yen Buddhism, the golden-haired lion is a symbol of inter-being, inter-penetration. Like a great hologram, it was said that each of the lion's hairs contained the whole lion. So the lion itself was an embodiment of Indra's net. It was a symbol for the living body of reality, where everything is contained within everything else.Majushri, the bodhisattva of Wisdom, is said to ride on this lion. Living this insight.So the appearance of this lion in this koan is an invitation to walk through the world as such. Seeing everyone you meet, every interaction as a reflection of the whole cosmos. Similar to the gnostic belief that the divine is contained within each of us. We are of one substance, and we are utterly unique in our expressions. Our heart is both the heart of the cosmos, and our personal heart (soul/psyche) which will flower in its own way, based on the causes and conditions of our precious life.The lion's gaze is another teaching in the buddhist tradition. The analogy goes that if you throw a ball to a dog, the dog will run after the ball. If you throw a ball to a lion, the lion will look back at the source. As practitioner's we train in the lion's gaze. Instead of following every thought form that flashes through our mind, we trace the thoughts back to our embodied experience, back to awareness itself—back to the source.We learn to gaze into the spacious source of our nature.The images of a koan are like the images of a dream, or even a fairy tale. Where each image is us. We are questioner, we are teacher, we are flowers opening alongside medicinal herbs, we are fence, we are lion, we are the bodhisattva of wisdom.Koans invite us to carry these images into our meditation practice and into our day. Where, like dreams, our associations carry insights into the more personal as well as archetypal dimensions of the koan. Perhaps we will find ourselves practicing our roars, or walking with confidence, embodying courage, letting ourselves shine or take up space. Maybe we will learn more about the mythological lions from fairy tales.Koans invite participation. Embodiment. Creativity.What is it like to sit as a lion? To walk down the street as your lion self? To show-up at a meeting with lion-like courage or confidence, optimism? How familiar are you with your inner strength? What would it be like to practice the lion's gaze when someone criticizes you, or when you criticize yourself? What is it like to let yourself be accompanied by such a lion? This is something I love about koans, they offer support. Companionship. As we get acquainted with the lion of our true nature, we can imagine having them around. Perhaps like in the strength card.Another dimension of this koan is the flower and the medicinal herbs. And so one tangible practice is to simply spend some time meditating with flowers or looking at flowers—really seeing them. Or maybe making yourself some medicinal herbal tea.I have a few friends who as a practice always have a bouquet of flowers on their altar or table, as a way of connecting to beauty and remembering self-appreciation (one friend realized that it was a way of giving herself a gift everyday, the other said it was a small way of connecting to joy).Last year Kennyo and I watched the early season of Twin Peaks, and there was this scene where Agent Cooper is getting pie at the dinner and he says to the sheriff Harry S Truman, “I give myself a gift everyday”.This koan is also about that. How do you nourish your heart? How can you be generous with yourself? Can you do something generous for yourself everyday?We might also try on some of the paradoxes these images hold. How can we be eternally blooming, and also allow all things to have their seasons? Can we sense our oneness, and allow each being to express themselves as they are? As you can see, each koan contains a lot of teachings even within a few images. This layered aspect of koans is what makes them potent teaching tools. So notice, was there any part of the koan, any one of the images or the teachings that the image invokes that you are curious about or do you have an area of life that you feel concerned about, that you aren't sure how to practice with—could the koan accompany you there….that might be the way to bring this teaching into your week.…Koan Practice and the Three Bodies of the BuddhaIn this next talk, I take a deeper dive into how to work with a koan using Blue Cliff Record Case 39: The Golden Haired Lion. I provide a framework for koan practice from the teachings of the Three Bodies of Buddha—three aspects of our embodied awakened life, which are:* Dharmakaya/Essence/Secret—koans point to our awakened nature, the ground of being, our shared light* Sambhogakaya/Inner/Dream Body—working with koan images and energies can help us meet and work with the stuff of our own hearts and minds and empower us to cultivate the awakened qualities that the koan points to. Koan images can also act as dharma protectors, beings we can turn towards to help us meet the inner demons, distractions and deeply conditioned patterns of mind that cause suffering to others and ourselves* Nirmanakaya/Outer/Form/Compassion Body—bringing the koan into our relationships, work we do, expression, embodiment, how we live…Seasons of Practice: Exploring Emptiness + FullnessThis final talk is a reflection + celebration of the end of summer and the practice opportunities that come with late Summer, a time symbolically represented by the Hermit. …I'm Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, budding Astrologer and Artist. In my Spiritual Counseling Practice, I practice at the confluence of spirituality and psychology, integrating mind, body and spirit. I am trained in Internal Family Systems (IFS), Dream Work, Hakomi (Somatic Therapy) and Mindful Eating.I also lead a weekly online meditation group through the Zen Community of Oregon and am leading a class series on the Zen Bodhisattva Precepts this Fall. Also if you are interested in workshopping your meditation practice join me in collaboration with Pause Meditation for a 5-week online class series called Beyond Mindfulness. More information can be found below.Monday Night Meditation + DharmaEvery Monday 6P PT / 9P ETJoin me on zoom for 40 minutes of meditation and a dharma talk. We are currently exploring the freedom, spontaneity and love of our original nature through the teachings of the Zen koan tradition. Koans invite us into the mythos of practice awakening, gifting us with the ordinary images of our lives, they help awaken us to the wonder, intimacy and compassion of life as it is!All are welcome to join. Drop in any time.Zoom Link for Monday NightLiving the Questions: 16 Bodhisattva Precepts Class SeriesBe patient with all that is unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves. Do not seek the answers, which can not be given to you, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. And perhaps you will then gradually…find yourself living the answer. — RilkeFar from being a set of rules or doctrine that we must follow, the Bodhisattva precepts act as koans, inquiries that we are empowered to take into our life. They ask us to consider, what does love look like in this situation? In this relationship, how do I work with my anger? Who is it who wants to gossip, or inflate one's self? How can I show up authentically in the world?With the final five grave precepts, pure precepts and refuges as our guide we will explore the heart of what it means for each one of us to live a life of integrity and love. We will explore how each precept touches the personal, interpersonal, global and secret dimensions of our living.Beyond Mindfulness: Deepening Your Meditation Practice Class SeriesThis workshop style course is designed to provide a map of the meditation path as well as:* Introduce you to the five main styles of meditation (calm-abiding, concentration, heart-based practices, inquiry and open-awareness)* Help you understand the intention of each method and how to practice it* Help you understand how the various methods and techniques fit together and support each other* Provide a fun, non-judgmental learning environment where you can try things out, ask questions and explore* Give you the opportunity to work with a teacher with an extensive background in various meditation techniquesI currently live in Columbus, Ohio with my partner Patrick Kennyo Dunn, we facilitate an in-person meditation gathering every Wednesday from 7P - 8:30P at ILLIO in Clintonville through Mud Lotus Sangha. If you happen to be in Columbus, feel free to stop by. We have weekly meditation gatherings, and are offering a day of meditation in October. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

Will gives an intro to Koans (Kongans) in this Dharma Talk.

Two-time unicorn founder Jason Cohen (WP Engine, Smart Bear) returns to discuss his Twitter 'koans', exploring their implications for founders. In this bonus episode, Yaniv Bernstein, Chris Saad, and Jason Cohen discuss: Half-Baked Ideas: The pitfalls of working on too many projects (or cakes). Work/Work Balance: What even is a 'lifestyle business'? The Invisible Startup: Why founders should stop saying they're going 'stealth mode'. Tune in for an engaging conversation that offers fun and valuable insights for entrepreneurs! The Pact Honour The Startup Podcast Pact! If you have listened to TSP and gotten value from it, please: Follow, rate, and review us in your listening app Subscribe to the TSP Mailing List at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://thestartuppodcast.beehiiv.com/subscribe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Secure your official TSP merchandise at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://shop.tsp.show/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow us on YouTube at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@startup-podcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Give us a public shout-out on LinkedIn or anywhere you have a social media following Key links The Startup Podcast is sponsored by Vanta. Vanta helps businesses get and stay compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in demand compliance frameworks. With over 200 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on. Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.vanta.com/tsp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for 20% off their incredible offer. Get your question in for our next Q&A episode: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://forms.gle/NZzgNWVLiFmwvFA2A⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ The Startup Podcast website: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://tsp.show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about Chris and Yaniv Work 1:1 with Chris: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠http://chrissaad.com/advisory/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Chris on Linkedin: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrissaad/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Yaniv on Linkedin: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/ybernstein/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Credits Editor: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Justin McArthur⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Intro Voice: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Jeremiah Owyang⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/30/24 - From the Koans of the Way of Reality - Xinyang's Sweet Melons - Being on the eve of the funeral of the monastery's beloved gardener, Senior monastic Choke Yukon, Abbot Shugen Roshi presents us, fittingly, with this koan from a collection compiled by the late John Daido Loori the founder of Zen Mountain Monastery.

Koans challenge our assumptions. By presenting seemingly nonsensical questions, they dismantle our reliance on logic and open us to new perspectives.  They bypass intellectual understanding, instead pointing us towards a direct experience of reality that transcends language. This process can be frustrating, dismantling our ego's need for control and certainty. However, by surrendering to the mystery, we embark on a transformative journey.Engaging with koans cultivates valuable qualities. Our intuition sharpens as we learn to understand beyond reason. We become more present, focusing intensely on the "here and now" as we grapple with the paradoxes presented. Finally, the disorientation caused by koans can foster compassion, allowing us to see the universality of human experience and connect with all beings on a deeper level.In essence, Zen koans are not about finding answers, but about experiencing a transformative process that leads to heightened awareness and a more compassionate understanding of ourselves and the world around us.Upcoming Programs This episode is a must-listen for coaches and anyone interested in the future of learning and development.Ready to take your coaching to the next level?  Here are our upcoming programs ACTCAdvanced +ACTCCoaching for Spiritual LeadershipICF- L1/ACC Coaching for Spiritual Leadership by Ram RamanathanWe look forward to welcoming you to our future events as we continue to explore the fascinating realm of coaching.Join our coaching Community: CoachnookThis episode was recorded on 13 March 2024 as part of the Future of Coaching seriesYou can watch the recording on our YouTube channel.  If you like this episode, please subscribe to our podcast and connect with us on the links below.  Thank you for your support!Contact Us https://coacharya.com/contactWebsite https://coacharya.comWebinars https://coacharya.com/events/LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/coacharyaYouTube https://youtube.com/c/coacharyaFacebook https://www.facebook.com/CoacharyaTwitter https://twitter.com/coacharyaInstagram https://www.instagram.com/coacharya

CASE 46: Stepping Forward From the Top of a PoleCase:Master Sekiso said, “How will you step forward from the top of a hundred-foot pole?”Another eminent master of old said, “Even though one who is sitting on the top of ahundred-foot pole has entered realization, it is not yet real. He must step forward from thetop of the pole and manifest his whole body throughout the world in ten directions.” Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

Rev. Paul Tesshin shares some of the fascinating aspects of the extremely unique practice of Zen puzzles/koans: If a Zen priest talks at the UU and no one attends did they actually talk?

Koans are intimate knowledge, teaches Sensei Wendy Johnson, and to be effective they “must and only live in reality through direct experience.”  Here, Sensei Wendy shares with us her intimate knowledge […]

Attention! A monk once asked Baso, “Your reverence, abandoning the four propositions and wiping out the hundred negations, please point out to me directly the meaning of Bodhidharma's coming from the West.” Baso said, “I don't feel like explaining to you today. Go ask Chizo.” The monk then went to ask Chizo, and Chizo said, “Why don't you ask the master?” The monk said, “The master told me to ask you.” Rubbing his head with his hand, Chizo said, “I've got a headache today. Go and ask Brother Kai.” The monk asked Kai, and Kai said, “Ever since I have been here, I don't know.” The monk returned and told Baso what had happened, and Baso said, “Chizo's head is white, Kai's head is black.” Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

Sensei Michael gives a Dharma Talk about letting go of our judgements about self and others as a prerequisite to awakening. Case six of the Record of Stone and Sand is discussed: No Loving-kindness  Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

I love color, and I love a “koan”--a question, story, or statement that can't be understood logically. These thirteen color koans explore the mysteries of color. Get in touch: podcast@gretchenrubin.com Follow on social media: @GretchenRubin on YouTube @GretchenRubin on TikTok @GretchenRubin on Instagram @GretchenRubin on Threads Get the podcast show notes by email every week: happiercast.com/shownotes Get Gretchen Rubin's newest book Life in Five Senses to see how she discovered a surprising path to a life of more energy, creativity, luck, and love: by tuning in to the five senses. Now available - order here. Visit Gretchen's website to learn more about Gretchen's best-selling books, products from The Happiness Project Collection, and the Happier app.  Happier with Gretchen Rubin is part of ‘The Onward Project,' a family of podcasts brought together by Gretchen Rubin—all about how to make your life better. Check out the other Onward Project podcasts— Side Hustle School, Happier in Hollywood and Everything Happens with Kate Bowler. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Sensei Michael Shikan Brunner Discusses case number thirty-seven from the Shaseki-shu - "Publishing the Sutras." Sensei teaches on the importance of living your life true to your intentions rather than some distant or lofty goals.  Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

Sensei Michael Shikan Brunner speaks during the 2023 Ango Sesshin to his students about case twenty-nine of the Gateless Gate: "Not the Wind, Not the Flag". The case inspires us to look beyond our ideas of how things are or should be and truly appreciate all that is present right here and now.  Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

Sensei Michael speaks to students during day two of the 2023 Rohatsu Sesshin about Blue Cliff Record case forty-three: "No Cold or Heat". The importance of moving beyond our judgements and preferences and truly opening to our lived experience is discussed in this case of the Hekiganroku.  Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

Sensei Michael Brunner engages in a discussion with his formal students during the 2023 Ango Practice Period about living life beyond regret. He draws inspiration from the insights of Bronnie Ware, an Australian nurse who intimately cared for individuals in the final 12 weeks of their lives. Ware compiled the top five regrets expressed by the dying. Sensei skillfully juxtaposes these regrets with Buddhism's Five Great Fears, illuminating a path towards a life that matters, emphasizing the importance of living beyond the confines of regret.  Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

Sensei Michael discusses fully immersing ourselves into our practice and our lives - losing the cares and concerns of the constructed "small self." The koan examined is case #36 of the Hekiganroku - Roaming the Mountains.   Learn more, study with us, and meditate online at oneriverzen.org.

00:00:26 - Three Koans with Joel Barna 00:29:46 - Meeting with Joel

I am delighted to share this conversation with Roshi Eve Myonen Marko about The Book of Householder Koans: Waking Up in the Land of Attachments, which she co-wrote with Roshi Wendy Egyoku Nakao. It was released in 2020 but I'm sure glad I finally found it! It's become one of my new favorite books and a real treasure as a practice tool. Roshi Eve Marko is a Founding Teacher of the Zen Peacemaker Order, with her late husband, the renowned Roshi Bernie Glassman. She is also the resident teacher at the Green River Zen Center in Massachusetts. Roshi has trained spiritually-based social activists and peacemakers in the US, Europe, and the Middle East, and has been a Spiritholder at retreats bearing witness to genocide at Auschwitz-Birkenau, Rwanda, and the Black Hills in South Dakota. Before that she worked at the Greyston Mandala, which provides housing, child care, jobs, and AIDS-related medical services in Yonkers, New York. Koans have always been a favorite practice of mine but I had drifted away from them off and on … and off for the last few years until this book. If you've listened to earlier episodes of this podcast, then you may have heard my back-to-back episodes about Zen Koans. This is unlike any book about koans I've ever read. It drills deep into your "hiding places" … doing what koans do perfectly: They stop you in your tracks, as they mess with your conceptual thinking, and shake your false trust in the stability of what we think we know. Being drawn into questions, without the comfortable ground of "knowing" offers a practice that can help us pause in our everyday rush to stress and anxiousness caused by trying to be somewhere other than where we are at this moment. I just loved this conversation with Roshi Eve! Among many other things, we talked about…The importance of "not knowing" … About the surprise factor in the situations we find ourselves in life and how they help the mind "make leaps" … And about how we should try to enter life with out whole selves—our bodies, not just our minds. So, don't miss this one! One of my favorite Buddhist subjects and one of the best books I've read in a very long time.   Buy the book, read the reviews, and learn more about Roshi Eve:   https://www.monkfishpublishing.com/products-page-2/buddhism/book-householder-koans/   Website and Blog: https://www.evemarko.com/   Zen Peacemakers: https://zenpeacemakers.org/   Green River Zen Center: http://www.greenriverzen.org/   Interview with Roshi Eve Myonen Marko: https://www.zlmc.org/blog/interview-with-roshi-eve-myonen-marko     Become a patron to support this podcast and get special member benefits, including a membership community and virtual sangha:https://www.patreon.com/EverydayBuddhism   If this podcast has helped you understand Buddhism or help in your everyday life, consider making a one-time donation here: https://donorbox.org/podcast-donations   Support the podcast through the affiliate link to buy the book, Everyday Buddhism: Real-Life Buddhist Teachings & Practices for Real Change: Buy the book, Everyday Buddhism

Koans are the record of provocative, and often paradoxical, exchanges between Zen masters and their students developed in medieval China. In her practice and writing, renowned Zen teacher Joan Sutherland reimagines the koan tradition with allegiance to its root spirit and to its profound potential for vivifying, subverting, and sanctifying our lives. In this episode, Joan is joined by clinical psychologist Megan Rundel in a conversation exploring how practice with Zen koans makes us permeable to the joys and the anguish of this life—and to the primordial mystery we glimpse behind the veil of the everyday. This episode was recorded during a live online event on July 27th, 2022. A transcript is available at ciispod.com. You can also watch it on the CIIS Public Programs YouTube channel. To find out more about CIIS and public programs like this one, visit our website ciis.edu and connect with us on social media @ciispubprograms. We hope that each episode of our podcast provides opportunities for growth, and that our listeners will use them as a starting point for further introspection. Many of the topics discussed on our podcast have the potential to bring up feelings and emotional responses. If you or someone you know is in need of mental health care and support, here are some resources to find immediate help and future healing: -Visit 988lifeline.org or text, call, or chat with The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline by dialing 988 from anywhere in the U.S. to be connected immediately with a trained counselor. Please note that 988 staff are required to take all action necessary to secure the safety of a caller and initiate emergency response with or without the caller's consent if they are unwilling or unable to take action on their own behalf. -Visit thrivelifeline.org or text “THRIVE” to begin a conversation with a THRIVE Lifeline crisis responder 24/7/365, from anywhere: +1.313.662.8209. This confidential text line is available for individuals 18+ and is staffed by people in STEMM with marginalized identities. -Visit translifeline.org or call (877) 565-8860 in the U.S. or (877) 330-6366 in Canada to learn more and contact Trans Lifeline, who provides trans peer support divested from police. -Visit ciis.edu/counseling-and-acupuncture-clinics to learn more and schedule counseling sessions at one of our centers. -Find information about additional global helplines at https://www.befrienders.org.

Continuing with the drive-time focus from the last segment is in keeping with the current thrust of UnMind. Each segment consists of a dissertation on issues typical of the USA, and coping with the international scope of global citizenship. Such concerns as over-consumption and the cult of the individual, plus lingering hangovers from 19th- and 20th-century ideas regarding right speech, action and livelihood, the right conduct sided of the Noble Eightfold Path, recur throughout as themes. The halo effect of right meditation proves to be our saving grace, in meeting, and managing to maintain, a genuine Zen practice in the face of daily life in a chaotic world. I would like to key off of one of our Paramitas, or “perfecting practices,” the very first one, concerning Dana, or generosity. I suggest that you might practice generosity with yourself while driving in traffic, which may strike you as an odd concept. But if you can be truly generous with yourself, it is much easier to be generous with others.According to my limited understanding of classical Buddhism, and likely the proto-Hinduism that preceded Buddhism, karmic consequences of our actions may be positive, negative, and even neutral. But there will be consequences, regardless. The judgment call as to whether a consequence may be regarded as positive or negative is based upon human perception and desire. Certain consequences, and outcomes, we want to happen; others we want to avoid like the plague. Incidentally, The first Plague of history turns out to be an unintended consequence of human activity. It was reputedly transmitted by commuters traveling along the Silk Road, with a generous assist from our rat cousins, and their fleas. Nowadays, the greatest threat of pandemics is the enormous scope of human travel by land, sea, and, especially, by air. Every human being is, for the first time in history, one plane ride away from every other human being on the planet.That any karmic consequence may be neutral — rather than necessarily positive or negative — may be a new idea to you. As an instance: if we continue breathing for the next five minutes, we are more likely to continue living. If we stop breathing for the next five minutes, then we will likely die. Whether this is a positive or negative consequence is, again, a judgment call. In most cases, life is preferable to death; but there are exceptions to the rule, which has become more of an issue with the life-extending technology available in modern medicine. The relatively neutral consequence is simply that life goes on, as long as we are breathing. But it may be in a vegetative state.From a general, social perspective, life going on, and increased longevity, is considered a positive consequence, considering the alternative. In that sense, we are all consumers of life. So, the more, the better. From the perspective of Buddhism, we might say that longevity is desirable mainly in that living longer allows us more time, more opportunity, to awaken to the truth. This spiritual awakening is the highest value in Buddhism and Zen. “Buddha” means the “fully awakened one.” A consequence of Buddha's life's work is that we all have now been enabled to become aware of this truth, or Dharma.For example, dukkha, a Sanskrit word usually translated as “suffering,” points to the unsatisfactory nature of this existence, encapsulated as “aging, sickness, and death.” This is the quagmire into which all sentient beings are born, and find themselves enmeshed. The wealthiest person in the world cannot turn back the clock, despite the hopeful claims of the medical and therapeutic professions; the cosmetics industry; plastic surgeons, et cetera. We see caricatures of this aspiration on a daily basis, for instance when certain botox and facelift icons appear on television. Or we see snapshots of the passing pageantry of life in Los Angeles and Manhattan, where women, in particular, as well as men, well into their 50s, 60s and older, strive to age gracefully by maintaining the outer appearance of an ingénue, or a dashing heartthrob. No amount of wealth can prevent some forms of illness, in the final stages of life. Particularly when one's lifestyle itself amounts to a cocktail of causes that accelerate the deterioration of body and mind, such as over-eating, smoking, taking recreational and diet drugs, and drinking alcohol to excess. The lifestyles of the rich and famous are often notorious for this kind of self-destructive dissolution, if you believe the press, which tends to exaggerate.Science fiction to the contrary, no amount of wealth can forestall forever the death of this body and mind, in spite of earnest life-extending efforts in geriatric medicine and cryogenics. The sometimes frantic activities surrounding preservation of life, as witnessed in the Terry Schiavo case, for example, betray a profound fear of death and dying. This fear naturally emerges as a fear of aging, the evidence provided by visible, gradual, long-term, symptoms we see in the mirror each day. Of course, we do what we can, but it is futile to postpone the inevitable. An old Chinese poem includes the line, “Save the body; it is the fruit of many lives.” But we cannot save it in the sense of preserving it forever. Other than as a mummy, which historically has been the fate of some Zen ancestors as well as Egyptian royalty.We who follow Zen do not arrogantly dismiss such fears as baseless. Nor do we pretend that Zen practice will allow us to go quietly into that dark night, though Zen's history is replete with stories of masters dying with great dignity and composure. Zen is not overly optimistic in this regard. It does not present a pollyannaish view of existence, promising a heavenly rose garden after death. Nor is Zen overly pessimistic. We don't bemoan the fact that this existence is, intrinsically, of the nature of suffering, or impermanence, imperfection, and insubstantiality. We don't insist that the natural process of aging, sickness and death is necessarily a negative consequence of existence. It is simply a consequence of existence. And, thus, our physical fate falls into the neutral category of karmic consequences.In this way, Zen is simply realistic about the causes and conditions that we all face in life. Its teachings do not suggest, pretend, or imagine that there could be some other outcome. In Zen, coming to this clarity regarding karma is regarded as a kind of spiritual maturity.We can usefully regard these causes and conditions, the “givens” of the equations of life, as natural koans, illogical riddles. Koans are not to be solved in the sense of finding a logical answer, as I get it. I understand that they are used as a central part of training in the Rinzai sect. In Soto Zen, we don't make programmatic use of the 1700 or so classic koans in the record. But instead we recognize the reality in which we find ourselves, the very spacetime continuum — to borrow Einstein's phrase — in which we are sitting at the moment, whether in the zendo or in the driver's seat, as our immediate koan. This very reality “in front of your face” is the primordial koan. An ancient Chinese poem reminds us: Emptiness here, emptiness there but the infinite universe stands always before your eyes“Emptiness” is used here to name the ideal of Buddhism and Zen: clarity of insight into the dynamic reality of existence. It does not indicate the “void” as the ultimate reality, set against our normal perception of everyday reality as being an illusion. This is not something we recommend obsessing over at full speed, or in bumper-to-bumper traffic. But this infinite universe, standing always before our eyes, is the real koan, the koan of everyday existence. It is the meaning of everyday life that we have to penetrate, whether we realize it or not. There is no choice in the matter. Penetrating to the depths of it may result in realizing that “every day is a happy day; every day is a good day,” another old Zen expression. We should add “regardless” — regardless of circumstance, that is.Most of our conventional cultural memes, as prescriptions for happiness — getting your go-to-hell-money; retiring to a life of travel and playing golf, and so on — can be seen, in this context, as avoidance techniques, evasive maneuvers. This kind of goal orientation amounts to a kind of self-indulgent cognitive therapy, in which we attempt to replace unpleasant thoughts — of failure, indebtedness, and so on — with pleasant ones. In which we attempt to conjure up a comfortable fantasy, in place of our dissatisfactory reality.This is a natural tendency, and actively promoted by the culture, particularly in the West. So we should not beat ourselves up too badly over the fact that we have fallen for this societal scam. Most highly touted concepts of happiness are designed and intended as marketing devices to sell us products and services, as well as alternative lifestyles. Those that most closely match the archetypal American dream come with the highest price tag. But the choices we have are not limited to only those that we think we can afford, within an economic paradigm. Zen is sometimes considered not immoral, but amoral, because it recognizes that we have complete free will at all times, and in every particular situation. That is, as long as we are willing to face the consequences — whether negative, positive, neutral, and unintended — of whatever actions we take. For example, many people are out of work, looking for a job, or changing jobs. The world economy is forcing a re-evaluation of the definition of a “job” as paid employment provided by someone else. A job includes a place of work to which one goes every day, commuting to the office or factory; checking in or punching a time clock, under the watchful eye of management; and after putting in a sufficient effort for the day, returning to the comforts of home. These and other outdated cultural memes, customs and habits can affect our view of reality in subconscious, even insidious, ways.But in our meditation practice, we are encouraged by Master Dogen — founder of Soto Zen in 13th century Japan, to stop the ordinary functions of the mind, setting aside all thoughts of good and evil, right or wrong. It is necessary to point out that this instruction, or advice, is intended to be followed mainly while we are on the cushion. When we leave the cushion, and go into daily life — get into the car, and enter onto the expressway — we are constantly faced with choices of good and evil, right and wrong. We must make judgments regarding the behavior of others, which we cannot ignore beyond a certain point, as well as concerning our own behavior. Once again, in all of these instances, Zen is neither overly optimistic or overly pessimistic. It is simply realistic.So this aspirational idea, that if we could somehow set aside all considerations of good and evil, right and wrong — that we can live blissfully unaware of all the obvious good and evil, right and wrong in the world and thus be happy — is tempered by the pragmatic nature of our Zen practice. Even when we sit on the cushion, we cannot completely avoid suffering, in the sense of the good and evil influences in our lives, and the right and wrong choices that we have made, and that we are forced to make, on a daily basis. The point is that it isour choice. And the consequences that flow naturally from the choice — from the action, or lack of action that we take — are also ours. Whether karmic or not.Some old wise man said, “Through change, consume change.” Change is all there is. But we try to maintain status quo, out of fear of losing control. It is already out of our control.As Ambrose Bierce pointed out in The Devil's Dictionary, what we call an accident is, paraphrasing widely, actually the inevitable result of immutable physical law. So if you become distracted by this podcast, and run into the car in front of you, that so-called accident is the inevitable result of the immutable laws of physics, as well as of the choices you made that led to it. And, while you might have prevented it, if you did not prevent it, still, it was no accident. Your driving in traffic is no accident. Nor is listening to my podcast.So be careful out there. If you consider that the driver of that vehicle that just recklessly cut in front of you may be someone you know and like, who is just under a lot more stress than you are at the moment, it may make it easier to respond to the situation in an appropriate manner, without adding the overlay of anger and condemnation that we reserve for strangers. It may also make you safer in the long run.Once you are safely ensconced back on your cushion, you might remember what it was like when you were on the commute, and come to appreciate your zazen even more.

This Teisho was given by the Reverend Karen Do'on Weik Sensei at the Buddhist Temple of Toledo on November 2, 2023. In this talk Do'on Sensei offers commentary on the 3rd case from the Mumonkan (aka The Gateless Gate) known as Gutei's Finger. If you would like to learn more about the Buddhist Temple of Toledo or to make a donation in support of this podcast please visit buddhisttempleoftoledo.org. Part of Reverand Do'on's Teisho on the Mumonkan series.

Welcome to the inaugural episode for the new season! Our first guest is an extremely special one. We go right into the deep end of our spiritual journeys and meditation practices, as we speak with a renowned Zen master - Henry Shukman. Henry teaches meditation, mindfulness and awakening practices to a wide range of students from all traditions and walks of life. He is a Zen Master in the Sanbo Zen lineage. He has an MA from Cambridge and an MLitt from St Andrews and has written several award-winning books of poetry and fiction. He has written of his own journey in his memoir One Blade of Grass: Finding the Old Road of the Heart, a Zen Memoir. Henry has recently created a new meditation program, Original Love, which aims to provide a broad, inclusive path of growth through meditation. In the episode, we learn Henry's own spiritual hurdles how he stumbled upon the practice, experiencing oneness with the world, the fundamentals of Zen meditation and power of Koans - or anecdotes and statements that provoke enlightenment. He teaches us how to practice mindfulness and gives us the most unique Philosophy of Now yet! Wait till the end for that mind-blowing mantra. This is an extremely personal, thought-provoking and inspirational conversation for us to all find and improve our purpose and practices. We recommend being full present as if meditating when you listen to this. We're excited for this one! Let's listen, learn and reflect together!

Deena Metzger. a writer and feminist and ecological thinker has published over 19 books, and has been teaching writing for over fifty years. La Negra y Blanca won the Oakland PEN Literature Award. Her penultimate novel, A Rain of Night Birds, focuses on two climatologist, one Native, who confront what they know and what they learn from the land and the cosmos.And earlier novel, The novel, The Other Hand, is an epistolary novel addressed to Cardinal Lustiger, by the protagonist, a cosmologist, who states that the Holocaust and the Bomb are the two Koans of the Twentieth Century. In La Vieja: A Journal of Fire, her latest novel, La Vieja takes up residence in a fire lookout in the Sierras, watching for fires and crossing the borders between time and space, human and animal.  She originated the genre, the Literature of Restoration, to promote spirit based, earth-based writing free of the seeds of extinction and climate collapse. She lives at the end of the road in the Santa Monica mountains, with Coyote, Bobcat, Mountain Lion, Squirrel, Owl, Raven and more on land she and the community have designated as a sanctuary for all beings, and regularly meets with African Elephants in the wild. deenametzger.net.

Awakening Inquiry is aimed at awakening to what I've been calling Reality-with-a-Capital-R. How do we inquire into aspects of Reality we have not yet even imagined? How do we even know what we don't know? How can we see what we have not yet seen? How do we even know where to look? In Zen, we do this through the use of koans, whether those are traditional koans or natural ones. I discuss the nature of awakening inquiry and how to find koans to focus your practice.

Deena Metzger, a writer and feminist and ecological thinker has published over 19 books, and has been teaching writing for over fifty years. La Negra y Blanca won the Oakland PEN Literature Award. Her penultimate novel, A Rain of Night Birds, focuses on two climatologist, one Native, who confront what they know and what they learn from the land and the cosmos.And earlier novel, The novel, The Other Hand, is an epistolary novel addressed to Cardinal Lustiger, by the protagonist, a cosmologist, who states that the Holocaust and the Bomb are the two Koans of the Twentieth Century. In La Vieja: A Journal of Fire, her latest novel, La Vieja takes up residence in a fire lookout in the Sierras, watching for fires and crossing the borders between time and space, human and animal.  She originated the genre, the Literature of Restoration, to promote spirit based, earth-based writing free of the seeds of extinction and climate collapse. She lives at the end of the road in the Santa Monica mountains, with Coyote, Bobcat, Mountain Lion, Squirrel, Owl, Raven and more on land she and the community have designated as a sanctuary for all beings, and regularly meets with African Elephants in the wild. deenametzger.net.

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Saturday 11/19/2022 - From the Koans of the Way of Reality - Dongshan's "How Dirty is the Water" - In the midst of what we think we know, we can be fooled into believing we're seeing clearly. How can we see into our implicit biases, our dualistic, judgmental tendencies and discover a place of equanimity?

Sam explains the concept of koans — repeatable phrases that help us think more deeply about ourselves and the world around us.You can find Joan Sutherland's book, “Through Forests of Every Color: Awakening with Koans,” here.Sam has taught mindfulness and social emotional learning to teens, families and adults all over the world for more than 12 years. She obtained her master's degrees in clinical and educational psychology from Columbia University, and an M.S. in emotion science from Mid-Sweden University. You can reach out to Sam on Instagram here!Try the Headspace app free for 30 days here!

Deena Metzger. a writer and feminist and ecological thinker has published over 19 books, and has been teaching writing for over fifty years. La Negra y Blanca won the Oakland PEN Literature Award. Her penultimate novel, A Rain of Night Birds, focuses on two climatologist, one Native, who confront what they know and what they learn from the land and the cosmos.And earlier novel, The novel, The Other Hand, is an epistolary novel addressed to Cardinal Lustiger, by the protagonist, a cosmologist, who states that the Holocaust and the Bomb are the two Koans of the Twentieth Century. In La Vieja: A Journal of Fire, her latest novel, La Vieja takes up residence in a fire lookout in the Sierras, watching for fires and crossing the borders between time and space, human and animal.  She originated the genre, the Literature of Restoration, to promote spirit based, earth-based writing free of the seeds of extinction and climate collapse. She lives at the end of the road in the Santa Monica mountains, with Coyote, Bobcat, Mountain Lion, Squirrel, Owl, Raven and more on land she and the community have designated as a sanctuary for all beings, and regularly meets with African Elephants in the wild. deenametzger.net.