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# Zen Mountain Monastery

Catskills Monastery and Retreat Center

## Sitemaps

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## Posts

- [Winter 2024](https://zmm.org/sangha-notes-polishing-the-jewel-winter-2024/) - By Shoan Osho At night, deep in the mountainsI sit in meditation.The affairs of the world never reach here:Everything is quiet and empty,All the incense has been swallowed up by the endless night.My robe has become a garment of dew.Unable to sleep, I walk into the woods—Suddenly, above the highest peak, the full moon appears. —Ryokan(trans.
- [Fall 2024](https://zmm.org/sangha-notes-polishing-the-jewel-fall-2024/) - By Shoan Osho For Muge Daido Daiosho: The Great WayIs not difficult—Slip the oar into the water on Long Pond. Is not easy—Build a seamless temple in the rain and snow. It is neither easy nor difficult—Today is a good day.Just bow and serve. What can I say after all these years?The Heavenly Light is never anywhere else,Yet when
- [A Choir Grows in Brooklyn](https://zmm.org/a-choir-grows-in-brooklyn/) - “May I support the life of boundless untold beings” By Sandy Joshin Del Valle One Sunday afternoon in September 2023, Hojin sensei announced to the sangha her intention to launch a choir at the Temple. She just needed a choir leader and sangha members willing to participate. No training in voice or experience in singing
- [Summer 2024](https://zmm.org/sangha-notes-polishing-the-jewel-summer-2024/) - By Shoan Osho Each training week, the sangha gathers in the rear of the zendo around an altar devoted to the Monastery and Temple’s guardian deity, Hakuryu-o Daizenjin, the white dragon. Hakuryu-o Daizenjin was the protector of Maezumi Roshi's home temple in Japan, and he brought this dragon with him to America. Daido Roshi continued
- [Looking Back at Spring Ango 2024](https://zmm.org/fall-training-and-ango-2023-2/) - The end of May brought the conclusion of Spring Ango, the three-month span of intensified training and commitments to personal practice taken up by lay practitioners and residents—nearly 300 people practicing together—in the Mountains & Rivers Order sangha. The three months seemed to speed by with a stream of reminders that impermanence and change is
- [Michael Yukon Grody: In Memoriam](https://zmm.org/yukon-memorial/) - It is with heavy hearts that we announce the passing of Senior Monastic Michael Choke Yukon Grody who left this life on Wednesday, February 28th, following a six month ordeal with brain cancer. In the end, it was a peaceful death with family and one of his monastic brothers at his side. The following morning,
- [Senior Monastic Yukon Grody <> 5/15/49 - 2/28/24](https://zmm.org/yukon/) - It is with sadness that we announce the passing of Senior Monastic Michael Choke Yukon Grody. Our dear brother and friend slipped away peacefully in the midst of a formidable wind storm Wednesday night here on Tremper Mountain. (The storm temporarily took out the local electrical grid, brought down a mess of trees, and knocked the main Monastery sign
- [An update on Senior Monastic Yukon Grody](https://zmm.org/yukon-on-our-minds/) - Since early September, we've been keeping the sangha informed through email of our dear brother Mn. Yukon's health condition. In the interest of sharing this news more widely, we're adding Mountain Notes to the means of communication. The following post does not add much substantive information to the email sent out to formal students and
- [Fall Ango 2023 and Winter Training](https://zmm.org/fall-training-and-ango-2023/) - As summer colors held fast we began the Ango Training period in September, a three-month span of retreats, training and commitments to personal practice taken up by nearly 300 people. The Ango Opening Ceremony was held both upstate and downstate at the Fire Lotus Temple in Brooklyn for participants to cross the threshold into ango,
- [Illustrating the Lojong—Slogans of Atisha](https://zmm.org/illustrating-the-lojong-slogans-of-atisha/) - By Eliza Nappi Former ZMM resident and MRO student Eliza is an artist who, during the Fall Ango 2023 art practice, combined two of her favorite things: illustration and "Inktober" She writes: First started in 2009 by Jake Parker, Inktober is a set of daily prompts that challenge artists. Ink is the traditional medium used,
- [Spring Ango 2023 and Summer Training](https://zmm.org/spring-ango-2023-and-summer-training-gatherings/) - Every season, rites of passage happen for students and practitioners in the Mountains and Rivers Order, some coinciding with the ango training period, some in the summer or winter months... In April 2023, five MRO students formally receive the sixteen Buddhist precepts in a ceremony officiated by Shugen Roshi, taking up these living teachings, living
- [Busy Bees and the Zen Tweens](https://zmm.org/busy-bees-and-the-zen-tweens/) - In early June, Monastery Apiary beekeeper Sansho Benton engaged ten Zen tweens and teens in a program introducing the youth to Monastery beehives. With some caution due to participants wearing shorts, the youth suited up in sangha-borrowed protective gear and ascended the hill behind the garden. The intention was to discover how the worker bees
- [The Great Bodhisattva Vows](https://zmm.org/the-great-bodhisattva-vows/) - In the Lotus Sutra the Buddha said: At all times, for all beings I teach the Dharma equally, never growing weary or disheartened. To those in low positions, in high positions, to those of great wealth, to those in poverty, to those who have many blessings in their life, to those who live within great
- [Rudy Redford (2015 - 2023)](https://zmm.org/rudy-p-tutti-2015-2023/) - Rudy, the Monastery's beloved, orange tabby, left his body on Thursday, May 31st, following a brief illness. He had undergone a number of tests over the past several months to determine what might have caused an increasing drop in energy, focus and acuity. Following an MRI exam at the Brewster Veterinary Hospital, it was determined
- [A Milestone in the MRO’s ‘Fossil Fuel Phaseout’ Plan](https://zmm.org/heatpumps/) - Toward the MRO’s goal of phasing out climate-heating fossil fuel emissions, Zen Mountain Monastery installed electric heat pumps in the Monastery’s main building in February. Our contractors, Archibald Heating and Cooling, and a few Monastery residents began work on February 6th and completed the installation in time for the Bodhidharma Sesshin, which began two weeks later. The heat pumps now provide highly efficient, sustainable electric heat to the zendo. Gone are the ‘click, click, click’ sounds of the previous baseboard heating units. Now, if one listens carefully, one might hear the gentle, intermittent whispering sounds of the air handling units.
- [Fall Ango 2022 into Winter 2023](https://zmm.org/spring-ango-2022-2/) - The rhythm of the Monastery's training year brought the fullness of ango to a close with the Precepts Ceremony of Jukai for five students, followed by the Shuso Hossen for Joel Sansho Benton, and then opened up the quiet space of winter practice. Rohatsu sesshin was full of participants again this year, and with January
- [Being Held By Refuge](https://zmm.org/being-held-by-refuge/) - To take refuge has a quality of despair to it. It feels like someone is pursuing me or there is a danger somewhere that is so large, I cannot handle it alone. I need a place of safety and security. A place where I am no longer pursued but can find succor and maybe even ease. Minimally, “refuge” implies a respite from danger, possibly from suffering.
- [Solar Power in Han Shan Meadow](https://zmm.org/solar-power-in-han-shan-meadow/) - By Sandy Joshin Del Valle Solar energy isn't anything new anymore, yet the recent additions to the Monastery's solar array at the Han Shan meadow still bring a spark of excitement: we are doing it! We are continuing to lessen our attachments to non renewable energy sources. This vow is renewed every day whether it
- [Spring Ango 2022](https://zmm.org/spring-ango-2022/) - At the conclusion of Ango. traditionally the sangha members who are in attendance that day gather on the back stairs for a group photo. This one was no exception. And while there was no Chief Disciple chosen for this training period, Shugen Roshi invited each of the fully transmitted Dharma teachers to lead one of
- [Book review > Butoh: Cradling Empty Space](https://zmm.org/butoh-review/) - Weaving history, methodology, neuroscience and psychodynamics, butoh innovator Vangeline covers a lot of ground in her expansive and illuminating book.
- [Trash is Only A Perspective](https://zmm.org/recycle/) - A Sangha-Wide Recycling Effort Updates from Jusan Chen: Just wanted to shine a light on our special recycling program at the Monastery through TerraCycle. We collect used plastic toothbrushes, toothpaste tubes, razors, used pens... and their packaging... (see below). New research shows that in the U.S. recycles only 7% of its recyclable waste. Not to
- [Jizo in the Monastery Garden](https://zmm.org/jizo/) - By Linda Shinji Hoffman At Zen Mountain Monastery we practice ango in the spring and the fall. The shuso can be either a layperson or a monastic. Their role is to inspire the sangha with their devotion and commitment to practice. The training period ends with a ceremony where the chief disciple gives their first talk on a koan and is then challenged by the sangha with live questions.
- [Taking the Bodhisattva Vows](https://zmm.org/bodhisattva-vows/) - As vaccinations for Covid-19 became more readily available last spring, the Monastery was able to resume offering on-site Jukai, the moral and ethical teachings represented in the Sixteen Precepts of the Buddha Way, welcoming six new Jukai students, six new MRO students, one new postulant monastic, and two fully ordained monastics. Just before Covid hit
- [Shuso Hossen Fall 2021](https://zmm.org/shuso-hossen-f2021/) - On 11/21/21, the Monastery held a Shuso Hossen ceremony that capped our fall ango training period. During the ango, Degna Chikei Levister held the position of chief disciple acting as a model of practice for the sangha. What does ‘a model of practice’ look like? It looks like a true person bringing their whole self
- [Zen Tweens In-person Programs](https://zmm.org/zen-tweens-in-person-programs/) - The Zen Tweens program has been offering in-person programs monthly on the 2nd Sunday of the month since restarting in June, and will continue with outdoor programs October 10 and November 14, 9am-noon. We focus on Zazen, concentration practices, and exploring perception through caretaking activities and creative games. We maintain Covid precautions, and hold space for
- [Orchard Grasses](https://zmm.org/shinji-shuso/) - By Linda Shinji Hoffman At Zen Mountain Monastery we practice ango in the spring and the fall. The shuso can be either a layperson or a monastic. Their role is to inspire the sangha with their devotion and commitment to practice. The training period ends with a ceremony where the chief disciple gives their first talk on a koan and is then challenged by the sangha with live questions.
- [Zen Kids: Grateful for Grapes and Taking Care of Dragon's Eggs](https://zmm.org/zen-kids-grateful-for-grapes/) - By Simon Sekku Harrison The Zen youth programs, (Kids, Tweens and Teens) have been online for well over a year. We’ve welcomed new sangha members from all over the country and even as far afield as Colombia, SA. The Zen Kids program (4-10 years) joins together once a week to sit zazen, create art, share
- [New Vows, New Aspirations](https://zmm.org/new-vows-new-aspirations/) - For those of us who live at the Monastery, it's been moving to watch remotely as home dwellers have taken refuge in their practice during the pandemic and continued to further explore commitment and self-study. As our lives are streamed every day (at least in the zendo), we residents also benefit from watching lay practitioners
- [Memorializing a Year](https://zmm.org/memorializing-a-year/) - Our online memorial to victims of the pandemic and a most unsettling year...
- [Awakening Justice: MLK Jr 2021](https://zmm.org/awakening-justice/) - By Taikyo Gilman Honoring the legacy of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. was not on the MRO's annual calendar of events until sangha member Tanya Bonner brought it up. She asked the teachers, Why do I have to go somewhere else outside of my practice community to honor this ancestor? While not a Buddhist,
- [Remembrance and Atonement on Thanksgiving Day](https://zmm.org/thanksgiving/) - We share with you this liturgy and dedication for Thanksgiving Day. Developed by Hojin Sensei and Shugen Roshi, this liturgy is offered at Zen Mountain Monastery on Thanksgiving to honor our ancestors, the original inhabitants of this land, and all beings of the great earth that support our lives. Call and response: LITURGIST : The
- [Sustainable Monastery, Locally Grown](https://zmm.org/sustainable-monastery-locally-grown/) - By Eve Romm The A-frame meadow offers a spectacular view of the gentle twin peaks of Mt. Tremper. Beneath them, deer wander through the meadow, cicadas and crickets buzz, even an occasional pack of wild turkeys passes. In the midst of all this the Monastery orchard and dye garden has flourished. Sunflowers tower over the
- [In Memoriam: Gary Shoso Peacock](https://zmm.org/in-memorium-gary-shoso-peacock/) - May 12, 1935—September 4, 2020 The sangha will miss good friend, committed Zen student and jazz legend Gary Shoso Peacock who passed away peacefully on September 4th, surrounded by family at his home in Olivebridge, NY. One week later, his ashes were interred at the Monastery cemetery, Nirvana Gardens, in an intimate ceremony officiated by Shugen
- [Books on Refuge: Sanctuary, Street Zen & Contemplative Caregiving](https://zmm.org/books-on-refuge/) - Sanctuary: A Meditation on Home, Homelessness and Belonging, by Zenju Earthlyn Manuel; Street Zen: the Life and Work of Issan Dorsey, 2020 reissue, by David Schneider; Contemplative Caregiving: Finding Healing, Compassion & Spiritual Growth Through End-of-Life Care, by John Eric Baugher Home and homeleaving, taking refuge and building a sanctuary—these phrases resonate with our sense
- [Ecodharma and Environmental Justice](https://zmm.org/ecodharma-and-environmental-justice/) - By Dojaku Niccolino If you’ve wondered how to respond to human-created ecological devastation and climate breakdown, so has author David Loy. "What does Buddhism have to offer?" is the question he posed for a discussion at Fire Lotus Temple last November, and the major theme of his upcoming Ecodharma retreat via zoom on Thursday, October
- [Gates of Zen Training Stay Open](https://zmm.org/gates-of-zen-training-open/) - By Eve Romm In the 2500 year history of Buddhism, sanghas and practitioners have always had to adapt to difficult times, and our own era is no exception. The dharma which has been passed down to us survived natural disasters and political marginalization, famine and war, conflict and corruption. So it’s no surprise that training
- [Sangha / Gathering](https://zmm.org/sangha-gathering/) - On July 1, over 170 sangha members gathered on Zoom to reflect on the state of our distancing. We heard from board members who are part of a special "reopening subcommittee." They've been focused on the various questions that arise when considering any relaxing of the quarantine at the Monastery and our city center. We
- [Building the House of Jizo](https://zmm.org/building-the-house-of-jizo/) - After more than a year of planning and fundraising, the humble and well-worn cottage across from the garden was torn down on June 18 to make way for a new Jizo House. That same week, another team successfully installed a lift in our main building. As part of a broader vision towards accessibility and inclusivity,
- [Inside the Cloistered Cloister](https://zmm.org/inside-the-cloistered-cloister/) - The pandemic changed so much for so many. For Zen Mountain Monastery, the imperative clearly became, how to maintain the refuge of our practice center, while staying healthy, sane, and available to all...
- [Two Statements from the MRO responding to the ongoing killing of Black People in our country](https://zmm.org/two-statements/) - Two statements—the first from the MRO People of Color Affinity Group, and second from Shugen Roshi and the white members of the BFoD Planning Group—were posted here in response to the surge in violence against men and women of color, and the persistence of unjust, white supremacist systems of oppression which remains invisible to the
- [Covid-19 Enso Healing Altar](https://zmm.org/covid-19-enso-altar/) - By Taikyo, Mariana and Laurel The Enso Healing Altar is like many home altars—symbolic and grounding—created as a personal space to share with others. It came into being early in the ZMM pandemic quarantine, first as a conversation between two nurses in residence about grief, gratitude, fears and hopes for a future that could transform
- [Uppalavanna's Courage](https://zmm.org/uppalavannas-courage/) - This dharma discourse by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold is excerpted from Mountains & Rivers: Zen Dharma and Practice, 2020 available here. The bhikkhuni Uppalavanna said to Mara the Evil One: Though a hundred thousand rogues just like you might come here, I stir not a hair, I feel no terror; Even alone, Mara, I don’t fear
- [One Continuous Thread: Virtual Sesshin](https://zmm.org/one-continuous-thread-virtual-sesshin/) - By Taikyo Gilman The wake-up drum and bell sounding through the hallway, people moving quietly before dawn, three rings on the bansho bell beginning morning zazen. Sesshin has its soundscape, and with a little bit of added technology, an unprecedented 133 people shared the experience of the Apple Blossom sesshin sounds. Through a monitor frame
- [New Bees In Town](https://zmm.org/new-bees-in-town/) - By Joel Sansho Benton Last Saturday a group of new residents entered the monastery for the first time—about thirty thousand of them to be more precise. On Saturday I picked up three new packages of bees from Hudson Valley Bee Supply to replace the hives we lost over the winter. Each package holds approximately ten
- [Conversation: A New Journal from the MRO](https://zmm.org/conversation-a-new-journal-from-the-mro/) - Print is in some ways an outmoded format, lacking the speed of digital or the ease of consuming audio/video content, so it was with some degree of soul-searching that the Monastery staff decided to collect a years' worth of teachings and practice in the new annual journal Mountains & Rivers: Zen Dharma and Practice. Just
- [Reflections on Temple Resident Life Under Quarantine](https://zmm.org/zcnyc-life-under-quarantine/) - Residency at our Brooklyn Temple has always been an interweaving of NYC energy with the Zen Buddhism of a lay practice center. In these early weeks of the pandemic, our current residents Oliver, Jo and Brian, have shifted gears from their personal and Temple related routines. Here they offer an inside view of their lives
- [Digital Refuge in the MRO](https://zmm.org/digital-refuge-in-the-mro/) - By Eve Romm Until two weeks ago, joining the residents for zazen meant hurriedly finishing the dinner dishes, throwing on my coat and heading down the road to the Monastery. Opening the front door, I would be greeted by the smell of incense and the wooden dragon's arresting gaze before finding an empty seat in
- [Cabin Quarantine Hermitage](https://zmm.org/cabin-quarantine-hermitage/) - By Taikyo Gilman I'm sitting outside the Sangha House on day nine of quarantine away from other residents and monastics (I get wifi here), and its a bright, drizzly spring day. A friend down with Covid-19 after we visited—maintaining appropriate distance—and so protecting the other 35 residential sangha members, including our monastic teachers, is a
- [Cloister Living in the 'New Normal' at ZMM](https://zmm.org/all-together-the-new-normal-at-zmm/) - The garden is always a refuge but especially now—the delights of the greenhouse and the fresh earth outside are intoxicating—spring has truly come. In the "new normal" at the Monastery and the Temple, life continues with adjustments great and small. Here are some highlights from our new precautions and practices as the reality of social
- [Excerpt: Creative Process as Art Practice](https://zmm.org/excerpt-creative-process-as-art-practice/) - This excerpt is from Mountains and Rivers, the annual book-length journal of the MRO which features original contributions from dharma teachers like Hojin Sensei, an artist, ceramicist and director of training at Zen Mountain Monastery. Learn more here about the journal and enjoy this teaching Hojin offered on creativity, connection and spiritual integrity. Hojin Sensei:
- [Update: Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic](https://zmm.org/responding-to-the-covid-19-pandemic-2/) - Like many communities around the world, at both Zen Mountain Monastery and the Zen Center of NYC we are concerned about the spread of Coronavirus COVID-19 and are monitoring the unfolding events related to the virus. Well-aware of the seriousness of the situation and of local and national health advisories, our Board of Directors has
- [Excerpt: Manifesting Buddha](https://zmm.org/excerpt-manifesting-buddha/) - This excerpt, Manifesting Buddha by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, is from the new journal Mountains & Rivers: Zen Dharma and Practice and explores how Buddhist practice manifests in our daily lives as illustrated by the Ten Guiding Values of the Beyond Fear of Differences. The journal features original contributions of dharma teachings and more from MRO
- [Spring Ango 2020](https://zmm.org/spring-ango-2020/) - by Jeffrey Gyokudo Roberts Even though the Catskills are frozen and quiet right now, if I close my eyes, I can already hear the returning song of the Hermit Thrush and smell the tulips blooming. Slowly the Esopus Creek, covered in ice, will loosen its grip on Winter and Spring will come. As our Order
- [Delving into "What is Whiteness?"](https://zmm.org/delving-into-what-is-whiteness/) - by Eve Romm The first two meetings of the ZMM sangha's new “What is Whiteness?” (WIW) group began the same way: enlarging the circle of chairs in the Sangha House to accommodate far larger numbers than expected. The overwhelmingly high attendance on Sunday afternoons didn’t come as a surprise. Since the BFOD forum last March
- [Zen on the Trail](https://zmm.org/zen-on-the-trail/) - Book review by Hokyu JL Aronson Many years ago, still in college, I hitchhiked north from Berkeley to the uppermost reaches of California, my last ride dropping me off at the foot of Mt. Shasta in the southern Cascade Range. I didn’t yet know of the Zen monastery there but I’d come on a quasi-spiritual
- [Transcending: Trans Buddhist Voices](https://zmm.org/review-transcending-trans-buddhist-voices/) - Book Review by Finn Jogen Schubert This book is unlike any book I have ever read. Like a quilt, each piece contributes a unique perspective and style, coming together to provide warmth and comfort on the dharma path. Whether you are cisgender, trans, questioning, or something else entirely, you will find fresh perspectives on the
- [Earth Initiative Winter Update](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-winter-update/) - Upstate sangha traveled to Albany on Monday, January 28, to join forces in urging New York state legislators to fully fund the CLCPA (Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act) so it can fulfill its far reaching mandate to bring NYS’s carbon production and usage down to zero. Ten sangha members joined with hundreds from all
- [ZMM Roundup—Fall Ango 2019](https://zmm.org/zmm-roundup-fall-ango-2019/) - Catching up with rites of passage happening during fall ango's 90 days of practice: Jukai for six students, novice ordination, and the Shuso Hossen for senior student Yosha Scott-Childress. First, Jukai. In early November Shugen Roshi officiated a ceremony at the Monastery in which six students received the sixteen Buddhist precepts. As part of the
- [Painting Enlightenment—Healing Visions of the Heart Sutra](https://zmm.org/painting-enlightenment-healing-visions-of-the-heart-sutra/) - The Buddhist Art of Iwasaki Tsuneo By Paula Arai Reviewed by Chikan Bacon Painting Enlightenment is a book of intricate Buddhist art and a visionary journey through the Heart of The Perfection of Wisdom Sutra. The book itself is worthy of its content, exquisitely bound and jacketed with a heft that feels steady in the
- [Illuminated Journals](https://zmm.org/illuminated-journals-2/) - By Birgitte J. Haug As fall ango came to an end, Monastery residents gathered to share their three-months of art practice. Led by Hojin Sensei, herself an artist, I felt that her deep interest in the work was contagious. Creative expression in art practice, one of the “eight gates” of Zen training, enriches our practice
- [Sangha marks 10th anniversary of Daido Roshi's passing](https://zmm.org/daido-2019memorial/) - by Sabine Russ The mountain offered itself in full autumn splendor on Daido Roshi’s tenth memorial day: flaming colors, sharp lines, the most pristine of skies. Such effortless radiance of nature and the light, creating extra rich contrasts—ironically (given the person we were commemorating) a photographer’s field day. The sangha gathered at the Monastery’s front
- [Earth Initiative at the Global Climate Strike](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-at-the-global-climate-strike/) - Sangha members joined with over six million people in a Global Climate Strike on September 20, 2019, attending rallies upstate and in NYC and other locations. Led by young people and their supporters inspired by Greta Thunberg’s leadership, the strike was an urgent call to wake up and address the causes of our climate crisis
- [ZMM Podcast: Larry Shainberg discusses his new book "Four Men Shaking"](https://zmm.org/larry-shainberg/) - Author Lawrence Shainberg will be at the Zen Center of NYC on Saturday, October 5th for a reading from his new book, Four Men Shaking. We used this as an excuse to catch up with our old friend "Larry-san" and to talk about the new book and how it came into being. Shainberg began formal Zen
- [Building Plans](https://zmm.org/building-plans/) - Thanks to the generous support of the Sangha, the Jizo Project is close to being fully funded, though we do still have a little ways to go. If we do pass our target of $1.2 million, any further donations will go towards Phase II plans in our ongoing effort to make Zen Mountain Monastery more
- [Illuminated Journals](https://zmm.org/illuminated-journals/) - Samples from fellow practitioners are posted below. On Wednesday, November 13th at Fire Lotus Temple (6:30pm), those who are participating in the Fall 2019 Ango will have the opportunity to share their work with illuminated nature journals. All are welcome to attend. Another art practice presentation will take place on Friday, November 15th from 4-6pm
- [Sangha Reflections on the Jizo Project](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-on-the-jizo-project/) - The Jizo Project is an important sangha-supported initiative to make Zen Mountain Monastery a more accessible and accommodating refuge for practice. Here are several reflections from sangha members on what the initiative means to them. Care to contribute your voice to the conversation? Email us at jizoproject@mro.org "There is a Chinese saying that goes something like this:
- [Diamond Net and Jizo Project](https://zmm.org/diamond-net-and-jizo-project/) - The Buddha instructed his followers in the sangha to care for each other’s needs and not just focus on their own individual realization. In this spirit the Jizo House project, for which we are fundraising, is an on-going effort to rebuild accommodations for both able-bodied and differently abled visitors, residents and monastics, and the Diamond
- [Letter from the Shuso](https://zmm.org/fall2019-shusoletter/) - Dear Sangha, Looking toward this Fall 2019 Ango, I feel the excitement and trepidation of a child starting a new school year, eager to learn, and fearful that I will fall short. I gain courage knowing we will be learning together as a sangha, and walking with the green teeming mountain into yellow, orange and
- [Watch the Jizo Project launch video](https://zmm.org/jizo-project-launch-video/) - On June 9, Shugen Roshi, along with the Jizo Project fundraising committee, revealed the scope of our current building plans, and asked the sangha for support.
- [Taking Care of Our Hemlocks](https://zmm.org/hemlocks-ei/) - Hemlock trees native to the Monastery region of the northeast have been greatly threatened by an invasive insect known as HWA (Hemlock Wooly Adelgid). Sangha members in the MRO Earth Initiative's “citizen science” project have been assessing and monitoring HWA on the Monastery property this past year and offer this update on protecting our trees.
- [Spring 2019 Shuso Hossen with Ely Seiryu Rayek](https://zmm.org/seiryu-shuso-hossen/) - May 26, 2019At the close of our Spring 2019 ango training period, the sangha gathered for this Shuso Hossen ceremony, recognizing Seiryu Rayek as a senior student practitioner of the Mountains and Rivers Order. You can check out an interview with Seiryu from earlier in the ango via this link.
- [Manifesting Buddha, Spring Ango](https://zmm.org/manifesting-buddha-spring-ango/) - From the ango opening retreat Peaceful Dwelling in early March through the greening trees and blossoms of Shuso Hossen in late May, here are highlights from our ninety-days of sangha practice at the Monastery in Spring 2019: Jukai In May, Shugen Roshi officiated the spring Jukai ceremony at the Monastery in which the following six
- [The Jizo Project comes to life](https://zmm.org/jizo-project-comes-to-life/) - Introducing plans to make Zen Mountain Monastery more accessible and sustainable.
- [Face To Face](https://zmm.org/face-to-face/) - Zen training in the Mountains and Rivers Order includes taking up creative expression—both the traditional Zen arts as well as contemporary arts—to deeply study the self through using our inherent human creativity. Hojin Sensei spoke in March after her recent art practice retreat, “Face to Face,” offering these words: This exquisite magical display we call
- [Meet the Chief Disciple](https://zmm.org/seiryu-interview/) - An interview with Ely Seiryu Rayek by Diego Antoni Seiryu knows his way from Mexico City to Mount Tremper inside out. He doesn’t even need to spend the night in New York City anymore, as when he was less familiar with the subway and the bus to Mount Tremper. He has now been coming to
- [Perspectives: Beyond Fear of Differences](https://zmm.org/bfod-forum19/) - The Beyond Fear of Differences (BFoD) Planning Group held a public forum at the Monastery on Sunday, March 3, 2019—a moment 10 years in the making. It was a chance to welcome the whole Sangha into the development of the BFoD mission and vision process, to share the details about the process that the committee
- [Healing the Wounds of Racism - a daylong workshop at the Zen Center of NYC](https://zmm.org/healing-the-wounds-of-racism/) - On Saturday, January 5th, ZCNYC held its first retreat just for people of color: Healing the Wounds of Racism with Valerie Brown and Marisela Gomez. This program was the result of changes in the Programming Committee that brought people of color from the Beyond Fear of Differences Planning Group into the decision-making process around programming.
- [All the Ancestors Are Like This](https://zmm.org/all-the-ancestors/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi The True Dharma Eye, Case 101 Nanyue’s “Its Not Like Something” Main Case Zen master of Nanyue went to study with the Sixth Ancestor, Huineng. The Sixth Ancestor said: “Where are you from?” Nanyue said, “I came from National Teacher Huian.” The Sixth Ancestor said, “What is it that has
- [Ending Well, Beginning Well](https://zmm.org/ending-well-beginning-well/) - Shugen Roshi wrote the following preface for issue 37.1, the final quarterly print issue of Mountain Record. This long-considered change reflects how communications have evolved since we began publishing the journal in the 1980s. Starting this spring, follow our on-line updates and offerings, here and through our newsletters, and look for our annual print journal, available December
- [Serving the Spirit](https://zmm.org/serving-the-spirit/) - In the Zen Buddhist tradition there are several ways of engaging with a teacher and one of them is mondo, an informal question and answer session on some aspect of the Dharma. This mondo was held with John Daido Loori, Roshi, the founder of the Mountains and Rivers Order, at Zen Mountain Monastery in 2008.
- [The Immovable Spot](https://zmm.org/the-immoveable-spot/) - by Jody Hojin Kimmel Originally published in Mountain Record journal: Zazen (2013)
- [Precepts in the World: Sangha Reflections](https://zmm.org/precepts-in-the-world-sangha-reflections/) - Originally published in Mountain Record journal: "Morality in the World" (2002) Family Courtby Adam StarrittI work as an attorney for children in Brooklyn Family Court. Essentially, I represent kids ranging in age from between newborn to eighteen in cases where New York City Administration for Children’s Services has alleged that parents have abused or neglected
- [The Unspoken Thing](https://zmm.org/the-unspoken-thing/) - by Bonnie Myotai Treace, SenseiOriginally published in Mountain Record journal: "Practicing the Edge" (2001) In the space between desire and despair, between holding and letting go; between clinging and release, in this space is the unspoken thing. The thing that lives.—Lives of the Monster Dogs I’ve been working over the last few weeks with family members as they make a memorial visit to Ground Zero. The trips
- [Facets of the Jewel](https://zmm.org/facets-of-the-jewel-2/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei and Vanessa Zuisei Goddard, Sensei, in conversation with Danica Shoan Ankele.Originally published in Mountain Record journal: "Mother of All Buddhas" (2016) Shoan: I wanted to speak to you as women teachers within what has historically been a very patriarchal tradition. As you know, some spiritual paths speak about spiritual development in
- [Book Review: Not Hearing the Wood Thrush ](https://zmm.org/book-review-not-hearing-the-wood-thrush/) - Oh my gosh! How did the high privilege ever come to me to review this book? I am lost in it and continually astonished. Margaret Gibson’s newest book of poems, Not Hearing the Wood Thrush, is ripe and full and endlessly transcendent. Not hearing the wood thrush is a fine art that we would all
- [Sangha Reflections on Buddhist Pilgrimage](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-on-buddhist-pilgrimage/) - NOTE: In October 2018, 16 sangha members, including Shugen Roshi and Hojin Sensei, travelled to India and Nepal "in the footsteps of the Buddha." Here are some of their reflections and photos. More photos from an earlier blog post here. No Longer Abstractby Rick Shozen HamlinI had never wanted to go to India: I was
- [Shuso's Letter Spring Ango 2019](https://zmm.org/shusos-letter-spring-ango-2019/) - Dear Sangha, Not being a native speaker of English, living my 75th year of life, hard of hearing—surely I was way back in the line of candidates for Chief Disciple. Thus, it was a big surprise when Shugen Roshi asked me to be Chief Disciple for Spring Ango. Immediately a line from the Shuso Hossen
- [Art-Making Joy](https://zmm.org/making-joy/) - Michelle Seigei Spark, senior lay student in the Mountains and Rivers Order, spoke recently with Mountain Record about creative process, resilience and joy. Seigei has been a practitioner since the 1990s, is a painter, collage artist and a retired art therapist, and helps coordinate the National Buddhist Prison Sangha correspondence program. Scroll down to see a
- [On Pilgrimage to India](https://zmm.org/india2018/) - October 23, 2018—As of this writing, Shugen Roshi and Hojin Sensei, along with 14 fellow sangha members, are nearing the end of their three week pilgrimage in the footsteps of the Buddha. They’re looking forward to sharing their photos and reflections with the rest of us when they return, but we’re getting a head start
- [Practice and Resilience](https://zmm.org/summer-2018-practice-resilience/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi LISTEN TO THIS TALK> FROM THE RECORD OF MASTER YANGSHAN Ho-shang Mi of Ching-chao sent a monastic to ask Yangshan: “Right in this very moment are you dependent on enlightenment?” Yangshan said “There is no absence of enlightenment. Why fall into the secondary?” Ho-shang Mi was a peer of Master
- [A New Incarnation](https://zmm.org/new-incarnation-editorial/) - Editorial by Danica Shoan Ankele Dear Reader, Here at the Monastery, we’ve been having deep discussions about the Mountain Record over the past several years. After long conversations and careful reflection among the Mountain Record staff, the Monastery’s abbot, monastics and Board of Directors, we’ve decided it’s time to make a significant change. We’re excited
- [Remembering Love](https://zmm.org/remembering-love/) - An Informal Contemplation on Healing by Lama Rod Owens You’ve got to learn to leave the table when love’s no longer being served. —Nina Simone Are you sure, sweetheart, that you want to be well?...Just so’s you’re sure, sweetheart, and ready to be healed, cause wholeness is no trifling matter. A lot of weight when
- [There's No App For That](https://zmm.org/no-app-for-that/) - Technology and Morality in the Age of Climate Change, Overpopulation, and Biodiversity Loss by Richard Heinberg Technology has grown with us, side by side, since the dawn of human society. Each time that we’ve turned to technology to solve a problem or make us more comfortable, we’ve been granted a solution. But it turns out that all of the gifts
- [The Fork](https://zmm.org/fork-poem/) - by Chase Takusei Twichell A wooden Buddha gazes down upon my desk from a small shelf painted the same color as the walls: Chinese Dragon. Beside him, a picture Lucy drew when she was six shows a bird with human face and the words Have fun being a parrot written below it in parrot colors.
- [Always an Immigrant](https://zmm.org/always-an-immigrant/) - by Margaret Gibson Always an immigrant the heart crosses borders and boundaries it trespasses it will not be held back Windswept, sea-swept star-swept it is poor, porous permeable it is outcry and prayer and a murmur that ends with a question mark Tell me, is it inside you the immigrant heart? Or are you inside
- [Sangha Reflections on Resilience](https://zmm.org/on-resilience/) - Resilience My experience of resiliency has been both bitter and sweet. I liken it to the way I feel when chewing the seeds of a pomegranate or drinking its juice; there’s a bite to it that cannot be ignored. If you want to get to the sweet you have to be clear that you’re gonna
- [The Soto Zen Buddhist Association at ZMM](https://zmm.org/szba-conference/) - Last month, Zen Mountain Monastery hosted the Soto Zen Buddhist Association's biennial conference for three full days of practice, discussion and exploration. Over 70 ordained priests and transmitted teachers joined the conference, representing dozens of training centers and sitting groups throughout North America. The gathering was last held at ZMM in 2006. (A ZMM Podcast
- [Reopening the Teahouse](https://zmm.org/tea-house-reopening/) - On June 17, following extensive renovations, the Monastery’s traditional tea house, Wako-an, was reopened for the summer season. The occasion was celebrated with a formal tea ceremony demonstrated by Hobai Pekarik and Anne Rubin. Hobai has long led workshops on chado at both the Monastery and the Zen Center, and even offers tea as part
- [New Zealand Sangha Celebrates 30 Years](https://zmm.org/new-zealand-sangha-celebrates-30-years/) - By Geoff Gensei Moore In telling the story of the celebration of the New Zealand Sangha’s 30th Anniversary, one place to start is with sesshin. Packed to the gunnels, fifty of us took part in this week-long silent retreat at Lake Rotoiti, the outdoor education centre which has been one of our South Island retreat
- [Shuso's Letter Fall Ango 2018](https://zmm.org/shusos-letter-fall-ango-2018/) - Dear Sangha, As Autumn is swiftly approaching and we experience the impermanence of those lovely summer days, we can be reminded of and reflect on the limited time we have in our own life to manifest what we came here to do. Shugen Roshi chose the theme “Buddha Ancestors” for this Fall Ango, and we
- [Artwork by The National Buddhist Prison Sangha](https://zmm.org/artwork-by-the-national-buddhist-prison-sangha/) - The National Buddhist Prison Sangha (NBPS) was started over twenty-five years ago by John Daido Loori, Roshi after he received a letter from an inmate at Greenhaven Correctional Facility. The correspondence program developed by the Zen Mountain Monastery community now provides guidance in Zen Buddhist spiritual practice for people in prisons all over the country.
- [PREVIEW: The Buddhist Poetry Festival at Zen Mountain Monastery](https://zmm.org/bpf-preview/) - This summer, July 5 - 8, some of the country’s most celebrated contemplative poetic voices will be headlining the first ever Buddhist Poetry Festival at Zen Mountain Monastery. The festival spans an overflowing weekend of workshops and readings, writing and reflection, designed for anyone who resonates with Dharma and poetry, regardless of their own previous
- [What Do You Call it?](https://zmm.org/spring-2018-what-do-you-call-it/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi LISTEN TO THIS TALK> Book of Serenity Case 74 Fayan’s Non-Abiding The Pointer Plenty has myriad virtues; swept clear, there’s not a mote of dust. Detached from all forms, identical to all things: taking a step atop a hundred foot pole, the universe in all directions is one’s whole body—but
- [Wordless Words](https://zmm.org/wordless-words/) - Editorial: by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman In creative work, facing a blank page or canvas calls for patience as we attune and express ourselves—a patience much like the receptive stillness of zazen. In zazen itself, we renounce our storytelling and let contact with mind deepen. The instructions to “let thoughts go” seem to defy the impulse
- [Miraculous Communication](https://zmm.org/miraculous-communication/) - by Eihei Dogen The miracles I am speaking of are the daily activities of buddhas, which they do not neglect to practice. There are six miracles [freedom from the six-sense desires], one miracle, going beyond miracles, and unsurpassable miracles. Miracles are practiced three thousand times morning and eight hundred times in the evening. Miracles arise
- [Words and Phrases](https://zmm.org/words-and-phrases/) - by Vanessa Zuisei Goddard, Sensei The poet Wallace Stevens wrote: After the final no there comes a yes And on that yes the future world depends. No was the night. Yes is this present sun. The last line of the poem reads, “It can never be satisfied, the mind, never.” Is this true, that the
- [According to the Gospel of Yes](https://zmm.org/according-to-the-gospel-of-yes/) - by Dana Levin It’s a thrill to say No. The way it smothers everything that beckons— Any baby in a crib will meet No’s palm on its mouth. And nothing sweet can ever happen to No— who holds your tongue captive behind your teeth, whose breath whets the edge of the guillotine— N, head of
- [Painting Peace](https://zmm.org/painting-peace/) - Media Review Painting Peace by Kaz Tanahashi Shambhala Publications Review by clyde fusei forth, MRO It is perhaps a widely held assumption about the Zen arts that they occur in a bubble of tranquility and equanimity unsullied by the chaos of the world. One might picture a solitary painter or poet, or a silent line of
- [Radical Dharma](https://zmm.org/radical-dharma/) - Media Review Radical Dharma by Rev. angel Kyodo williams Sensei, Lama Rod Owens and Jasmine Syedullah, Ph.D. North Atlantic Books Review by Theresa Braine, MRO Barbecuing, AirBnB-ing, Waiting, Living...While Black. Police interactions ranging from traumatic to deadly. Not to mention: redlining, gentrification and incarceration-for-profit. The outrages abound. Where does Buddhism land in all this? Enter Radical Dharma:
- [Dharma Action Initiative - June 2018 Update](https://zmm.org/dharma-action-june-2018-update/) - This is a brief update on the MRO’s Dharma Action initiative – progress to date, ongoing work, and events and meetings that have been planned. Over the past couple of months, sangha-led Dharma Action focus groups and initiatives have formed (or in a couple of cases, evolved) largely around interests that MRO sangha expressed through
- [Monastery Store launches new line of mountain-made wares](https://zmm.org/tenkozan-launch/) - Today, the Monastery Store takes a big step in increasing its offerings of sangha-made items. For several years we've featured bird house gourds, incense holders, beeswax candles and of course honey from our own hives. All of these products and more have celebrated age-old traditions of handcraft using resources cultivated and harvested from our own
- [Receiving That Which Can Not Be Given – Reflections on Zuisei Sensei’s Dharma Transmission](https://zmm.org/zuisei-transmission/) - By Robyn Ikyo Love On April 8, 2018, Shugen Roshi completed the process of dharma transmission for Vanessa Zuisei Goddard. Zuisei first came into residency in 1995, fresh out of university. She spent 14 years as a monastic and returned to lay life in 2014, continuing to work full time for the Monastery in various
- [Building Our Beloved Community](https://zmm.org/building-our-beloved-community/) - Posted by Danica Shoan Ankele Among the present blessings of my monastic life, I count the chance to be part of a newly formed collaboration between members of the Temple’s People of Color Tea Group and the Monastery’s Beyond Fear of Differences Planning Group. Together, nineteen of us (about half of us identify as people
- [With Nothing to Call My Own](https://zmm.org/winter-2018-with-nothing-to-call-my-own/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi LISTEN TO THIS TALK> Book of Serenity Case 14 Attendant Huo Passes Tea The Pointer Probing pole in hand, shadowing grass around him, sometimes he wraps a ball of silk in iron, sometimes he wraps a special stone with silk. To determine the soft by means of the hard is
- [Receiving Kindness](https://zmm.org/receiving-kindness/) - Editorial: by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman How do you experience gratitude? Gratefulness, as David Steindl-Rast writes, happens when the heart flows over and must be expressed. Gratefulness arises like the surf or a fresh breath, natural and in accord—a basic, personal awareness that something good has happened. When we look at our lives for these moments,
- [Cultivating  Gratitude](https://zmm.org/cultivating-gratitude/) - by Jan Chozen Bays, Roshi It is ironic that in countries where food is abundant, disharmony with food and eating is most common. Americans appear to have a particularly unbalanced and often negative relationship with food. In the 1990s, a research team led by an American psychologist and a French sociologist teamed up to do
- [Thanks](https://zmm.org/thanks/) - Poem by Yusef Komunyakaa Thanks for the tree between me & a sniper’s bullet. I don’t know what made the grass sway seconds before the Viet Cong raised his soundless rifle. Some voice always followed, telling me which foot to put down first. Thanks for deflecting the ricochet against that anarchy of dusk. I was
- [The Lessons of Gratitude](https://zmm.org/the-lessons-of-gratitude/) - by Thanissaro Bhikkhu These two people are hard to find in the world. Which two? The one who is first to do a kindness, and the one who is grateful and thankful for a kindness done.” AN 2.118 In saying that kind and grateful people are rare, the Buddha isn’t simply stating a harsh truth
- [Dusting](https://zmm.org/dusting/) - Poem by Marilyn Nelson Thank you for these tiny particles of ocean salt, pearl-necklace viruses, winged protozoans: for the infinite, intricate shapes of submicroscopic living things. For algae spores and fungus spores, bonded by vital mutual genetic cooperation, spreading their inseparable lives from equator to pole. My hand, my arm, make sweeping circles. Dust climbs the
- [Shuso's Letter Spring Ango 2018](https://zmm.org/shusos-letter-spring-ango-2018/) - Dear Sangha, On Mt. Tremper we are alive in cold February. The wind stings, the ice cracks underfoot, and at night we are dazzled by bright, bright stars. What a privilege it is to live on this mountain and feel the earth turn from season to season and to share our practice with the sun
- [Sangha Reflections on Gratitude](https://zmm.org/on-gratitude/) - Gratitude I walked against the stream in this river all of my life because I used to believe I did not deserve anything unless I suffered first. It was disheartening and often excruciating yet I always told myself Don’t be a wuss. Try a little harder and just a little longer. I did not acknowledge
- [The Light That Shines Through Infinity](https://zmm.org/the-light-that-shines-through-infinity/) - Media Review The Light That Shines Through Infinity: Zen and the Energy of Life by Dainin Katagiri Edited by Andrea Martin Shambhala Publications Review by Richard Superti, MRO In this collection of transcribed talks, Dainin Katagiri, one of the founding teachers of North America Zen, manifests how the universe is suffused with a dynamic energy that
- [The Diary of a Bookseller](https://zmm.org/the-diary-of-a-bookseller/) - Media Review by Shaun Bythel Profile Books LTD Review by Sandy Joshin De Valle, MRO Shaun Bythell’s “The Diary of a Bookseller” is a gem of a book. Bythell, the owner of Scotland’s largest second-hand bookstore, gives us this day-by-day account of his life as a bookseller. It’s a warm and funny book marked by Bythell’s
- [MRO Sangha Members join Buddhist Progressive Gathering in NYC](https://zmm.org/uniontheological/) - MRO Sangha Members join Buddhist Progressive Gathering in NYC How does a group from various Buddhist traditions respond to the pressing moral issues of our day? How do we bring Buddhism’s practices and teachings to the larger world without proselytizing, and without losing the unique perspective that Buddhism offers? And how can Buddhists, who traditionally
- [Dharma Action Day](https://zmm.org/dharma-action-day/) - On Sunday, January 28, 2018 over 75 sangha members gathered to share and investigate ways to actively and intentionally channel our collective concern for our world into beneficial action. The Dharma Action afternoon began with a screening of a short documentary, In Gladness and At Ease, created by sangha members Mary Bosakowski and Cameron Kito
- [Death as a Mirror for Living](https://zmm.org/death-as-a-mirror-for-living/) - by Theresa Braine The room was dim. About sixty bodies arranged themselves wall-to-wall in rows, eyes closed, supine on zabutons. Imagining themselves dead. “How did you die?” intoned a voice. “How old were you when you died? Where were you when you died? Who was with you, or not, when you died?” The questioner was
- [December's monastic ordination and Buddha's enlightenment vigil](https://zmm.org/decembers-monastic-ordination-and-buddhas-enlightenment-vigil/) - On Sunday, December 10, Shugen Roshi officiated Tokudo, the full Monastic Ordination, for Shea Zuiko Ikusei Settimi. During the morning ceremony at the Monastery she received the kesa, zagu, monastic bowl and lineage chart as well as the monastic name Zuiko, which means “auspicious peace." This step along Zuiko Ikusei’s path is the culmination of
- [Ask the One Who Knows](https://zmm.org/ask-the-one-who-knows/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi Gateless Gate Case 47 Doushuai’s Three Barriers Main Case Master Doushuai made three barriers to test his students. To inquire after the truth, groping your way through the underbrush, is for the purpose of seeing your nature. Here, now, where is your nature, Venerable Monk? If you realize your
- [Look Again, and Again](https://zmm.org/look-again-and-again/) - by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman Looking around at the people and things which come into our orbit, we can be easily misled. The seeing mind is dynamic, complex, and can be affected by a gnawing hunger for lunch, a yearning for praise or even a craving for peace and justice, filling our minds with opinions and
- [Right View Comes First](https://zmm.org/right-view-comes-first/) - by The Buddha Monks, right view comes first. And how does right view come first? One understands wrong view as wrong view and right view as right view: this is one’s right view. And what is wrong view? There is nothing given, nothing sacrificed, nothing offered; there is no fruit or result of good and
- [Why Do Beings Live in Hate?](https://zmm.org/why-do-beings-live-in-hate/) - by The Buddha Sakka, ruler of the devas, asked the Blessed One: “Beings wish to live without hate, hostility, or enmity; they wish to live in peace. Yet they live in hate, harming one another, hostile, and as enemies. By what fetters are they bound, sir, that they live in such a way?” [The
- [The Perception of Sages](https://zmm.org/the-perception-of-sages/) - by Zen Master Xiatang To learn to be a Buddha, first you should break through the seeds of habit with great determination, and then be aware of cause and effect so that you fear to do wrong. Transcend all mental objects, stop all rumination. Don’t let either good or bad thoughts enter into your thinking,
- [The Reality of Mind](https://zmm.org/the-reality-of-mind/) - by Zen Master Hsuan-Sha The earth and the sky are entirely composed of mind, but how do you explain the principle of being composed of mind? And how do you explain the reality of mind without form pervading the ten directions? There is no part that does not come from compassion producing knowledge, there is
- [Buddha Flowers, Leaves, Roots, and Dusts](https://zmm.org/buddha-flowers-leaves-roots-and-dusts/) - by Zen Master Hongzhi Contemplating your own authentic form is how to contemplate Buddha. If you can experience yourself without distractions, simply surpass partiality and go beyond conceptualizing. All buddhas and all minds reach the essential without duality. Patch-robed monks silently wander and tranquilly dwell in the empty spirit, wondrously penetrating, just as the supreme
- [Ma-tsu's White and Black](https://zmm.org/ma-tsus-white-and-black/) - by Bonnie Myotai Treace, Sensei Book of Equanimity, Case 6 Ma-tsu's White and Black A Stage Whisper: Where you can’t open your mouth, a tongueless person can speak; where you lift your feet without rising, a legless person can walk. If you fall within their range and die at the phrase, how can you have
- [Sangha Reflections on View](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-2/) - View When my son was born 20 years ago, I became very afraid of flying on air planes. It was not just a case of the jitters but more like curl-up-in-a-ball-and-miss-your- flight terror. While it is certainly possible to live a happy, fulfilling life without getting on an airplane, I started to doubt that I
- [The Wilds of Poetry](https://zmm.org/the-wilds-of-poetry/) - Media Review THE WILDS OF POETRY: Adventures in Mind and Landscape by David Hinton Shambhala Publications Review by Peter Pitzele A single word runs like a fissure through the short essays that introduce us to the poets collected by David Hinton in The Wilds of Poetry: Adventures in Mind and Landscape: “contact”. These poets, Hinton demonstrates, share a
- [Fall Ango 2017 comes to a close](https://zmm.org/fall-ango-2017-comes-to-a-close/) - On November 19, 2017, we ended the three-month ango training period with Shuso Hossen, where the Chief Disciple Patrick Yunen Kelly offered his first public talk and engaged the sangha in Dharma Encounter. Yunen, now a senior student in the MRO, will continue to help keep the dharma flame burning at Fire Lotus Temple near
- [Sharing space with the Buddha](https://zmm.org/sharing-space-with-the-buddha/) - On September 3, in addition to opening the Fall 2017 Ango training period, the Monastery also held a different sort of opening ceremony. Shugen Sensei and Hojin Sensei performed an eye opening for two new images, created specifically for the the main altar in our zendo. Having featured the Buddha as a solo figure for
- [This is the Way I Express My Gratitude](https://zmm.org/this-is-the-way-i-express-my-gratitude/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi In the Mountains and Rivers Order we have two paths by which a student can practice and realize Buddhadharma—a lay training path and a monastic path. These make up the fourfold sangha as established by the Buddha: female and male monastics, and female and male lay students. The lay and
- [A True Life](https://zmm.org/a-true-life/) - by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman What is a true, reliably grounded, fulfilling life? The question of what is true can haunt us, fueling our underlying dis-ease and motivating us to explore and even make major life changes. But rare are the opportunities to unravel the skein as thoroughly as through spiritual inquiry. The taking up of
- [You Can Change the Story, My Spirit Said to Me as I Sat Near the Sea](https://zmm.org/you-can-change-the-story-my-spirit-said-to-me-as-i-sat-near-the-sea/) - by Joy Harjo I am in a village up north, in the lands named “Alaska” now. These places had their own names long before English, Russian, or any other politically imposed trade language. It is in the times when people dreamed and thought together as one being. That doesn’t mean there weren’t individuals. In those
- [Giving Rise to Discernment](https://zmm.org/giving-rise-to-discernment/) - By Thanissaro Bhikkhu We meditate, developing mindfulness, developing concentration, and after a while we begin to wonder, “When is the discernment going to come? When are the insights going to come?” And it’s important to look at what the Buddha has to say about what gives rise to discernment. Mindfulness and concentration are prerequisites, but
- [Sangha Reflections](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections/) - Discernment Learning how to listen to, recognize and act upon my longing has pulled the strings of my discernment. This is how I have made decisions in my life about my life and my Zen practice. But I don’t always know this. And I have had to be patient. It almost feels like I am
- [Fall 2017 Ango](https://zmm.org/fall-2017-ango/) - The Mountains and Rivers Order training schedule cycles through periods of intensification and relaxation, mirroring seasonal changes and giving us varied opportunities to study and practice. The spring and fall quarters are ango (“peaceful dwelling”), ninety-day intensives that continue an ancient tradition dating back to the time of the Buddha, when the sangha gathered in
- [Buddhist Economics](https://zmm.org/buddhist-economics/) - Media Review BUDDHIST ECONOMICS: An Enlightened Approach to the Dismal Science by Clair Brown Ph.D. Bloomsbury Press Review by Lillian Childress What would a world look like where the rules of economics were governed by Buddhist principles? Clair Brown has set out to imagine such a world, drawing on her experience as an economics professor
- [A Plea for the Animals](https://zmm.org/a-plea-for-the-animals/) - Media Review A Plea for the Animals The Moral, Philosophical, and Evolutionary Imperative to Treat All Beings with Compassion by Mathieu Ricard Shambhala Publications Ahimsa, the Sanskrit word for non-harming, is an elemental attribute of the Buddha’s teaching. The concept of “harm,” in and of itself, is not mysterious. It manifests when we needlessly inflict
- [Traveling by Day](https://zmm.org/traveling-by-day/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi This Discourse appeared in the Fall 2013 issue of Mountain Record, "Within Light, Darkness." True Dharma Eye, Case 113 Baofu’s Blocking of the Eyes, Ears, and Mind How do we become lost to ourselves? What does this even mean, and what’s the consequence of being lost? To see things as
- [New Zealand Sesshin, July 2017](https://zmm.org/new-zealand-sesshin-july-2017/) - NOTE: This July, Shugen Arnold Sensei made his annual trip to New Zealand to lead retreats and public programs with our substantial sangha there. He first visited NZ almost 30 years ago with Daido Loori Roshi and he and other teachers in the Order have been visiting ever since. In this blog post, sangha member
- [Shugen Sensei visits New Zealand](https://zmm.org/nz-july2017/) - NOTE: This July, Shugen Arnold Sensei made his annual trip to New Zealand to lead retreats and public programs with our substantial sangha there. He first visited NZ almost 30 years ago with Daido Roshi and he and other teachers in the Order have been visiting ever since. In this blog post, MRO students Myoke
- [The Ninth Grave Precept](https://zmm.org/the-ninth-grave-precept/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi This excerpt appeared in the Fall 2013 issue of Mountain Record, "Within Light, Darkness." From The heart of Being: Moral and Ethical Teachings of Zen Buddhism by John Daido Loori, Roshi Actualize harmony. Do not be angry. Bodhidharma said, “Self-nature is inconceivably wondrous. In the dharma of no-self, not postulating
- [Major renovations for the ZMM kitchen](https://zmm.org/kitchen-renovation/) - Since the founding of Zen Mountain Monastery in 1980, the Monastery kitchen has been an emotional hearth, a training hall, and the birth place of approximately 38,850 meals. It has also remained functionally the same for much of that time, even as other parts of the main building have been renovated and other structures on
- [Rakusan Moshin's Ordination Day](https://zmm.org/rakusanmoshin-ordination/) - The monastic calling can sweep up the young in their daisy-eyed enthusiasm. It can take root in older practitioners, too: a penchant for absolute commitment previously unknown to the individual. It can also burn steadily, if flickering, throughout decades of practice, finally being realized when circumstances come together or after a very long period of
- [Dharma Transmission for Hojin Sensei](https://zmm.org/dharma-transmission-for-hojin-sensei/) - On Sunday, June 18, 2017, Shugen Sensei completed a process of dharma transmission to Jody Hojin Kimmel as a large gathering of sangha shared the moment. Denbo, the actual transmission empowerment, took place—in accord with tradition—at midnight the evening before without witnesses. Dharma transmission is an intimate expression of the student meeting the teacher's understanding
- [Falling into Summer](https://zmm.org/spring17-shuso-hossen/) - Shuso Hossen with Valerie Meiju Linet With the onset of summer, our Spring Ango training period came to a close with multiple displays of dedication and playful inquiry. First, on May 17 and 18, art presentations were held at the Zen Center and at the Monastery, giving ango participants the chance to share their work.
- [Finding Our Way](https://zmm.org/finding-our-way/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi Listen to this Talk The Zen tradition places a special emphasis on beginner’s mind because the mind of a beginner has qualities that are so important for dharma study. The beginner’s mind can be quite open and have a certain kind of innocence within the dharma. There can be a
- [This Should Be Easy](https://zmm.org/this-should-be-easy/) - by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman This life of mine is perfect and complete Buddha nature; the teachings state this directly. So this should be easy—just live as an enlightened being. But what is that, really? We come to practice to be completely liberated from suffering, but the old habits of solving problems, finding adjustments or applying
- [The Seven Branches](https://zmm.org/the-seven-branches/) - The Avatamsaka Sutra To all the buddhas, the lions of the human race, In all directions of the universe, through past and present and future: To every single one of you, I bow in homage; Devotion fills my body, speech and mind. Through the power of this prayer, aspiring to Good Action, All the victorious
- [One Thing](https://zmm.org/one-thing/) - by Jody Hojin Kimmel Master Dogen taught in his fascicle Henzan—Encountering Everywhere, that whole-hearted practice of the Way is to take up the study of one thing and to understand it deeply. He encouraged us to “study each dharma exhaustively and then to study it still further.” In Spring of 2000 during one of our
- [Arousing the Aspiration for Enlightenment](https://zmm.org/arousing-the-aspiration-for-enlightenment/) - By Dogen Zenji Kashvapa Bodhisattva extolled Shakyamuni Buddha with a verse: Although beginner’s mind and ultimate mind are indistinguishable, the beginner’s mind is more difficult. I bow to the beginner’s mind that lets others awaken first. Already a teacher of humans and devas, the beginner’s mind excels the mind of a shravaka or of a
- [After All I Still Don't Know](https://zmm.org/after-all-i-still-dont-know/) - By Ron Hogen Green, Sensei, MRO Listen to this Talk Gateless Gate Case 9 Daitsu Chisho Buddha Main Case Once, a monk earnestly asked priest Jo of Koyo, “Daitsu Chisho Buddha sat in the meditation hall for ten kalpas, but the Dharma of the Buddha did not manifest itself, and he could not attain Buddhahood.
- [Beginner's Disease](https://zmm.org/beginners-disease/) - by Zen Master Ta Hui Buddha preached all doctrines to save all minds; I have no mind at all, so what’s the use of any doctrines? Basically there is nothing in any doctrine, and no mind in mind. The emptiness of mind and things both is their real character. But these days students of the
- [The Gate](https://zmm.org/the-gate/) - by Marie Howe I had no idea that the gate I would step through to finally enter this world would be the space my brother’s body made. He was a little taller than me: a young man but grown, himself by then, done at twenty-eight, having folded every sheet, rinsed every glass he would ever rinse
- [Right View](https://zmm.org/right-view/) - By Vanessa Zuisei Goddard At the beginning of our spiritual journey, most of us have a sense that the path we’ve traveled until now is not, by itself, the path that will lead us to liberation. We know, vaguely or with certainty, that there must be another way, but we’re not yet able to discern
- [Sangha Reflections](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-beginning-mind/) - Beginning Mind The National Buddhist Prison Sangha (NBPS) is a branch of the MRO dedicated to supporting incarcerated women and men dedicated to the study of Zen Buddhism through a daily practice of zazen, Dharma study, and the moral and ethical teachings of Zen Buddhism. These contributions reflect the lives and sincere practice of many
- [Sangha Reflections](https://zmm.org/beginning-years-at-zen-mountain-monastery/) - Beginning Years at Zen Mountain Monastery Attending a Buddhist festival in 1974 for me had many blessings. My two year old son was being cared for by dear friends, the drive to Boston with my husband John was sunny and pleasant, and the free admission to an education center was exciting. After participating in a meditation
- [Social and Communal Harmony](https://zmm.org/social-and-communal-harmony/) - Media Review The Buddha's Teachings on Social and Communal Harmony Edited and introduced by Bhikkhu Bodhi Wisdom Publications As we are often reminded, we do not get to pick the conditions of the time and place we were born into. I ask myself how can I use the conditions rather than let them use me?
- [Spring 2017 Jukai](https://zmm.org/spring-2017-jukai/) - On Sunday, April 23, Shugen Sensei officiated over a jukai ceremony for six students who have been practicing and studying the Bodhisattva precepts for several years. Throughout the week leading up to Sunday, the group worked with Kaishin Jamieson who oversaw the sewing of their rakusus. Shugen Sensei also met with the students each day to further
- [Earth Day](https://zmm.org/earthday2017/) - ZMM Hosts the 2017 Woodstock Interfaith Earth Day Happy Earth Day. This week, Zen Mountain Monastery welcomed the Woodstock Interfaith Council and community members to celebrate a common vision of respect and identification with the Earth. The Council is a volunteer body of clergy and leaders of spiritual communities in the greater Woodstock region who
- [Kimchi time](https://zmm.org/kimchi/) - Something fermented this way comes. Recently, sangha member Achong Chen visited the Monastery kitchen to share some of her passion for kimchi. Normally associated with Korean cuisine, kimchi is also very popular in Japan, Taiwan (Achong's home turf), and increasingly in the US. While there are many different recipes, Achong had us make a fairly
- [2017 Spring Ango Gets Underway](https://zmm.org/2017-spring-ango-gets-underway/) - On Sunday March 5, the Monastery marked the beginning of the Spring training period with an Ango Opening Ceremony. This brief yet meaningful service brings the sangha together and reminds us of both our personal commitment and the shared experience of intensifying our practice. Following morning service and a period of zazen, Ango participants line
- [Freedom to Move](https://zmm.org/freedom-to-move/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi Book of Serenity, Case 79: Changsha Advancing a Step Listen to this talk The Pointer The bodhisattva appearing as a maiden on the banks of golden sand was a special spirit. Stuffing pastries in a crystal jar, who would dare to roll it? Without going into the frightening waves, it’s
- [This is My Stop](https://zmm.org/the-heartbeat/) - by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Mountain Record Editor Not a story I like to tell, but years ago I got into a fight on the subway. A big-shouldered, well-groomed man in his 40s was tearing down a safe sex poster which showed some playfully kissing teenagers, straight and gay. I questioned him angrily as he tore
- [Living in Harmony](https://zmm.org/living-in-harmony/) - by The Buddha EDITOR’S NOTE: Mahayana Buddhism teaches various perspectives and ways of manifesting the precepts. The precept Actualize harmony: Do not be angry can be understood as an instruction to practice not giving rise to angry thoughts, words and actions when anger hasn’t yet arisen, and to practice facing and letting go of anger
- [Love and Compassion in Meditation and Action](https://zmm.org/love-and-compassion-in-meditation-and-action/) - by Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi The classical Buddhist commentaries hold that before one can meditate on compassion, one first has to master the meditation on loving-kindness. However, I consider this position too stern. I have found that when you are able to stabilize a warm feeling of sincere loving-kindness for sentient beings, you can begin to cultivate
- [Where Does It Hurt?](https://zmm.org/where-does-it-hurt/) - Ruby Sales interviewed by Krista Tippet “Where does it hurt?” That’s a question the civil rights legend Ruby Sales learned to ask during the days of that movement—a question she found to have a power to drive to the heart of the matter. It’s a question we scarcely know how to ask in public life
- [Vowing Peace in a Time of War](https://zmm.org/vowing-peace-in-a-time-of-war/) - by Hozan Alan Senauke, Roshi San Quentin Prison sits on a bare spit of land on San Francisco Bay. This is where the State of California puts prisoners to death. The gas chamber is still there, but for the last five years executions have been done by lethal injection in a mock-clinical setting that cruelly imitates
- [The Conscience of Words](https://zmm.org/the-conscience-of-words/) - by Susan Sontag We fret about words, we writers. Words mean. Words point. They are arrows. Arrows stuck in the rough hide of reality. And the more portentous, more general the word, the more they also resemble rooms or tunnels. They can expand, or cave in. They can come to be filled with a bad smell.
- [How to Take a Stand Without Taking Sides](https://zmm.org/how-to-take-a-stand-without-taking-sides/) - An Annotated List of Digital Resources for Informed Community Action, Resistance, and Renewal I have never been one to get involved in politics. As a journalist I definitively steer clear of anything that could be construed as activism or partisanship. In Buddhism, taking action in the face of injustice can pose a similar question: how
- [Sangha Reflections](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-stepping-forward/) - Stepping Forward The first time I heard about the Women’s March, I felt strongly moved to go. Still months away, I signed my name on the list. As the date drew nearer, I found myself feeling more and more trepidation. Why was I going? Couldn’t it be dangerous to be in Washington the day after
- [Dharma Action Updates](https://zmm.org/right-action-updates/) - Beyond Fear of Differences (BFoD) Social justice has long been a focal point for the Mountains & Rivers Order. While Shugen Sensei was based at the Brooklyn Temple, the Beyond Fear of Differences Initiative was formed, initially holding retreats and study groups for the sangha. Since May 2016, a planning committee of nine MRO practitioners
- [Spring Ango 2017](https://zmm.org/spring-ango-2017/) - Shuso Letter Dear Sangha Family, I am sincerely honored and humbled by the opportunity to serve as Chief Disciple for the Spring Ango. When Shugen Sensei requested that I step into this service position, I felt both the gulp! of nervousness, anticipating the exposure and responsibility of this role, as well as a surprising readiness
- [Fierceness, Gentleness & Faith](https://zmm.org/fierceness-gentleness-faith/) - Sesshin with the Buffalo Zen Dharma Community post by Shea Ikusei Settimi, MRO The train ride from Rhinecliff to Buffalo took about six hours, with snow along the way whiting-out the view. Gwen Kimu Coe, MRO, was waiting for Zuisei and I at the Amtrak station. We made a brief stop at her house, where her
- [ZCNYC Dives Into the Blue](https://zmm.org/zcnyc-feb2017-shibori/) - On Saturday, February 11th, a group of 16 gathered at the Temple in Brooklyn to explore the color blue. An Overview of Blue: Introduction to Indigo and Shibori, a day-long workshop led by Robyn Ikyo Love, MRO and Bob Seiyu Lanaghan, MRO, offered an opportunity to explore the history and chemistry of indigo in a very hands-on
- [MRO Sangha Participate in Historic Women's Marches](https://zmm.org/mro-sangha-participate-in-historic-womens-marches/) - On Saturday, January 21st, we saw a tremendous outpouring of support from around the US and the world for the rights and well-being of women and all who suffer injustice, discrimination and inequality. We would like to share some of the excitement from this momentous day with you. More than thirty of our Sangha members joined
- [Welcoming the New Year](https://zmm.org/welcoming-the-new-year/) - Shugen Sensei officiated a fusatsu, or renewal of vows ceremony, shortly before midnight on Saturday, December 31st as the Monastery's Rohatsu Sesshin drew to a close. The ceremony included a talk (video below) on the precepts, or moral and ethical teachings, and Sensei finished by encouraging the sangha to use the final minutes before midnight to
- [Ron Hogen Green Receives Dharma Transmission in MRO](https://zmm.org/ron-hogen-green-receives-dharma-transmission-in-mro/) - On Sunday, December 11th, Shugen Sensei officiated a Dharma Successor Welcoming Ceremony for Ron Hogen Green, formally marking the transmission of the dharma to Hogen. This brief, simple ceremony was the culmination of the week-long transmission process, held mostly in private in the Monastery's Buddha Hall. The formal transmission began early the previous Monday morning. Monastery residents
- [Shuso Hossen Ceremony Concludes Fall Ango](https://zmm.org/shuso-hossen-ceremony-concludes-fall-ango/) - Gikon Meets the Sangha in Dharma Encounter photos by Joel Sansho Benton, MRO On Sunday, November 20th, at the conclusion of a full and steady Shuso Hossen Sesshin, Chief Disciple Prabu Gikon Vasan offered his first talk and met the sangha in dharma encounter. After several sunny days that barely felt like autumn, Sunday dawned
- [Your Rightful Place](https://zmm.org/your-rightful-place/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi From The Perfection of Wisdom in 8,000 Lines Listen to this talk The Buddha said, ‘It is as with a mother who has many children five, or ten, or twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, a hundred, a thousand. If she fell ill, they would all exert themselves to prevent their mother from
- [Who's Your Mama](https://zmm.org/whos-your-mama/) - by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Mountain Record Editor I arrived at the monastery for the first time curious about Zen but prepared to stay on the sidelines. Organized religions of any kind were to me male-defined, patriarchal institutions I was better off avoiding, and yet here I was. When I turned toward the monastic in the
- [Earth Initiative: Regional Action](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-regional-action-bees/) - The Bees and the Mountain Bears For many years the Monastery garden has shared space with a trove of bee hives, growing to a whopping six active, thriving hives this summer. In addition to providing pollination for the gardens and beyond, the bees have shared the surplus of their delicious raw honey, which we have
- [Earth Initiative: National Action](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-national-action-2/) - Dakota Access Pipeline Project My great-grandmother became known as Pearl, as her Sioux birth name was forgotten. Her legend in my family suggests that her patient endurance—despite the traumas of her life during the Western expansion—was similar to the Earth’s great offering of itself. The Earth has offered a great quantity of petroleum, transformed from
- [Earth Initiative: Global Action](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-global-action-nz/) - New Zealand and the 'Climate Angels' “It’s different when you arrest an angel.” That’s what I thought when in May 2016 I saw the Climate Angels being carried away by police at the blockade of the world’s largest coal port in Newcastle, Australia. Protestors are often dismissed and ignored, and their messages even more so.
- [From The Perfection of Wisdom](https://zmm.org/from-the-perfection-of-wisdom/) - translated by Edward Conze The Venerable Subhuti, by the Buddha’s might, said to the Lord: The Lord has said, ‘Make it clear now, Subhuti, to the Bodhisattvas, the great beings, starting from perfect wisdom, how the Bodhisattvas, the great beings go forth into perfect wisdom!’ When one speaks of a ‘Bodhisattva,’ what dharma does that
- [From Right View, Red Rust, White Bones](https://zmm.org/from-right-view-red-rust-white-bones/) - A Re-examination of Buddhist Teachings on Female Inferiority by Allison Goodwin In the Tripitaka and later sutras, the Buddha repeatedly establishes standards for evaluating spiritual teachings and practices—including his own—before one accepts them. He makes clear that his teachings are often misremembered, misrepresented, or misunderstood: This is one of his main reasons for outlining terms for
- [Facets of the Jewel](https://zmm.org/facets-of-the-jewel/) - A Conversation with Women Teachers in the Mountains & Rivers Order Jody Hojin Kimmel and Vanessa Zuisei Goddard, with Danica Shoan Ankele Shoan: I wanted to speak to you as women teachers within what has historically been a very patriarchal tradition. As you know, some spiritual paths speak about spiritual development in terms of balancing
- [Welcoming All of Our Ancestors](https://zmm.org/welcoming-all-of-our-ancestors/) - by Shannon Shinko Hayes, MRO The Mountains and Rivers Order sangha has recently been formally introduced to our women ancestors. For several years our Sunday morning program has included a service at the Mahapajapati altar during which we chant a short list of names. We now begin a new tradition, chanting a long list of
- [Receiving the Marrow by Bowing](https://zmm.org/receiving-the-marrow-by-bowing/) - by Eihei Dogen In the practice of unsurpassable, complete enlightenment, what is most difficult is to find a guiding teacher. The guiding teacher should be a strong person, regardless of being a male or female. The teacher should be a person of thusness, with excellent knowledge and wild fox [transformative] spirit, whether living in the
- [In Memoriam: John Shido MacKenzie](https://zmm.org/in-memoriam-john-shido-mackenzie/) - July 22, 1946 - August 4, 2016 A large circle of mourners stood around the fresh grave and a neat, wooden marker. Shido, whose dharma name means “Way of the Poet,” was laid to rest at ZMM’s cemetery, not far from his mother’s grave and surrounded by pine trees. He had visited this place once
- [Good Karma](https://zmm.org/good-karma/) - Media Review How to Create the Causes of Happiness and Avoid the Causes of Suffering By Thubton Chodron Shambhala Publications, 2016 Despite the “how-to” title, this is not a conventional “build it yourself” manual for constructing a problem-free life starting with the usual messy ingredients like divorce, illness, or bankruptcy. Rather it is a penetrating meditation
- [Sangha Reflections: On Mother of All Buddhas](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-on-mother-of-all-buddhas/) - The changes in the liturgy—reciting the names of realized women and the switching of the word “patriarchs” to “ancestors”—have been gentle and welcome reminders to me of the role of women in the preservation of the Buddha Way and of the debt we owe to them. But what has affected me most profoundly has been
- [Brief Biographies of Women Zen Ancestors](https://zmm.org/brief-biographies-of-women-zen-ancestors/) - Many of these short bios are drawn from the work of Sallie Jiko Tisdale and were included as a postscript in her essay “The Mothers: Discovering a Lineage of Women.” Prajna Paramita The Mother of the Buddhas; the Womb of the Buddhas. Wisdom is often presented as a female principle; this goddess represents both the
- [Walking the Path of Peace](https://zmm.org/walking-the-path-of-peace/) - A Dharma Discourse by Shugen Sensei One week following the US elections, many of us are still reeling with frustration, confusion, sadness, and anger. In the Karaniya Metta Sutta, the Buddha said: This is what should be done by one who is skilled in goodness And who knows the path of peace. Let them be
- [We Are Enough Just As We Are](https://zmm.org/we-are-enough-just-as-we-are/) - Wild Grasses Women's Sesshin 2016 Post by Kestrel Ali Mills; photos by Annelisse Fifi It was over a year ago that I left the Monastery after a three-month residency. It was the last day of Spring Ango and Shugen Sensei offered a Dharma Encounter. When the line opened, Shugen said, “Shoan will lead off.” During
- [Six MRO Students Receive Jukai](https://zmm.org/fall-2016-jukai/) - On Sunday, October 16th, six Mountains and Rivers Order students received The Sixteen Bodhisattva Precepts from Shugen Sensei. The Jukai Ceremony was the culmination of a week of precepts training for these students who have been formally training in the Order for many years. Following morning service and period of zazen, the zendo was arranged for the
- [Beyond Words: 2016 Fall Ango Intensive](https://zmm.org/beyond-words-2016-fall-ango-intensive/) - post by Robyn Ikyo Love, MRO On Thursday night, after a period of zazen, Shugen Sensei introduced the theme of the Fall Ango Intensive weekend to the participants in the zendo. We would be studying Dogen’s Genjokoan—the Ango theme—but he asked us to examine it through the lens of faith, which he said could be
- [In Memoriam: William Kishin Gamble](https://zmm.org/in-memoriam-william-kishin-gamble/) - William Kishin Gamble, a longtime Mountains & Rivers Order student, passed away last month. Kishin was one of Daido Roshi's earliest students, having begun his training at the Monastery in the early 1980s. He lived in New York City for many years and practiced actively at Fire Lotus Temple as well as at the Monastery. Kishin was a
- [Funeral Service for John Shido MacKenzie](https://zmm.org/funeral-service-for-john-shido-mackenzie/) - Post by Chris Tyler, MRO Photos by William Carpenter A broad circle of mourners ringed the fresh grave—a stone square set flush in the earth, and a clean upright plank that reads “John Shido MacKenzie, 7.22.1946 – 8.4.2016.” The pine trees were still, and the vague slab of clouds held in a week’s worth of
- [Sangha Reflections: On Earth Medicine](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-on-earth-medicine/) - Increasingly these days I notice how a play of light, a sound, a smell can send me back in time. I live in the same town I grew up in. During Ango this spring I was struck, during one of these moments when the feeling was particularly intense, by the realization that this place is,
- [Arousing the Aspiration for the Unsurpassable](https://zmm.org/arousing-the-aspiration-for-the-unsurpassable/) - by Eihei Dogen, translated by Kazuaki Tanahashi The high ancestor of India [Shakyamuni Buddha] said, “The Snow Mountains [the Himalayas] are like great nirvana.” Know that this is a precise analogy, intimate and direct. To take up the Snow Mountains is to speak of the Snow Mountains. To take up great nirvana is to speak of
- [The Most Amazing Challenge](https://zmm.org/the-most-amazing-challenge/) - by Paul Hawken The evening before I gave the commencement speech, I threw the original away. That night, at a dinner given for those receiving honorary degrees, I got the distinct impression that some of the trustees and officials were not happy about my being the commencement speaker. I was introduced as Paul “Hawker,” and someone
- [An American Land Ethic](https://zmm.org/an-american-land-ethic/) - by N. Scott Momaday One night a strange thing happened. I had written the greater part of The Way to Rainy Mountain—all of it, in fact, except the epilogue. I had set down the last of the old Kiowa tales, and I had composed both the historical and the autobiographical commentaries for it. I had the
- [Orchard Revival](https://zmm.org/orchard-revival/) - by Linda Shinji Hoffman An apple tree was concerned about a late frost and losing its gifts that would help feed a poor family. Can’t the clouds be generous with what falls from them? Can’t the sun ration itself with precision? They can speak, trees, they can say the sweetest things but it takes special ears
- [A Daring Compassion](https://zmm.org/a-daring-compassion/) - by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Mountain Record Editor The news on environmental activism rarely makes headlines, despite some prominent demonstrations and the groundswell of change they can lead to. Occasionally there are clashes or even violence against those who continue working, courageously, to protect and defend. Communities are torn apart, resources are depleted, our human greed
- [Build a True Sanctuary](https://zmm.org/build-a-true-sanctuary/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi The World-Honored One Points to the Ground Book of Serenity, Case 4 Listen to this talk Introduction As soon as a single mote of dust arises, the whole earth is contained therein; with a single horse and a single lance, the land’s extended. Who is this person who can be
- [What We're Fighting For Now Is Each Other](https://zmm.org/what-were-fighting-for-now-is-each-other/) - Media Review What We're Fighting For Now Is Each Other: Dispatches from the Front Lines of Climate Justice By Wen Stephenson Beacon Press, 2015 Wen Stephenson shines a bright light on the emerging climate-justice movement in his new book What We’re Fighting for Now is Each Other. He weaves together the stories and voices of people
- [The Intelligent Heart](https://zmm.org/the-intelligent-heart/) - Media Review The Intelligent Heart: A Guide to the Compassionate Life By Dzigar Kongtrul, Rinpoche Shambhala Publications 2016 The transformative practice of tonglen, described as “the exchange of self and other,” is the subject of this book. The author, a contemporary teacher in the west with deep roots in Tibetian monastic training, takes us in
- [Earth Initiative: Regional Action](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-regional-action/) - Pollinator Habitats When we suffer, struggle, thirst, falter or fail, many of us look to nature to ground ourselves. And though dramatic landscapes can deliver the solace we seek, it is the intimacy created by deep attention that heals. Today I find that intimacy as I release the roots of a young service- berry from
- [Earth Initiative: National Action](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-national-action/) - Case Summary: Juliana v. United States Twenty-one teenagers from ten states and the Yankton Sioux Tribe, along with an adult acting on behalf of future generations, have cleared an important hurdle in their novel lawsuit against the United States government for contributing to climate change. The plaintiffs, represented by the organization, Our Children’s Trust, filed
- [Fall Ango 2016](https://zmm.org/fall-ango-2016/) - Shuso Letter Dear Friends, The blaze and burn of summer begins to cool, and we turn our attention to the Fall Ango. Shugen Sensei has asked me to be Chief Disciple for the training period, and I find myself feeling at once excited and scared and grateful—excited to offer myself up completely, scared that it
- [Earth Initiative: Global Action](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative-global-action/) - United Nations Global Compact Takes Action on Climate Change In September 2015, the United Nations launched the Sustainable Development Goals, also known as the Global Goals: seventeen ambitious, all-encompassing goals to transform our world by 2030, ending poverty, fighting injustice and inequality, and combating climate change. Progress on these goals is being marshalled by an
- [Circles on the Water: Reflections on the Women's Wilderness Retreat](https://zmm.org/circles-on-the-water-reflections-on-the-womens-wilderness-retreat/) - The week of July 19-24, 2016, fourteen women set off for Little Tupper Lake in the Adirondacks to attend Circles on the Water: A Wilderness Retreat for Women, led by Hojin Osho. What follows are the reflections of two of the retreat participants; photos by Carey Joyu DePalma, MRO. by Diana Strablow Mist, hues of orange and
- [Reflections on Moshin and Onjin’s Novice Ordination Ceremony](https://zmm.org/moshin-onjin-novice/) - post by Polly Horne, MRO photos by David McNamara, MRO On the last morning of this Summer Solstice Sesshin, as thoughts of the world trickled back into the container—my mind and body waning, the Sangha gathered our strength and concentration to send Moshin and Onjin on the next phase of their discernment as Novice Monastics. It’s
- [Being the Bowl 2016](https://zmm.org/beingthebowl-2016/) - post by Donna Nicolino, MRO photos by Simone Couto From June 15th to the 19th, participants in this year’s Being the Bowl retreat came together with Hojin Osho and Yosha Scott-Childress to spend several sunny, warm days shaping clay with our hands, experimenting with glazes, “juicing rocks,” painting, and expanding our ideas about what a
- [List of Female Ancestors Enters the Order's Liturgy](https://zmm.org/femaleancestors/) - post by Shannon Shinko Hayes, MRO photo credit: Photo Dharma On Sunday, May 29th, the Mountains and Rivers Order sangha was formally introduced to our women ancestors. For several years, our Sunday morning program has included a service at the Mahapajapati altar, in which we chant a short list of some of the women ancestors’ names.
- [How to Let Go of the World](https://zmm.org/review-how-to-let-go-of-the-world/) - Media Review: How to Let Go of the World and Love All the Things Climate Can’t Change Directed by Josh Fox Premiering on HBO, June 2016 In the beginning there was dancing. But before we get to that, we need to go back even further: In the beginning there was the Marcellus, a geologic formation
- [Udumbara Flower / Udonge](https://zmm.org/udumbara-flowerudonge/) - by Jan Chozen Bays, Roshi Why would Dogen Zenji devote an entire fascicle of the Shobogenzo to praising a flower, a flower that some people say is mythical and does not exist? Others say it does exist, but it only blooms every 3,000 years, to herald the arrival of another Buddha, an enlightened being. In
- [Jan Chozen Bays Roshi Teaches at the Monastery](https://zmm.org/chozenroshi-2016/) - The Inner Critic and the Four Immeasurables: A Lesson in the Care, Feeding and Ultimate Sidelining of Our Personal Maras post by Theresa Braine From the harsh realities of our own personal Maras, to a whirlwind tour of the Four Immeasurables, Jan Chozen Bays Roshi took participants of back-to-back retreats at Zen Mountain Monastery last
- [From 'Cultivating the Empty Field'](https://zmm.org/from-cultivating-the-empty-field/) - by Honghzhi Zhengjue Investigating Wonder In clarity the wonder exists, with spiritual energy shining on its own. It cannot be grasped and so cannot be called being. It cannot be rubbed away and so cannot be called nonbeing. Beyond the mind of deliberation and discussion, depart from the remains of the shadowy images. Emptying [one’s
- [Born As The Earth](https://zmm.org/born-as-the-earth/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi Koans of the Way of Reality, Case 8 Main Case A visiting student began to ask, “The truths of the Earth continually wait. They are not so concealed either. They’re calm, subtle, untransmissible by print.” The teacher interrupted, saying, “Stop, stop! Is that Walt Whitman’s poem?" The student said, “Yes
- [Maha-Rahulovada Sutra](https://zmm.org/maha-rahulovada-sutra/) - Translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu I have heard that on one occasion the Blessed One was staying at Savatthi, in Jeta’s Grove, Anathapindika’s Monastery. Then the Blessed One, early in the morning, put on his robes and, carrying his bowl and outer robe, went into Savatthi for alms. And Ven. Rahula, early in
- [Bright, Dancing Aliveness](https://zmm.org/bright-dancing-aliveness/) - by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Mountain Record Editor Fire draws our attention with its light. The aliveness dancing in a candle flame is made from the cotton in its wick, the moisture in the candle wax, oxygen feeding its burning. I name the different parts and feel their separateness, grasping at difference. As I return to
- [River Seeing River](https://zmm.org/river-seeing-river/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi from Master Dogen’s Mountains and Rivers Sutra The river is neither strong nor weak, neither wet nor dry, neither moving nor still,neither cold nor hot, neither being nor non-being, neither delusion nor enlightenment. Solidified, it is harder than diamond: who could break it? Melted, it is softer than milk: who
- [Outdoor Earth Day Service at the Monastery & Dharma Encounter](https://zmm.org/earthday-2016/) - post by Charla Koren Malamed, MRO Sesshin had just ended, and to celebrate Earth day, we held our morning service outside in the meadow—Tremper mountain our Buddha, an oval stone our Mahapajapatti, a pile of dirt our incense ash. Shugen invited us to offer ourselves, in addition to the usual offerings of incense, water, and candlelight.
- [Four MRO Students Receive Jukai](https://zmm.org/spring2016-jukai/) - post by Brian Pontolilo, MRO On Sunday, April 17, four Mountains and Rivers Order students received The Sixteen Bodhisattva Precepts from Shugen Sensei. The Jukai Ceremony was the culmination of a week of precepts training for Christian, Anna, James and Charla, as well as a fitting end to the weekend’s retreat on intent and commitment
- [Born as the Earth: Spring Ango Intensive 2016](https://zmm.org/spring2016angointensive/) - post by Chris Tyler, MRO From April 7th through the 10th, more than 60 sangha members gathered to sit, study, practice, and support each other in exploring the theme of this spring ango intensive, Being Born as the Earth. True to Shugen Sensei’s words from the opening sesshin, “the Earth is our chief disciple.” Throughout
- [Opening Spring 2016 Ango: Born as the Earth](https://zmm.org/angoopening-spring-2016/) - by Karen Spicher, MRO On Sunday, February 28, we began Spring Ango, a period of intensified practice during the months of March, April, and May. An Ango Opening Sesshin extended from Friday evening through Sunday morning, when sangha members and visitors filled the zendo for the Sunday program. Hojin Osho officiated service, followed by a
- [Funeral Service for Mujaku Senjin](https://zmm.org/senjin-funeral/) - On Sunday, February 21st, at the end of Bodhidharma Sesshin, the Monastery held a funeral service for senior monastic Mujaku Senjin. After services and eulogies in a very full zendo, the sangha processed up to the cemetery for a short service at the chapel. Shugen Sensei offered this memorial poem for Senjin: Like rain seeking parched
- [Manifestation of Great Prajna](https://zmm.org/manifestation-of-great-prajna/) - by Eihei Dogen Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva, while experiencing deeply the manifestation of prajna, clearly saw with the entire body that all five skandhas are empty. These five skandhas—form, feeling, perception, inclination, and discernment—are fivefold prajna. Clear seeing is prajna. To expound this teaching, it is said in the Maha Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra that form is emptiness
- [One Single Thing](https://zmm.org/one-single-thing/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi The Tao cannot be conveyed by either words or silence. In that state, which is neither speech nor silence, its transcendental nature may be apprehended. —Chung Tzu According to Chuang Tzu, the transcendental nature of reality cannot be apprehended and conveyed unless we can attain the state that is neither speech
- [Within The Vast Web](https://zmm.org/within-the-vast-web/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi Priest Xixian's "I Am Watching" True Dharma Eye, Case 227 Listen to this talk Main Case Xixian Faan of Lushan was asked by a government officer, “When I took the city of Jinling with an army troop, I killed countless people. Am I at fault?” Xixian said, “I am watching closely.”
- [The Passing of Senior Monastic Mujaku Senjin](https://zmm.org/senjin/) - Cremation & Funeral Services for Monastic Mujaku Senjin The cremation service will be Monday, February 1st at 9:30am at the crematorium at Wiltwyck Cemetery, 145 Pine Grove Avenue in Kingston, NY. Get directions. The funeral service will be at Zen Mountain Monastery on Sunday, February 21st at 1:30pm. Dear Sangha, Our sister monastic Senjin passed away
- [Monastery Residents Travel to Albany for Climate Rally](https://zmm.org/albanyrally/) - On Wednesday January 13th, a dozen monastery residents and local sangha joined several hundred state-wide protesters in Albany, NY to urge New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo, state senators and legislators to stay focused on renewable energy and to discontinue reliance on coal, oil, nuclear and "fracked" natural gas. Rally participants traveled to Albany from
- [The Monastery Hosts Its 27th Annual Community Holiday Dinner](https://zmm.org/danadinner-2015/) - post by Es Taylor The Monastery halls were rife with excitement, children's laughter, and the delicious smell of gravy on the morning of Saturday, December 19th for our annual Dana Dinner. This 27-year tradition was started as the Monastery’s offering to the community and includes a meal, gifts, and live entertainment open to all who
- [Ikusei Receives Novice Ordination](https://zmm.org/ikusei-novice/) - On Sunday, December 6th, Shea Ikusei Settimi received novice ordination at the Monastery from Shugen Sensei. A full zendo of sangha, friends and family came to share the day and support Ikusei in this next step on her path. Similar to a Jukai ceremony, novice ordination consists of the 16 precepts of the Buddha way,
- [Fall 2015 Ango Closes with Shuso Hossen Ceremony](https://zmm.org/fall-2015-ango-shusohossen/) - post by Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, MRO; photos by David McNamara, MRO The zendo at the monastery was overflowing on Sunday, November 22nd, when the sangha celebrated the Shuso Hossen ceremony with chief disciple Richard Ryoha Dunworth, MRO, marking the culmination of three months of intensive ango study and training. Shugen Sensei led the sangha in what
- [Jukai for Five Students at the Monastery](https://zmm.org/fall-2015-jukai/) - On Sunday, November 15th, Shugen Sensei officiated a Precepts Ceremony—Jukai—for five MRO students at Zen Mountain Monastery. The zendo was filled to capacity with sangha, family, friends, plus a sizable contingent of students from the New York City sangha. From left to right, in the featured image: Shannon Shinko ("deep light") Hayes, JL Hokyu ("penetrating dharma")
- [Tending the Tigress: An Apprenticeship in Clay](https://zmm.org/tending-the-tigress/) - by Jody Hojin Kimmel, Osho Recently, somebody asked me how I was turned into a vessel before my eyes. found Buddhism. I found it through a crooked tea bowl. At the time, I had been studying with a teacher who was very formal. Everything had to have these exact proportions, and everything had to be straight.
- [Document of Heritage](https://zmm.org/document-of-heritage/) - by Eihei Dogen A Buddha is transmitted dharma only from a buddha, an ancestor only from an ancestor, through merging realization in direct transmission. In this way, it is the unsurpassable enlightenment. It is impossible to give the seal of realization without being a buddha, and it is impossible to become a buddha without receiving the
- [Past, Present, Future](https://zmm.org/past-present-future/) - by Jan Chozen Bays, Roshi I thought it would be interesting to offer you a feeling or what it was like back in the old days—you know, back when we had to walk ten miles to the zendo, knee-deep in snow, barefoot. It’s good to know your history. And although Hogen’s immediate lineage is separate
- [In Accord with All Time](https://zmm.org/in-accord-with-all-time/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Sensei Prajnatara Transmission of the Light, Case 28 Listen to this talk Main Case The Buddhist master Punyamitra said to Prajnatara, “Do you remember events of the past?” Prajnatara said, “I remember in a distant eon I was living in the same place as you. You were expounding great wisdom and I
- [The Place of Discipleship in Buddhism](https://zmm.org/the-place-of-discipleship-in-buddhism/) - by Bhikkhu Bodhi As a religious founder the Buddha did not claim to be a divinely inspired prophet, a personal savior, or a deity incarnate in flesh. Within the framework of his Teaching, the Dhamma, his special role is that of a teacher, the Supreme Teacher who reveals the unique path to final deliverance. In the earliest
- [The Passing of Moss the Cat](https://zmm.org/moss/) - After 15 years of dedicated prowling, purring, sunning himself and serving the Monastery sangha in numerous ways, Moss passed away on November 10th, surrounded by those who loved him. A service was held with recognition of all benevolent creatures of the earth, expressing gratitude for Moss's life. A resting place was made near the garden
- [Wild Grasses Sesshin Culminates with Full Monastic Ordination for Sensui Shoan](https://zmm.org/shoanordination/) - October 22nd-25th marked the second annual Wild Grasses Sesshin at the Monastery—a meditation intensive for women led by Hojin Osho. By Friday evening, eighty women sat together in the zendo, in long, curving rows. Amid preparations on Thursday morning, Hojin Osho envisioned a zendo set-up that dispensed with the usual straight rows in favor of
- [The MRO Celebrates its 35th Anniversary](https://zmm.org/anniversary/) - by JL Aronson, MRO “Happy 35th Anniversary Dragons and Elephants,” proclaimed a bright red and white painted banner hanging over the Monastery’s dining hall, a salute to the noblest creatures of the land, sea and air. October 9-11 brought nearly 150 sangha members (dragons and elephants alike) together for a weekend of reflection, celebration, dreaming
- [The Wild Grasses sit at Fire Lotus Temple](https://zmm.org/wildgrasseszazenkai/) - post by Theresa Braine “Wild Grasses. We are all wild grasses.” With these words, Hojin Osho opened the second all-woman Zazenkai at Fire Lotus Temple, the Zen Center of New York City. Nearly 30 of us gathered, sitting in a circle, the room divided into four quarters for daisan purposes. The poetry of Otagaki Rengetsu, "Field of
- [Intimate Language](https://zmm.org/intimate-language/) - by Eihei Dogen Actualizing the fundamental point, you realize the great road maintained by all buddhas. “You are like this. I am like this. Keep it well,” is revealed. Yunju, Great Master Hongjiao, was asked by an imperial minister who brought an offering, “The World-Honored One had an intimate language, and Mahakashyapa did not conceal
- [From 'The Lankavatara Sutra'](https://zmm.org/from-the-lankavatara-sutra/) - translated by Red Pine Mahamati once more asked the Buddha, “Bhagavan, according to the Bhagavan, the sutras are concerned with what neither arises nor ceases. The Bhagavan has also said ‘what neither arises nor ceases’ is another name for tathagatas. Bhagavan, is it because of their nonexistence that he says they neither arise nor cease?
- [Body of Truth](https://zmm.org/body-of-truth/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Sensei Xiangyan's "Person Up a Tree" True Dharma Eye, Case 243 Listen to this talk Main Case Master Xiangyan said to the sangha, “What if you are hanging by your teeth from a tree on a thousand foot cliff, with no place for your hands to hold or your feet to step on?
- [Jisan Gokan Receives Full Monastic Ordination](https://zmm.org/gokanordination/) - On Sunday, August 2nd, at the conclusion of our Interdependence Sesshin, Bear Gokan Bonebakker received shukke tokudo, or full monastic ordination, from Shugen Sensei in a moving ceremony attended by a zendo full of family and sangha. During the ceremony, Gokan received the Sixteen Bodhisattva Precepts and the five monastic life vows of simplicity, service,
- [One Giant Bowl of Oryoki: Unfolding the Dharma with Shugen Sensei in New Zealand](https://zmm.org/newzealand2015/) - by Cameron Kito Broadhurst, MRO Zen Institute of New Zealand Every year, our flock of New Zealand Zen practitioners leaves their home and local sangha practice to travel to Nelson for our national Zen workshops, social events and winter sesshin. At the same time, Shugen Sensei steps into the stomach of the iron bird and flies across
- [2015 Being the Bowl Clay Retreat](https://zmm.org/beingthebowl2015/) - by Roni Nyuko Schnadow, MRO On June 10, 2015 we began the four-day “Being the Bowl” retreat, led by Hojin Osho and assisted by Katie Yosha Scott-Childress. After being on the waiting list last year, I signed up early and was lucky enough to get to experience clay with nine other participants who had traveled
- [Temple Kicks Off Summer Schedule with Sangha Work Day](https://zmm.org/templefushinsamu/) - By Dennis Daiken Ferrill, MRO On May 30th at Fire Lotus Temple, just a week after the end of our spring Ango, we celebrated a day of Fushin Samu, or Sangha Work Day. Traditionally, fushin samu refers to the ordinary work of communal labor. It was fitting that the day came at the end of
- [Spring Ango 2015 Comes to a Close](https://zmm.org/springangoconcludes/) - by Jeffrey Gyokudo Roberts, MRO Amidst birdsong and blue sky, our 2015 Spring Ango Intensive training period came to its end on Sunday, May 24th, and the sangha returned to harbor from the journey we set out on together during the snowy days of March. The morning started early with dawn zazen and the conclusion of sesshin,
- [Memorial Service for Maezumi Roshi](https://zmm.org/maezumi-memorial/) - by Sankai Lemmens, MRO photo by Peter Cunningham courtesy of Stephanie Young Merzel On Sunday, May 17th, Shugen Sensei officiated a memorial service during the Sunday Morning Program to mark the 20th year of the passing of Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi Roshi—Daido Roshi's teacher and the first abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery—in May, the "Month of Azaleas."
- [Cunda Sutta](https://zmm.org/cunda-sutta/) - Translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu On one occasion the Blessed One was staying near Savatthi in Jeta’s Grove, Anathapindika’s monastery. Now at that time Ven. Sariputta was staying among the Magadhans in Nalaka village—diseased, in pain, severely ill. Cunda the novice was his attendant. Then, because of that illness, Ven. Sariputta attained total Unbinding. So Cunda
- [Born in a Moment](https://zmm.org/body-of-truth-2/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Sensei Hui Ch'ao Asks About Buddha Blue Cliff Record, Case 7 Pointer The thousand sages have not transmitted the single word before sound; if you have never seen it personally, it is as if it were worlds away. Even if you discern it before sound and cut off the tongues of everyone
- [Merle Kodo Boyd, Sensei, Leads Retreat at ZCNYC](https://zmm.org/kodosensei/) - White Plum teacher Merle Kodo Boyd Sensei visited the Temple for a full day retreat that she described as a “collaboration” between her and the sangha. Kodo Sensei is a successor of Wendy Egyoku Nakao, the abbot of the Zen Center of Los Angeles and a successor of Maezumi Roshi. She is part of our
- [Zuisei Goddard Becomes Dharma Holder](https://zmm.org/zuiseidharmaholder/) - On Sunday, April 26th concluding the April Apple Blossom Sesshin, Shugen Sensei conferred the title of Dharma Holder to Zuisei Goddard. This indicates that she is nearing the completion of her formal training and has received the "Seal of Forbearance" from Sensei, expressing his intention to transmit the Dharma to her at the appropriate time. The
- [Jukai for Five Students at ZCNYC](https://zmm.org/zcnycjukai/) - On Sunday, April 19th, Shugen Sensei officiated a Precepts Ceremony—Jukai—for five MRO students. The zendo was filled to capacity with Sangha, family, friends, plus a contingent from Mount Tremper. From left to right, in the featured image: Carey Joyu (“peaceful courage”) DePalma, Clyde Fusei (“sacred wind”) Forth, Gwen Kimu (“awakening from the dream”) Coe, Sara
- [A Mid-Ango Boost: Sangha Hikes Up Tremper Mountain](https://zmm.org/springangohike/) - Just after 1:00 PM on Sunday, April 12th, the Sangha participated in the traditional hike up Mt. Tremper. About thirty people took part in the event, which followed the Ango Intensive Retreat on "Taking Refuge in the Three Treasures," led by Shugen Sensei. Some had wondered if the hike would need to be rescheduled—a resident
- [First Sangha Treasure Meeting Held at Monastery](https://zmm.org/sanghameeting/) - On the evening of Wednesday, April 8th, about 40 residents and local MRO students gathered in the performance hall for the first Sangha Treasure Meeting, a new forum for the sangha to reflect on and share their experience of practice and training within the MRO community. The idea for holding such a meeting arose in the
- [An Intimate Encounter: Taking Refuge in the Buddha](https://zmm.org/dharmaencounter/) - post by Alison Mills photographs by Nicholas Lue, MRO On Sunday, March 29th, Shugen Sensei opened the first Dharma Encounter of the ango by asking the sangha, “What is Buddha?” and “What does it mean to take refuge in the Buddha?” This was my first sesshin and I wasn’t sure what to expect from dharma
- [Shugen Sensei Assumes Abbotship of Monastery as Spring Ango Begins](https://zmm.org/abbotship/) - On Sunday, March 8th, Shugen Sensei officially stepped into the role of Abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery in a brief but emotional ceremony as the sangha prepared to enter into the Spring Ango Intensive training period. Coming on the heels of the weekend’s Ango Opening Sesshin, the Sunday morning program began as usual with a
- [Barriers and the Creative Process](https://zmm.org/barriers-and-the-creative-process/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi As our work with the creative process evolves and we see how creativity extends beyond art into our lives, we may notice barriers that keep us from seeing in a way that’s unhindered by ideas or attitudes. These barriers pop up as we struggle to find equanimity in our art
- [Sangha Reflections: On Daido Roshi](https://zmm.org/on-daido-roshi/) - WHEN I MET DAIDO, I WAS living in a yoga ashram and working part time in an art gallery. Daido would come into the gallery to have his photographs framed. He had just resigned from International Flavors and Fragrances and was starting to go into the advertising business. He needed a model for a shoot
- [Poems](https://zmm.org/poems/)
- [The Stone Lion](https://zmm.org/the-stone-lion/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi Koans of the Way of Reality, Case 103 The Prolouge Confined in a cage, up against a wall, pressed against barriers—if you linger in thought, holding back your potential, you will remain mired in fear and frozen in inaction. If, on the other hand, you advance fearlessly and without hesitation, you manifest
- [Buddha's Birthday, a Poem](https://zmm.org/buddhas-birthday-a-poem/)
- [Journal 1971-1974](https://zmm.org/journal-1971-1974/) - Editor’s Note: The following are entries from a journal Daido Roshi kept shortly after attending a photography workshop led by Minor White at the Hotchkiss School, prior to his involvement in Zen. The Images are roughly from this period, too. The last record was concluded and this one started because of the transitions that
- [The Gift of Monasticism](https://zmm.org/the-gift-of-monasticism/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi Gatha on Shaving the Head In this drifting, wandering world, it is very difficult to cut off our human ties. Now I cast them away, and enter true activity. It is in this way that I express my gratitude. As I shave my head, I vow to live a life
- [Spiritual Ripeness: The Tenth Stage](https://zmm.org/spiritual-ripeness-the-tenth-stage/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi Entering the marketplace barefoot and unadorned. Blissfully smiling, though covered with dust and ragged of clothes. Using no supernatural power, you bring the withered trees spontaneously into bloom. Arriving at the tenth stage, you enter the marketplace. This is nirmanakaya, the physical body and the teachings of the Buddha
- [Meeting Maezumi Roshi](https://zmm.org/meeting-maezumi-roshi/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi As I spent time at Dai Bosatsu, I began to suspect that the key to the profound qualities I was seeing in Zen art was Zen practice, and that zazen— Zen meditation—was its foundation. I had heard that as a young man Soen Roshi used to sit zazen high up
- [The Insentient Express the Way](https://zmm.org/the-insentient-express-the-way/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi Commentary on Master Dogen's "Teachings of the Insentient" Our usual way of understanding the insentient is that they are objects that make up the physical world, objects that are non-living, lacking consciousness or perception. They are stones, stars, atoms, mountains and rivers—the inanimate. On the other hand, we under- stand
- [Really Put Yourself Into It](https://zmm.org/really-put-yourself-into-it/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi Opening Remarks to the Zen Training Weekend Welcome to Zen Mountain Monastery. This weekend in the Zen training workshop we’ll be looking at the basis of Zen training. We’ll be discussing the philosophy, the underlying theories. There will be plenty of opportunity for questions and answers, but by far the
- [Raquette River Field Journal](https://zmm.org/raquette-river-field-journal/) - The insentient speak in a language that we are unable to understand but some- how are able to feel. It’s way of teaching us is not rational but rather visceral. Listen to the voice of rock and water. What does it say? Is it one voice or is it many? A chorus of voices, perhaps.
- [Light](https://zmm.org/light/) - by John Daido Loori, Roshi Pearly, shadowless images are becoming warmer as they begin to fill with color. Reds and oranges are seeping into the day, transforming this land and my feelings. Though still below the horizon, the sun has begun to illuminate the morning sky. The light filters through the forest of white pine
- [ZMM Residents Attend Teaching by Tenzin Palmo at KTD](https://zmm.org/tenzinpalmo/) - From December 19th to December 21st, a number of ZMM residents had the rare opportunity to step off campus and attend a retreat offered by Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo at Karma Triyana Dharmachakra (KTD), the Tibetan Buddhist Monastery just down the road in Woodstock. Tenzin Palmo, reknowned for being one of the first Westerners ordained as
- [Selections from Shobogenzo Zuimonki](https://zmm.org/selections-from-shobogenzo-zuimonki/) - Sayings of Eihei Dogen, Recorded by Koun Ejo, translated by Shohaku Okumura In a dharma talk, Dogen said, Even if you are speaking rationally and another person says something unreasonable, it is wrong to defeat him by arguing logically. On the other hand, it is not good to give up hastily saying that you are
- [Dealing with Situations](https://zmm.org/dealing-with-situations/) - by Master Ta Hui, translated by Thomas Cleary To Secretary Lau: Since we parted, I don’t know whether or not you can avoid being carried away by external objects in your daily activities as you respond to circumstances, whether or not you can put aside your heap of legal documents as you look through them, whether
- [Transformation at the Heart Level](https://zmm.org/your-mountain-form-finds-its-seat-2/) - by Konrad Ryushin Marchaj, Sensei Dhritaka Transmission of the Light, Case 6 Main Case The fifth ancestor, Dhritaka, said, “Because one who makes his home departure is a selfless Self, is selfless and possesses nothing, and because the Mind neither arises nor ceases, this is the eternal Way. All Buddhas are also eternal. The mind
- [Your Mountain Form Finds its Seat](https://zmm.org/your-mountain-form-finds-its-seat/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Sensei from Master Dogen’s Fukanzazengi The way is originally perfect and all pervading. How could it be contingent upon practice and realization? The true vehicle is selfsufficient. What need is there for special effort? Indeed, the whole body is free from dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it
- [Sangha Reflections: On Wildness](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-on-wildness/) - AS A KID I TRIED TO IMAGINE the rural landscapes around me without telephone poles and electric wires—how the rivers and hills might have looked to the Native Americans or the first European settlers or the deer and raccoons. Even then I was yearning for wilderness and an unobstructed aliveness. Drawn to Buddhism through Daido
- [Plum Blossoms](https://zmm.org/plum-blossoms/) - by Eihei Dogen, translated by Kazuaki Tanahashi Rujing, my late master, Old Buddha Tiantong, was the thirtieth abbot of the Tiantong Jingde Monastery, renowned Mount Taibai, Qingyuan Prefecture, Great Song. He ascended the teaching seat and said to the assembly: Tiantong’s first phrase of midwinter: Old plum tree bent and gnarled all at once opens one
- [To Know Living Things](https://zmm.org/to-know-living-things/) - From the journals of Thomas Merton Yesterday I was sitting in the woodshed reading and a little Carolina wren suddenly hopped on to my shoulder and then on to the corner of the book I was read- ing and paused a second to take a look at me before flying away. Same wren just came
- [Meeting Machig Labdron](https://zmm.org/meeting-machig-labdron/) - by Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei Right now you have the opportunity. Look for the essence of mind—this is meaningful. When you look at mind, there is nothing to be seen. In this very not-seeing, you see the definitive meaning. —Machig Labdron A few years ago I was leafing through a magazine and came eye-to-eye with
- [Natural, Vivid, Alive](https://zmm.org/natural-vivid-alive/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Sensei Ordinary Mind is Tao Gateless Gate, Case 19 Main Case Chao-chou once asked Nanchuan, “What is Tao?” Nanchuan answered, “Ordinary mind is Tao.” “Then should we direct ourselves toward it or not?” asked Chao-chou. “If you try to direct yourself toward it, you go away from it,” answered Nanchuan. Chao-chou
- [Sacred Wildness](https://zmm.org/sacred-wildness/) - by John Daido Loori Roshi The river never speaks, yet it knows how to find its way to the Great Ocean. The mountains have no words, yet the ten thousand things are born here. Where the river finds its way, you can perceive the essence. Where the mountain gives birth to the ten thousand things, you
- [The Holy Spirit as Wild Spirit](https://zmm.org/the-holy-spirit-as-wild-spirit/) - by Matthew Fox Life is wild. Life is a wild ride, a ride between the highs and the lows, the mountains and the valleys, the via positiva and the via negativa. Nature is wild. We come from the wild—from the surging seas of the ocean, from the heat-blasting, hydrogen-exploding sun, from the supernovas bursting, from
- [The Unexpected Rears Its Head](https://zmm.org/the-unexpected-rears-its-head/) - by Konrad Ryushin Marchaj, Sensei Yangshan's Declaration Book of Serenity, Case 90 Introduction ‘I alone am sober’—this is drunkenness indeed. Yangshan speaks of a dream just like when awake. But say, as I say this and you hear it, tell me, is this wakefulness or is this a dream? Case Yangshan dreamed he went to
- [The Night Journey of Nicodemus](https://zmm.org/the-night-journey-of-nicodemus/) - by Philip Zaleski The words are magisterial, even harsh: Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God (John 3:3). Astonishing idea, to be born again! This cryptic teaching, given by Jesus in Jerusalem at the beginning of his ministry, bewilders Nicodemus, a pious Jew and
- [Birth and Death](https://zmm.org/birth-and-death/) - by Eihei Dogen, translated by Kazuaki Tanahashi As a Buddha is in birth and death, there is no birth and death.” It is also said, “As a buddha is not in birth and death, a buddha is not deluded by birth and death.” These statements are the essence of the words of the two Zen masters
- [Transmigrating, For Now](https://zmm.org/transmigrating-for-now/) - by Konrad Ryushin Marchaj, Sensei Ruiyan's "Constant Principle" Book of Serenity, Case 75 Introduction Even as you call it ‘thus,’ it’s already changed. Where knowledge doesn’t reach, avoid speaking of it. Here, is there any investigating or not? Case Ruiyan asked Yantou, “What is the fundamental constant principle?” Yantou said, “Moving.” Ruiyan said, “When moving,
- [Oceans](https://zmm.org/oceans/) - by Juan Ramón Jiménez, translated by Robert Bly I have a feeling that my boat has struck, down there in the depths, against a great thing. And nothing happens! Nothing . . . Silence. . . Waves —Nothing happens? Or has everything happened, and are we standing now, quietly, in the new life? From News of
- [Liberation: Uncoiling in Space](https://zmm.org/liberation-uncoiling-in-space/) - by Francesca Fremantle What is liberation? How is it accomplished? Who is liberated, and from what? The state of liberation is the ultimate goal. It has been given many names and has been described in many different ways, although it is essentially inexpressible. It is our true, innate nature, our inalienable birthright, yet we do not
- [Why Beings Fare As They Do After Death](https://zmm.org/why-beings-fare-as-they-do-after-death/) - by Bhikkhu Bodhi Thus have I heard. On one occasion the Blessed One was wandering by stages in the Kosalan country with a large Sangha of monks, and eventually he arrived at a Kosalan brahmin village named Sala. The brahmin householders of Sala heard: “It is said that the ascetic Gotama, the Sakyan son who went
- [The Original Question](https://zmm.org/the-original-question/) - by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Sensei Zhao Zhou's "Indestructible Nature" True Dharma Eye, Case 288 Main Case Zhao Zhou was once asked by a monastic, “Before the world existed, there was already the original nature. When the world is destroyed, true nature is not destroyed. What is this indestructible nature?” Zhao Zhou said, “Four great elements
- [Sangha Reflections: On Rebirth](https://zmm.org/sangha-reflections-on-rebirth/) - THIRTY-FIVE YEARS AGO, as a graduate student at Columbia University, I studied with Yoshito Hakeda, Professor of Religion and a Shingon priest. We worked one-on-one studying Buddhist texts. He was not only my teacher, but also my mentor and my friend. At one point, deeply immersed in research in an unfamiliar eld, I was experiencing
- [Adolescent Buddhism](https://zmm.org/adolescent-buddhism/) - by Rachel Yuho RiderOriginally published in Mountain Record journal: "Spirituality and Education" (2001) During my childhood, religion was not a major part of my family life, nor was it a part of the life of anyone around me. My life revolved around my fam­ily and friends; the people who loved me. I saw no need
- [Cars and Trucks, too](https://zmm.org/cars-and-trucks-too/) - by Sybil Seisui Rosenoriginally published in Mountain Record journal: Teachings of the Insentient (1998) “Is everything in the world in the middle of my heart?” my nephew Austin asks me, out of the blue. He is four; I am dumbstruck. “Y-yes, absolutely,” I stammer. “Cars and trucks too?” he goes on. “Uh-huh,” I reply. I
- [All the Way to Heaven](https://zmm.org/all-the-way-to-heaven/) - by Amy Shoko BrownOriginally published in Mountain Record journal: "Death and Renewal" (1993) For a long time after Michael died I wanted to write but didn’t because somehow it felt like taking advantage of his absence. It was as if in some way Michael was looking over my shoul­der and saying, “How could you do
- [Lone Zen](https://zmm.org/lone-zen/) - by Bill Kigen Delaney Originally published in Mountain Record journal: "Fear and Fearlessness" (1992)
- [Wilderness Camping as a Retreat](https://zmm.org/wilderness-camping-as-a-retreat/) - by Robert Genjin Savageoriginally published in the Mountain Record journal on Compassion (1991) Before I discovered Zen, week-long solo backpacking trips were my sesshins. The absence of human references in the blank stare of nature can either quiet the mind or drive it crazy. I’ve experienced both. Usually the former happens, especially if you keep
- [Shikantaza is for Wimps](https://zmm.org/shikantaza-is-for-wimps/) - by Maureen Jisho Ford originally publishing in Mountain Record journal: Wellness (1990)

## Pages

- [Homepage](https://zmm.org/) - May we open new pathways to creating societiesthat value and nurture generosity and peace.And may we realize the Buddha Way Together. Welcome to Zen Mountain Monastery, a modern Zen Monastery nestled in the foothills of the Catskill mountains, currently offering in-person retreats and online programs. ZMM is affiliated with The Mountains and Rivers Order, a
- [Blog](https://zmm.org/blog/)
- [Teachers and Staff](https://zmm.org/teachers-and-staff/) - TEACHERS Visit the Media Page for an ongoing collection of recorded talks. Many teachings in print can be found at MountainRecord.org. FOUNDER John Daido Loori, Roshi | (1931-2009) Daido Roshi was the founder of Zen Mountain Monastery and the Mountains and Rivers Order, and served as the guiding teacher for almost 30 years. A holder of the Soto
- [Governance](https://zmm.org/governance/) - Shared Governance The Mountains and Rivers Order has evolved over the years to include a number of co-leadership bodies, each with its own functions and reach. The Teachers Council, comprised of all active teachers within the MRO, discusses matters related to all aspects of practice and training within the Order. The Guardian Council is comprised
- [Staying Connected](https://zmm.org/staying-connected/) - Sangha Practice Groups We encourage everyone participating in any of our Zoom events to add your pronouns to your name in order to promote gender inclusion. To do this, once in the Zoom meeting click on the three dots in the corner of your screen, edit your name and add your pronouns. Here’s a link
- [Live](https://zmm.org/live/) - Fusatsu Ceremony Fusatsu CerremonyFriday, March 27th7:00pm - 9:00pmWe will start with a 35 minute period of zazen. Morning ZazenWednesday through Saturday4:45am – 7:00am EST (includes liturgy service)*except for last week of the month, when we are in an intensive retreat Evening ZazenTuesday through Saturday7:30pm – 9:00pm EST*except for last week of the month, when we
- [About ZMM Residency](https://zmm.org/about-zmm-residency/) - Request Application
- [Ango](https://zmm.org/ango/) - What is Ango? Ango—“peaceful dwelling”—is a traditional intensive training period common to many schools of Buddhism. Read More Ango traces its history to the time of Shakyamuni Buddha and the early sangha. Each year, as the monsoon rains began, the community would gather together. This enabled everyone to deepen their practice and polish their understanding
- [Media](https://zmm.org/media/) - Featured Dharma Talk Watch Video Don’t Overlook Anything One of the hallmarks of Zen teaching is that the deepest truth is indivisible from the most ordinary moment. When we release our habitual, grasping mind, then the whole universe can come alive, and we can awaken to our boundless nature in the midst of the most
- [Diamond Net](https://zmm.org/diamond-net/) - Offering support and advocacy for practice in times of need Help with challenges and life changes – you are not alone The inevitabilities of old age, sickness, and death are no different today than they were nearly 2500 years ago when the Buddha encountered them as a young prince. With this in mind, a group
- [Zen Kids and Teens](https://zmm.org/zen-kids-and-teens/) - Our youth and family programs help children and teenagers develop self-awareness, kindness, and a sense of interconnectedness with all beings. Zazen is the heart of our practice. Even a few minutes of stillness supports children to enjoy calm minds and bodies, bring more attention to the present moment, and meet each other with kindness. Creative expression invites children and teens
- [DEIJ](https://zmm.org/deij/) - We invite and welcome every person seeking refuge in the ancient teachings of wisdom and compassion to practice with our Sangha. The Mountains & Rivers Order of Zen Buddhism stands firmly against hatred and violence in all its forms. Click here to read our Inclusion Statement. Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Justice in the Mountains and
- [Earth Initiative](https://zmm.org/earth-initiative/) - Earth Awareness, Earth Body Bring your heart/mind and “gather under the tree” at our next Green Dragon gathering, on the first Monday of each month, 7pm, where we will hear from each other, reflect on nourishing words from environmental/dharma leaders, and turn to embrace each month’s call to action, caring for our planet and all
- [Year Long Intensive at ZMM](https://zmm.org/year-long-intensive-at-zmm/) - For those wishing to devote an extended period of time to their spiritual practice, the Year-Long Intensive is a demanding but life-transforming experience. Committing to a year allows you to benefit from the seasonal rhythms of the schedule, build a deeper connection to the sangha, develop a relationship to the teachers and seniors, and feel
- [One Month Residential Retreat at ZMM](https://zmm.org/one-month-residential-retreat-at-zmm/) - The Monastery’s residential sangha is made up of monastics who make a lifetime commitment and lay residents of all ages who commit to being here for a week, a month, or a year or more. A one-month retreat is our most popular way to enter training; it offers an intense and varied experience which is
- [All Programs](https://zmm.org/programs/) - Here you can find in-person events and online programs as well, including recurring Zazen, Liturgy and Study Groups, Affinity Groups, and other offerings on Sangha Practice Groups and Zazen and Liturgy Online. See all the Upcoming Programs listed below for all updated information at the ZMM and ZCNYC locations, as well as webcasts and online retreats. For information
- [Financial Costs of Studentship](https://zmm.org/financial-costs-of-studentship/) - Since the time of the Buddha, the Monastery and lay sangha have had an intimate and mutually-reliant relationship, supporting and nourishing each other. Monastery and Temple program fees make it possible for the Order to support and sustain the monastics, the buildings and grounds, and all that’s necessary to run retreats and residencies. Student donations
- [Student Member Dues](https://zmm.org/student-member-dues/) - To pay dues for MRO Students or Practicing Members, please click the appropriate category. If you would like to make a general donation to Zen Mountain Monastery and/or the Zen Center of NYC, click here. Student Dues Formal students are those who wish to enter into formal training in the MRO and are making a commitment
- [Buildings and Grounds](https://zmm.org/buildings-and-grounds/) - According to the ancient Chinese art of geomancy, the site of the Monastery—at the confluence of two rivers (the Beaverkill and Esopus), with a mountain to the north (Tremper Mountain)—is an auspicious place for religious practice. Designated by the Monastery’s first Board of Directors as a nature sanctuary, to remain “forever wild,” the property comprises
- [Practicing Members](https://zmm.org/practicing-members/) - Deepen Your Connection The Practicing Member program was created for those wishing to develop and maintain a relationship with the teachers and sangha at Zen Mountain Monastery and the Zen Center of NYC, but without the formal requirements of a Training Student. Becoming a Practicing Member is a great way to support the Dharma in your
- [Visiting the Monastery](https://zmm.org/visiting-the-monastery/) - **PRE-REGISTRATION REQUIRED FOR ALL SUNDAY VISITORS. NO DROP-IN SUNDAY VISITORS PLEASE!** Register ahead of your arrival on our PROGRAMS webpage Each month, we offer programs for new visitors. Beginning Instruction is offered on alternate Sunday mornings and on one Wednesday evening each month. We also offer a weekend Introduction to Zen Training Retreat as well as various other weekend retreats and residential programs. For returning visitors who have had
- [Beginning Instruction](https://zmm.org/beginning-instruction/) - We offer Beginning Instruction in zazen and an orientation to the Monastery in-person at Zen Mountain Monastery every other Sunday Morning, and once a month on Wednesday evenings. We also offer Beginning Instruction every other month over zoom. Registration times are listed below. Once you've received beginning instruction, you are welcome to come sit with
- [Health & Safety Protocols](https://zmm.org/pandemic-response/) - Acknowledging that the official Covid emergency has ended, we have a new health and wellness policy that applies to all visitors. For all day visitors: Vaccination and boosters are encouraged but not required. No rapid test is required. Masking is optional. If you have a cough or any flu-like symptoms, please reschedule your visit to the
- [The Sangha Harmony Advisory Council (SHAC)](https://zmm.org/shac/) - SHAC listens to the sangha through reflection, dialogue, and care. If you have reflections, concerns, or experiences you’d like to share, you’re welcome to reach us here. Send a reflection to SHAC via Listening Form The Sangha Harmony Advisory Council (SHAC) is a representative, lay-led body within the Mountains and Rivers Order (MRO) dedicated to
- [404 - Not Found](https://zmm.org/404-2/) - The content you are looking for cannot be found. You may have followed a broken link or an outdated bookmark.
- [Coming to a Retreat](https://zmm.org/coming-to-a-retreat/) - A retreat at the Monastery is different from those offered at most other retreat centers. Participants take part in a unique integration of the retreat’s topic and Zen training, stepping into the monastic schedule and cloistered community for a weekend. For a complete listing of current retreats at both of our locations, check here: Zen
- [About Mountains and Rivers Order](https://zmm.org/about-mountains-and-rivers-order/)
- [Danica Shoan Sensei Talks](https://zmm.org/media/danica-shoan-sensei-talks/)
- [Ron Hogen Green Talks](https://zmm.org/media/ron-hogen-green/)
- [Entering Zen Training](https://zmm.org/entering-zen-training/) - Entering Zen Training in the MRO If you feel an affinity with the Zen path you may wish to bring the practice more deeply into your entire life. There are different ways to explore Zen training: as a formal lay student in the world, in full-time residence at the Monastery for a week, a month, or up to a
- [Recommended Reading](https://zmm.org/recommended-reading/) - **An updated list is in the works! Please check back in the future.** Stage I: Records of Ancient Masters Yampolsky, Philip B., trans., The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch: The text of the TunHuang Manuscript. New York: Columbia University Press, 1998. Records of Modern Masters Aitken, Robert. Taking the Path of Zen. San Francisco: North
- [Introduction to Zen Training Weekend](https://zmm.org/intro-to-zen-weekend/) - Offered Monthly, an Introduction to Zen Training Weekend is a wonderful way to explore how Zen practice and training can function in all aspects of our lives. Led by resident teachers and training staff at Zen Mountain Monastery. Consider signing up for one of these listed below:
- [Monastery Schedule](https://zmm.org/monastery-schedule/) - Here is the daily schedule for Spring and Fall Ango training periods, as well as the lighter schedule for the Summer and Winter training periods. Note: the Monastery is closed during our monthly sesshin to daily visitors, generally the last week of every month. SPRING & FALL ANGO Tuesday2:00 – 5:00 PM Work Practice5:00 – 6:00 Art
- [Liturgy](https://zmm.org/liturgy/) - Liturgy can be one of the most intriguing and challenging aspects of Buddhist practice. For many, religious liturgy is inseparable from the worship of God. But because Zen liturgy is not based on the belief in a supreme being, it requires that we approach it with a genuine desire to understand what is being expressed and revealed through
- [Financial Assistance](https://zmm.org/financial-assistance/) - Please don’t let financial issues prevent you from attending a program at the Monastery. If you can’t afford the program fee, there are options: 1. Scholarships – We currently provide scholarship assistance upon request. Scholarships are open to anyone based upon need and are intended to help cover retreat costs. Please click here to apply. 2. Diversity,
- [Interviews](https://zmm.org/media/interviews/)
- [John Daido Loori (1931-2009)](https://zmm.org/media/john-daido-loori-1931-2009/)
- [Other MRO Talks](https://zmm.org/media/other-mro-talks/)
- [Jody Hojin Kimmel](https://zmm.org/media/jody-hojin-kimmel/)
- [Geoffrey Shugen Arnold Talks](https://zmm.org/media/geoffrey-shugen-arnold/)
- [Intro to Zen Weekend-origional](https://zmm.org/intro-to-zen-weekend-original/) - Introduction to Zen Training Weekend with Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi, Shoan Ankele, Osho and Gokan Bonebakker, Osho August 1 - 3, 2025 Zen Mountain Monastery Are you new to meditation or Zen Buddhist practice? Have you read books about Zen, or been doing meditation on your own? Do you think you’d like to study with
- [Directions to ZMM](https://zmm.org/directions-to-zmm/) - We’re Easy to Find Our street address is 871 Plank Road, Mount Tremper, NY 12457 By Car From the South: Take NY Thruway 87 to Exit 19 (Kingston). At the traffic circle, take Route 28 West (Pine Hill) for about 20 miles. Turn right at the Mt Tremper exit. Follow the road until you reach a
- [Retreats](https://zmm.org/retreats/)
- [Meditation Instructions](https://zmm.org/meditation-instructions/) - We offer beginning instruction in zazen every few months over Zoom, and in person at the Monastery on many Sundays and Wednesday evenings. You can find dates for this and other events on our Online Programs web page, and more information about unique opportunities for residency at the Monastery on this page. Zazen, a form of seated meditation, is at the
- [Zen Arts](https://zmm.org/zen-arts/) - Since its very founding in 1980, Zen Mountain Monastery has celebrated and promulgated the use of creative expression as a means of spiritual inquiry. The Zen arts provide a unique platform for direct observation of things as they are in the present moment; and not not just an observation but a recognition of shared identity
- [ZMM Residency Photo Album](https://zmm.org/zmm-residency-photo-album/) - We do our best to provide applicants with a sense of what residency is like, but even with this information, it’s safe to say that your image of what residential Zen training is like will not match the actual experience. In some ways, residency will exceed your expectations, providing you with a transformative experience that
- [Zazen Online](https://zmm.org/zazen-online/) - Practice and enlightenment, the masters have long said, are both solitary and social endeavors. We need each other for reflection, encouragement and inspiration. Though some may have a strong capacity for seclusion, sangha is one of the three precious gems for a very good reason. We depend on each other to wake up. At this
- [Zen Mountain Monastery](https://zmm.org/zen-mountain-monastery/) - Since ancient times, monasteries have been places where seekers could delve deeply into the deepest questions of life and death. Built in the 1920s and 30’s, Zen Mountain Monastery was originally a Catholic retreat center and boys’ camp. Now, for over three decades, it has offered practitioners from all walks of life a refuge from
- [Donate](https://zmm.org/donate/) - Donations to the Mountains and Rivers Order The Mountains and Rivers Order operates without a large endowment, depending completely on students, retreat participants, friends and supporters for the funds to continue its many services. All donations are tax deductible. Your gifts are greatly appreciated. Donations received by Zen Mountain Monastery will be used, as needed,
- [Donations](https://zmm.org/donations-to-mro/)
- [Retreat Teachers](https://zmm.org/retreat-teachers/)
- [Newsletter Sign Up](https://zmm.org/newsletter-sign-up/) - We have three primary newsletters: Mountain Notes (for ZMM), Temple Notes (for ZCNYC), and Monastery Store (for our product store). Sign up for any or all of the newsletters and receive information on programs, events, sangha news, and ZMM related products. Mountain Notes See Sample Newsletter > SIGN UP Temple Notes See Sample Newsletter >
- [Accessibility](https://zmm.org/accessibility/) - General zmm.org strives to ensure that its services are accessible to people with disabilities. zmm.org has invested a significant amount of resources to help ensure that its website is made easier to use and more accessible for people with disabilities, with the strong belief that every person has the right to live with dignity, equality,
- [Beyond Fear of Differences Sangha Forum](https://zmm.org/bfod-sangha-forum/) - Please Join Us for the BFoD Sangha Forum In the summer of 2017, there was an urgent call to action made from sangha members of color to Mountains and Rivers Order leadership to address lingering diversity and equity gaps in the Order. These problem areas—as outlined by the sangha members of color—were identified as lack
- [What Is Whiteness](https://zmm.org/what-is-whiteness/) - Sunday, monthly, 1-2:30pm“Me & White Supremacy” Sangha GroupThis group is for those who identify as white and is part of an ongoing monthly inquiry- based in Dharma practice- into Whiteness and it’s many biases and blindspots, using the study guide My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakem. The six-month commitment MRO group is now closed, but feel free to
- [Dues Payment Confirmation](https://zmm.org/dues-payment-confirmation/) - Your donation was received. We sent you an email confirming your transaction. Please review it to make sure all details are correct. Return to ZMM homepage >>
- [ZESI Retreats](https://zmm.org/zesi-retreats/)
- [Meditation Intensives](https://zmm.org/meditation-intensives/)
- [Women's Retreats](https://zmm.org/womens-retreats/)
- [Buddhist Studies Retreats](https://zmm.org/buddhist-studies-retreats/)
- [Arts Retreats](https://zmm.org/arts-retreats/)
- [Video Conferences](https://zmm.org/video-conferences/) - In 2016, we launched a video conference series open to formal students and practicing members. Each month at least one of the teachers in the Order offers a conversation topic and those students who have pre-registered join that teacher at an appointed time using the Zoom web conference platform. Participation is free and on a first
- [LGBTQ Tea Group](https://zmm.org/lgbtq-tea-group/) - The LGBTQ Group at Fire Lotus Temple is a place for practitioners in the MRO to explore how the dharma teachings can illuminate life as an LGBTQ person. We want to create a space to help us be more visible to ourselves and to one another, and we envision the group as a way for LGBTQ sangha
- [Thank You For Your Donation](https://zmm.org/thank-you-for-your-donation/) - A confirmation email has been sent to your email address. Your generosity helps insure the vitality of the Monastery so that all who seek the dharma have a dedicated place to practice. We sincerely appreciate your gift. Whether your donation was a one-time or a recurring monthly donation, please know that it is being directed
- [Inclusion Statement](https://zmm.org/inclusion-statement/) - To All Seeking Refuge In this time of challenge and heightened uncertainty, we invite and welcome every person seeking refuge in the ancient teachings of wisdom and compassion to practice with our Sangha. If you are black or brown, white or any other race or color, you are welcome here. If you’re Asian, Latino, Middle
- [Letter from the Chief Disciple](https://zmm.org/letter-from-kiju/) - Dear Sangha, On his last trip to New Zealand, Shugen Roshi asked me to serve as Chief Disciple for an ango period the following year. I must admit I experienced some anxiety and trepidation, but there was only a millisecond of hesitation before I said “yes.” My “yes” feels deep and true. I am deeply
- [Scholarship Application Form](https://zmm.org/scholarship-application-form/)
- [DEIJ Application Form](https://zmm.org/deij-application-form/)
- [Contact](https://zmm.org/contact/) - We’re here to answer your questions about the Monastery and to support your practice however we can. Please don’t hesitate to reach out—we’d be glad to hear from you. Zen Mountain Monastery 871 Plank RdPO Box 197Mount Tremper, NY 12457845.688.2228registrar@dharma.net Office HoursTue: 2:30 – 5 pmWed – Sat: 9 am – noon and 1:30 to
- [The Buddha’s Words on Loving-kindness](https://zmm.org/the-buddhas-words-on-loving-kindness/) - Translated from the Pali by The Amaravati Sangha This is what should be doneBy one who is skilled in goodness,And who knows the path of peace:Let them be able and upright,Straightforward and gentle in speech,Humble and not conceited,Contented and easily satisfied,Unburdened with duties and frugal in their ways.Peaceful and calm and wise and skillful,Not proud
- [Verse of the Kesa](https://zmm.org/verse-of-the-kesa/) - Vast is the robe of liberation,a formless field of benefaction.I wear the Tathagata’s teachings,saving all sentient beings.
- [The Four Immeasurables](https://zmm.org/the-four-immeasurables/) - May all beings be free from suffering and the root of sufferingMay all beings know happiness and the root of happinessMay all beings live in sympathetic joy, rejoicing in the happiness of othersMay all beings live in equanimity, free from passion, aggression and delusion
- [Three Treasures](https://zmm.org/three-treasures/) - Liturgist: Being One with the Buddha All: With all sentient beings, raise the bodhi mind. Let the supreme way be realized Liturgist: Being one with the Dharma All: With all sentient beings, penetrate all sutras. Let wisdom be like the ocean Liturgist: Being one with the Sangha All: With all sentient beings, lead the people.
- [Seven Buddhas](https://zmm.org/seven-buddhas/) - Seven Buddhas Namu Past Seven Buddhas Namu Shakyamuni Buddha Namu Manjushri Bodhisattva Namu Samantabhadra Bodhisattva Namu Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva Namu Maitreya Buddha Namu Successive Daiosho
- [Gatha of Atonement](https://zmm.org/gatha-of-atonement/) - Gatha of Atonement All evil karma ever committed by me since of oldOn account of my beginningless greed, anger and ignoranceBorn of my body, mouth and thoughtNow I atone for it all
- [Enmei Jukku Kannon Gyo](https://zmm.org/enmei-jukku-kannon-gyo/) - Repeat three times Kan ze on na mu butsu yo butsu u in yo butsu uen bup po so en jo raku ga jo cho nenkan ze on bo nen kan ze on nennen ju shin ki nen nen fu ri shin English translation by Maezumi Roshi Kanzeon! At one with the Buddha, related to
- [Oryoki](https://zmm.org/oryoki/) - All:Buddha was born at Kapilavastu,enlightened at Magadha,taught at Varanasi,entered Nirvana at Kusinagara.Now I open Buddha Tathagata’s eating bowls;May we be relieved from self-clinging with all sentient beings. Liturgist:In the midst of the Three Treasures, with all sentient beings,let us recite the names of Buddha: All:Pure Dharmakaya Vairochana Buddha;Complete Sambhogakaya Vairochana Buddha;Numerous Nirmanakaya Shakyamuni Buddhas;Future Maitreya
- [Gatha on Opening the Sutra](https://zmm.org/gatha-on-opening-the-sutra/) - The Dharma, incomparably profound and infinitely subtle,is rarely encountered, even in millions of ages.Now we see it, hear it, receive and maintain it.May we completely realize the Tathagata’s true meaning.
- [Women Ancestors](https://zmm.org/women-ancestors/) - Prajna Paramita Daiosho Maha Maya Daiosho Srimala Daiosho Ratnavati Daiosho Mahapajapati Daiosho Khema Daiosho Patachara Daiosho Dhammadinna Daiosho Sukha Daiosho Bhadda Kundalakesa Daiosho Yasodhara Daiosho Kisagotami Daiosho Prabhuta Daishi Sinha Vijurmbhita Daiosho Vasumitra Daishi Zongchi Daiosho Ling Xingpo Daiosho Pang Lingzhao Daishi Liu Tiemo Daiosho Moshan Liaoran Daiosho Miaoxin Daiosho Daoshen Daiosho Huiguang Daiosho Kongshi
- [Ancestral Lineage](https://zmm.org/ancestral-lineage/) - Note (April 2023): We are making a change in how we chant our Indian and Chinese Ancestor’s names during our Sunday Program. We are now chanting these names using their original Sanskrit and Chinese pronunciations. Below please find recordings from members of our sangha to help you learn the correct pronunciation. The above audio contains
- [Daihishin Dharani](https://zmm.org/daihishin-dharani/) - Namu kara tan no tora ya ya namu ori ya boryo ki chi shiu ra yaFuji sato bo ya moko sato bo ya mo ko kya runi kya ya enSa hara ha ei shu tan no ton sha namu shiki riToi mo ori ya boryo ki chi shiu ra riTo bo na mu no ra
- [Identity of Relative and Absolute](https://zmm.org/identity-of-relative-and-absolute/) - The mind of the great sage of India was intimately conveyed from West to East.Among human beings are wise ones and fools,but in the Way there is no northern or southern ancestor.The subtle source is clear and bright,the tributary stream flows through the darkness.To be attached to things is illusion,to encounter the absolute is not
- [Sho Sai Myo Kichijo Dharani](https://zmm.org/sho-sai-myo-kichijo-dharani/) - Repeat three times No mo san man da moto nan oha ra chi koto sha sono nanTo ji to en gya gya gya ki gya ki un nun shiu raShiu ra hara shiu ra hara shiu ra chisu saChisu sa chisu ri chisu ri sowa ja sowa jaSen chi gya shiri ei somo ko
- [All Buddhas Dedication](https://zmm.org/all-buddhas-dedication/) - All buddhas throughout space and time,All bodhisattvas mahasattvas,Maha Prajna Paramita.
- [Maha Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra](https://zmm.org/maha-prajna-paramita-heart-sutra/) - Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva, doing deep Prajna Paramita,clearly saw emptiness of all the five conditions,thus completely relieving misfortune and pain.Oh Shariputra, form is no other than emptiness,emptiness no other than form.Form is exactly emptiness, emptiness exactly form.Sensation, conception, discrimination, awareness are likewise like this.Oh Shariputra, all dharmas are forms of emptiness;not born, not destroyed, not stained, not
- [Four Bodhisattva Vows](https://zmm.org/four-bodhisattva-vows/) - Sentient beings are numberless; I vow to save them.Desires are inexhaustible; I vow to put an end to them.The Dharmas are boundless; I vow to master them.The Buddha Way is unattainable; I vow to attain it.
- [Receiving the Zen Precepts](https://zmm.org/receiving-the-zen-precepts/) - To see the secular as a hindrance to practice is to only know that in the secular nothing is sacred; it is not yet realizing that in sacredness, nothing is secular. Realize the Precepts as your own body and mind and realize sacredness. — John Daido Loori, Roshi In the MRO, taking the Buddhist Precepts
- [Practicing Member Dues](https://zmm.org/practicing-dues/) - Becoming a Practicing Member is a way to maintain a connection with the Mountains and Rivers Order; have some access to the teachers through video mondos and livestreamed dharma talks; and to support the work of the Order. You will receive a password to the Practicing Members activity page when you register. For more information,
- [Lay Monastic Practice](https://zmm.org/lay-monastic-practice/) - The Way of the Lay Practitioner Lay practitioners have always been a vital part of Mahayana Buddhism. The history of lay practice goes back to the time of the Buddha and the great lay practitioner Vimalakirti, during whose life the term “white-robed one” began to be used. In the MRO, John Daido Loori, Roshi designed
- [Eight Gates of Zen](https://zmm.org/eight-gates-of-zen/) - The Eight Gates of Zen were developed by John Daido Loori Roshi and form the basis of training in the Mountains and Rivers Order. The Eight Gates offer us a tangible way to take up the whole of our lives as a path of spiritual practice, revealing that whether we are engaged in a busy life in
- [Prison Sangha](https://zmm.org/prison-sangha/) - NBPS Facilitator Resources Login The National Buddhist Prison Sangha (NBPS) is a nationwide network of Buddhist volunteers. NBPS’s mission is to sustain a correspondence program in Zen Buddhist practice with inmates across the country in prison facility settings. In addition, NBPS also supports and leads Buddhist meditation practice groups in New York State. NBPS came
- [Monastery Calendar](https://zmm.org/monastery-calendar/)
- [Beyond Fear of Difference Resource List](https://zmm.org/beyond-fear-of-difference-resource-list/) - Note: some of these resources focus on white-embodied people studying together to undo racism/classism, and some resources focus on BIAPoC peoples specifically, and some on multifaceted community building and learning. Online Courses in Undoing Racism **based in Buddhism White Awake —online courses and resources for white embodied people undoing racism and classism Finding Our Freedom —courses and support
- [In Solidarity and Support of AAPI](https://zmm.org/in-solidarity-and-support-of-aapi/) - We are sickened and heartbroken by the recent attacks in Atlanta and to the rising tide of hate crimes that have targeted people of Asian descent in this country over this past year. The murders on March 16th, 2021 once again point to a central crisis in our nation, in which the evil of white
- [Black Lives Matter](https://zmm.org/black-lives-matter/) - Dear Sangha, Our hearts are heavy with news of the May 14th shooting in Buffalo, as we struggle to hold and reckon with the deep pain and suffering that this violence has brought into our world. Once again, we are faced with the magnitude of America’s racial karma. This is karma that is deep, painful
- [Affiliates](https://zmm.org/affiliates/) - Affiliate Groups in the Mountains and Rivers Order give practitioners who live near one another an opportunity to come together for zazen as well as for periodic retreats and intensives with visiting MRO teachers and senior students. Sitting with an affiliate group offers an excellent introduction to Zen practice and provides a supportive environment in
- [Becoming a Student](https://zmm.org/becoming-a-student/) - Becoming a formal student is a process that helps make conscious our spiritual motivation. The purpose of this is to help us clarify Buddhist practice as an important part of our life by bringing us into contact with the deeper, more fundamental aspirations of what we want our life to be about. This then helps
- [Pronouns](https://zmm.org/pronouns/) - What is a pronoun? Pronouns are the words that people use to refer to other people or things instead of using their names. When talking about others in the third person we commonly use pronouns like “he/him/his,” “she/her/hers,” and “they/them/theirs.” Less common are neopronouns, such as “xe/xem/xyr,” “ze/hir/hirs,” and “ey/em/eir.” Why are we talking about
- [BFOD History](https://zmm.org/bfod-history/) - Since 2017, through the combined efforts and inspiration of the sangha, we have created: Beyond Fear of Differences Planning Committee—a group of 17 Black, Brown and white sangha members working together on uprooting racism and oppression. Membership was equally split between BIAPOC and white people. The group met regularly for about two years, dealing with
- [Temple Advisory Council](https://zmm.org/tac/) - The purpose of the Zen Center of New York City (ZCNYC) Advisory Council is to provide updates, give advice, and make recommendations to the ZCNYC Abbess, Abbot or Guiding Teacher, and the Director of Operations on matters pertinent to the smooth running, operation and maintenance of the Fire Lotus Temple. ZCNYC, while a branch of
- [Board of Directors](https://zmm.org/governance-2/) - MRO Board of Directors Observer Guidelines Training students of the Mountains and Rivers Order are eligible to attend the quarterly board meetings. This is a way to learn more about the functioning and responsibilities of the board, which is a vital aspect of governance within the MRO. Observers are asked to observe the following guidelines:
- [Beyond Fear of Differences](https://zmm.org/beyond-fear-of-differences/)
- [ZCNYC](https://zmm.org/zcnyc/)

## Podcasts

- [Acupuncture Needle of Zazen](https://zmm.org/podcast/acupuncture-needle-of-zazen/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/28/26 - The subtle healing energy of zazen is likened to an acupuncture needle by Hongzhi, and Shugen Roshi explores how this teaching functions in our own practice life. Within zazen, are we truly engaging what is right in front of us? The simple and direct nature of zazen brings us back again and again, and so we return and settle into the ease of being within our own minds. Hongzhi invites us to “know without touching…and rest there.” Things become closer, softer, bright and clear.
- [Finding the Monastery in Samsara](https://zmm.org/podcast/finding-the-monastery-in-samsara/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - ZMM - 3/27/26 - In this Renewal of Vows (Fusatsu) talk, Shoan Sensei offers the perspective that we are practicing within samsara, exactly where we are. Here we can come very close to the narrow habits and patterns that create suffering—something we cannot do in some imagined fantasy of a Buddha Land. Taking up the place where we find ourselves as the place of our own vows, we can discover ways to bring forward our infinite capacity to leave possessiveness and self-delusion behind, and, with the support of the precepts, learn to be truly free. It is here that transformation can happen.
- [Entering the Wilderness](https://zmm.org/podcast/entering-the-wilderness/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 3/26/26 - A very human practice is to go into unfamiliar places, maybe on a pilgrimage or a journey of some sort into the unknown. What might be the benefit of this type of practice, why did it come to exist? Gokan Osho explores the Buddha’s teachings on facing one’s own mind, free of attachments. When we relax, and get very close to our direct experience, there is the possibility of transformations which can’t be prepared for.
- [Just Resting, While Freely Going Forth](https://zmm.org/podcast/just-resting-while-freely-going-forth/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - 3/25/26 - ZMM - Hogen Sensei asks the question: what is it to just rest? To let our busy preoccupation with our thoughts come to rest. Accepting all streams, everything becomes “one taste,” non-dual and not in opposition to anything. To truly settle down and allow the busyness to rest is to let the continuous flow be present just as it is, revealing the edges of what we call our “self” in the moment-to-moment flow of reality.
- [Ango Opening Talk at Fire Lotus Temple](https://zmm.org/podcast/ango-opening-talk-at-fire-lotus-temple/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/22/26 - Join Hojin Sensei for her Spring Ango opening remarks at the Temple. Auspicious Beginning of Spring! Homage to the buddha, dharma, sangha treasures! How auspicious! What does it mean to dwell peacefully—together—right here in the midst of things as they are? To take delight in development? Ango gives us a field to see this clearly.
- [Offerings to the Land Deity](https://zmm.org/podcast/offerings-to-the-land-deity/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 6/29/25 - Shugen Roshi asks, “If all things are empty with no inherent existence, then how do things come into being?” In other words, how are we creating our world, moment by moment? How do we do this consciously, intentionally, bringing our vows to life? Every occurrence is handed to us fresh, and in practice we can learn to bring our best selves forward, without grasping or clinging to anything extra. - From the Treasury of the True Dharma Eye - Case 18 - "Nanquan and the Land Deity."
- [Compassionate Interdependence](https://zmm.org/podcast/compassionate-interdependence/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 7/6/25 - The teachings of dependent origination tell us that all that arises does so with all of reality: "because of this, that, and because of that, this." In studying what we call “the self,” Shoan Osho reminds us that we are not a fixed, unchanging element among all the other aspects of life. Rather, we are the manifestation of causes and conditions, interdependent with all of reality, full of innate wisdom and compassion. This is the benefit of our practice; it is our true interdependence.
- [What’s Opening?](https://zmm.org/podcast/whats-opening/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 7/12/25 - The Bright, Boundless Field is a practice instruction of Chan Master Hongzhi, found in the text Cultivating the Empty Field. Join Hojin in an exploration of this teaching of the great way to closely observe delusions using these ‘habits or seeming obstructions’ themselves to clarify and illuminate the field of awakening—opening to the truth body, the truth of our embodiment.
- [Practicing the Path: Right Understanding](https://zmm.org/podcast/practicing-the-path-right-understanding/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 7/13/25 - Many people describe a deep sense of “being home” when they arrive at a practice center. But how can we make the Noble Path our true home—wherever we are, whatever our circumstances? In this talk in his series on the Noble Eightfold Path, Gokan Osho reflects on the practice of Right Intention.
- [Singing the Body Electric: The Body in the Body](https://zmm.org/podcast/singing-the-body-electric-the-body-in-the-body/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 7/20/25 - What is this we think of as ‘my body’? Hojin Sensei brings in the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutra focusing on Buddha’s teaching to meditate on ‘the body in the body.’ Our culture already encourages a focus on the mind and the intellect, and because we’re educated to be in our heads, it can be really hard to include the body in our awareness as we’re developing the capacity for more presence. Hojin offers this talk as a tribute to poet and performance artist Andrea Gibson —who passed earlier this week— and delivers her poem, "I Sing the Body Electric, Especially When My Power’s Out."
- [Practicing the Path: Right Intention](https://zmm.org/podcast/practicing-the-path-right-intention/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 7/24/25 - The wisdom aspects of the Eightfold Path include Right Intention, or Right Thought. What is it to take full responsibility for our lives by practicing our intentions, our thoughts? How do we access the joy and ease through the Path? We practice zazen as instructed, and we also have to study and understand the truth of cause and effect, action and result, to understand the power of Right Intention and it’s impact on our lives.
- [Being Still](https://zmm.org/podcast/being-still-2/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZMM - 7/25/25 - What we do, how we use our minds and our time, can transform our lives. When we can quiet the constant referencing of a “self,” our internal preoccupations and obsessions, we begin to find the still point and rest there. In this Sesshin talk, Hojin Sensei invokes the stillness of a mountain range, and the stilling of turbid water as it settles, and the whole of reality that this can reveal.
- [Invoking A Vast Love](https://zmm.org/podcast/invoking-a-vast-love/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 7/26/25 - Invoking is more than simply using words. It is bringing forth all of our life energy and intention in a way that is transformative. Liturgy can be an entryway to this whole-body practice, expanding and opening our consciousness. When free of storytelling about the “self,” we are not at all separated from that “vastness of mind” that pervades the whole universe. In this way we open our whole selves to giving—and receiving—a vast love for all the world.
- [Reclaiming Royal Ease](https://zmm.org/podcast/reclaiming-royal-ease/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZMM - 7/27/25 - The wisdom of our bodies can be invoked precisely because it is always present, within, as our inherent Buddha nature. How then does the bearing of the body at ease enable us to meet the cries of the world? What is it to be a noble being? And how, through practice, can we verify this for ourselves? Join Hojin Sensei for this Dharma talk at the end of Interdependence Sesshin.
- [Sutra Walking](https://zmm.org/podcast/sutra-walking/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 8/3/25 - Often overlooked, kinhin (walking meditation) is a most important, exquisite practice of the transition of rising up off our mountain seat and walking into our everyday lives in an undivided manner. How do we walk in accord with the Dharma—touching this great earth with wisdom and care, amidst all that life presents to us? Are we walking towards or away greater understanding? Are these different? Hojin Sensei begins by sharing her own daily ritual for maintaining harmony and offers the teaching of Master Dogen, "We must devote ourselves to a detailed study of this virtue of walking.”
- [Compassion Starts in the Mind](https://zmm.org/podcast/compassion-starts-in-the-mind/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/3/25 - How do we meet our conscious mind, skillfully? Mind training offers us ways to see our self-centered thinking habits, meeting our minds directly, and using this quality to learn about ourselves and to experience humility. In this way, our capacity for compassion can increase and we can hold the world in an unconditional way. - From the Book of Serenity - Case 14 - "Attendant Huo Passes Tea"
- [This World, Your Buddha Field](https://zmm.org/podcast/this-world-your-buddha-field/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/10/25 - Living within the present world, surrounded by many acts of cruelty and hatred, each of us is called to recognize, liberate, and transform samsara as we are able to. The path to creating peace requires that we live within this reality, meeting our own strong emotions like frustration and despair and making use of the dharma to bring renewed energy and aspiration to the path. We can each ask: “What does my sphere of influence include?” What does this mind of practice encompass as a “Buddha Field,” and how within that reality can each of us serve?
- [Rejoicing in Virtue](https://zmm.org/podcast/rejoicing-in-virtue/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/17/25 - Shugen Roshi reminds us that mind is the basis of all conflicted action, and so it is to mind that we direct our aspirations and intentions to bring goodness and ease into the world. Using mind to intentionally bring a joyful, generous state of being forward, as Shantideva’s verses encourage, can shift even the most divisive moments we encounter in our world of activity. Our willingness to practice this edge makes all the difference.
- [Turning Words: A Mud Buddha](https://zmm.org/podcast/turning-words-a-mud-buddha/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/20/25 - In the language of koans, we are invited to step right into the embodied experience of the koan, which in this case is a Buddha made of mud which cannot pass through water. Can you immerse your mind in the muck and entanglement of a mud buddha? Is this mind trustworthy? To reveal our minds to ourselves, we can take up the method of focusing our own “miraculous awareness” within zazen, to bring forward the freedom and generosity to which we aspire. - Part 1 of 3. From the Blue Cliff Record, Case 96: Chao Chou's Three Turning Words
- [Deepening of Faith, Doubt & Determination](https://zmm.org/podcast/deepening-of-faith-doubt-determination/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 8/22/25 - As we practice over time, we mature in our practice and if we’re lucky we can also experience and appreciate that ripening in each other. Sharing the words of realized women and men from six centuries ago, Shoan Osho brings home our common commitment, shared questions and aspiration within ourselves and our dharma ancestors. Engaging our minds is the simple and direct way to deepen our understanding of our commonality, as well as our own unique ways of walking the Path.
- [Turning Words: A Gold Buddha](https://zmm.org/podcast/turning-words-a-gold-buddha/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/23/25 - The discriminating function of our minds has many benefits, and at the same time we need to reveal how it can become weaponized against ourselves. The furnace of a gold buddha might be seen as the more difficult entanglements of our lives, and yet within these circumstances we are empowered to completely transform the mind that resists and defends. Liberation takes determination and commitment to release our own obstructions. - Part 2 of 3. From the Blue Cliff Record, Case 96: Chao Chou's Three Turning Words
- [Turning Words: A Wood Buddha](https://zmm.org/podcast/turning-words-a-wood-buddha/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/24/25 - What is it to pass through something? Or to not pass through? In koan practice this image is utilized over and over again, and here a buddha made of wood cannot pass through a fire. To pass through or not presents a dilemma, the duality of good or bad, easy or difficult. How does the dharma help us to reach true freedom of mind? Shugen Roshi reminds us that suffering is always in the mind, and the end of suffering is the miraculous activity of our life itself. - Part 3 of 3. From the Blue Cliff Record, Case 96: Chao Chou's Three Turning Words
- [What Limits Your Freedom?](https://zmm.org/podcast/what-limits-your-freedom/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/30/25 - While many people search outside for the causes of feeling constrained and limited, the radical step toward transformation is to turn the light around. Coming close enough to see clearly our own constraining, deluded thinking—to see the truth in our own delusions— takes great courage and honesty. Before we can heal the world, we need to get clear about our own thinking and go beyond what appears to us as the limits of our freedom. This empowerment is always ultimately in our own hands. - From the Transmission of the Light, 32nd Zen Ancestor: Daoxin
- [Fall 2025 Ango Opening Talk - "The Way of Everyday Life: Genjokoan" - Shugen Roshi](https://zmm.org/podcast/fall-2025-ango-opening-talk-the-way-of-everyday-life-genjokoan-shugen-roshi/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 8/31/25 - Shugen Roshi introduces the theme of the MRO 90-day Fall Ango 2025 training period, "The Way of Everyday Life: Genjokoan."
- [Every Day Life and Ancestral Streaming Currents](https://zmm.org/podcast/every-day-life-and-ancestral-streaming-currents/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 9/7/25 - “Buddhas and ancestors of old were as we, we in the future shall be Buddhas and ancestors.” This quote is from the 13th century Zen master Eihei Dogen in his Bodhisattva Vow to express gratitude for the ancestors continuous guidance in our practice for the benefit of all beings. Hojin Sensei shares this recognition that we are the recipients of innumerable currents of life streaming into and influencing our own lives. She follows this with an introduction to the life of Great Ancestor Eihei Dogen and his fascicle Genjo Koan that we are studying this Ango.
- [When All Dharmas Are Buddhadharma](https://zmm.org/podcast/when-all-dharmas-are-buddhadharma/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 9/7/25 - Becoming aware of our sense of self is central to understanding the True Self—the self of no-self. And with practice, we come to realize that the ten thousand things are none other than what we call “self.” In this talk, Shugen Roshi introduces Genjokoan, a fascicle of Dogen, which brings us face to face with the everyday reality of our lives. Our most important question then becomes: How do we live freely within this great truth, when all dharmas are Buddhadharma and nothing is left outside? (Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks Part 1)
- [Practicing The Path: Right Action & Right Livelihood](https://zmm.org/podcast/practicing-the-path-right-action-right-livelihood/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 9/14/25 - The Eightfold Path offers us a way to bring the Dharma teachings directly into the practice of our lives. In this talk, Gokan Osho continues exploring these core teachings, turning to how we understand ourselves and how we engage through body, speech, and mind. With attention to moral and ethical conduct, he examines our relationship to cause and effect, and the potential impact — both beneficial and harmful — we can have on everything around us.
- [Spring 2026 Ango Opening Talk - "The Turning Words of Hongzhi"](https://zmm.org/podcast/spring-2026-ango-opening-talk-the-turning-words-of-hongzhi/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/22/26 - Shugen Roshi introduces the theme of the MRO Spring Ango 2026 training period, "The Turning Words of Hongzhi".
- [Intimate Understanding](https://zmm.org/podcast/intimate-understanding/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 9/21/25 - Awareness is an essential aspect of being alive, and quite essential for doing good actions to bring healing to our troubled world. In Genjokoan, however, Dogen says a buddha doesn’t need to be aware of being a buddha. What does this mean? Is it a lack of awareness, or something else? Our entire world of experience centers around self-awareness, and a sense of “something” there, even when being truly selfless. This exploration by Shugen Roshi shows how this seeming duality can be a gate to our freedom, by closing the distance between us and them, this and that, self and other. (Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks Part 3)
- [To Study The Self, To Forget The Self](https://zmm.org/podcast/to-study-the-self-to-forget-the-self/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 9/24/25 - Being devoted to the study of the self which Dogen outlines in Genjokoan is quite different than being self-centered. Rather, it means to take up wholeheartedly the practice of living into our true nature. Making this path real—bringing our understanding out of the realm of concept and abstraction—becomes the entryway to the joy and ease of practice-realization. In recognizing our deluded, karmic self, we are freed to realize the true self, our true nature. That's where Dogen is pointing. (Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks Part 4)
- [The Secret Ingredient](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-secret-ingredient/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 9/25/25 - Being receptive to our minds and trusting in the path are essential ingredients for a zazen practice that is vibrant and alive. In a way, this is what distinguishes rote practice from real practice — receptivity, devotion, and wakefulness. Are we asking ourselves, “What is it?” Or are we filling in the blanks with our delusive inability to stay with not-knowing? Truly engaging in the practice — not merely thinking about it — is the living edge we all encounter, and it is this edge that Shoan Osho explores in this sesshin talk.
- [Fusatsu: Make Fresh](https://zmm.org/podcast/fusatsu-make-fresh/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZMM - 9/26/25 - Taking responsibility allows us to make fresh and new karma, to heal what needs to be healed. The vows of atonement or repentance are at the center of this ceremony of Fusatsu. Hojin Sensei explores what the words of our vows in this context mean, and how our intentions can turn the tides of harmful karma -- born of greed, anger and ignorance -- and allow us to heal. (Dharma Talk during the Mountains and Rivers Sesshin Fusatsu Ceremony)
- [Not Separate From Yourself](https://zmm.org/podcast/not-separate-from-yourself/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 9/27/25 - Zazen is a powerful practice for entering an intimate relationship with ourselves. Without adding anything extra, we have available at all times our true mind, our buddha nature, perfect and complete. But how to work with it skillfully? How to let go of all the suffering we carry, and re-create, moment by moment? Drawing from Dogen’s Genjokoan, Shugen Roshi takes up the opportunity this radical intimacy offers. - Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 5
- [Genjokoan Dharma Encounter](https://zmm.org/podcast/genjokoan-dharma-encounter/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 9/28/25 - Manifesting absolute reality—awakened reality—in everyday life is Genjokoan. In this lively Dharma Encounter with Hogen Sensei, the awakened reality of everyday life is explored as our fundamental practice. Sensei says “true realization manifests as compassionate action in the world; that’s the bottom line,” and asks that we each consider how we enter this ordinary, everyday actualization of compassion. (Dharma Encounter at the September 2025 Mountains and Rivers Sesshin)
- [Firewood Does Not Become Ash](https://zmm.org/podcast/firewood-does-not-become-ash/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 10/05/25 - The opportunity our lives offer is simply to live—not in the past, nor the future, but now—and this requires a measure of both faith and appreciation for all that is present, right now. Rather than living in memory and recollection, or in our hopes and fears, Dogen’s Genjokoan emphasizes that the dharma state of any phenomenon is just this, right now. - Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 6
- [Tending the Lamp](https://zmm.org/podcast/tending-the-lamp/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 10/12/25 - Passing this lamp that the Buddha lit, it falls to the next generation to tend that lamp for the next generation, and for generations to come. Building something new, whether a temple or a community as Daido Roshi and others from the Monastery’s early years have done, over time it’s the vow itself that comes alive. On this 45th Anniversary of ZMM, Shugen Roshi celebrates all those who helped to put down good roots here. When each of us arrive at the place of practice, the vows of our ancestors unfold.
- [Patient Forbearance](https://zmm.org/podcast/patient-forbearance/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 10/18/25 - How do you become ‘rested and ready’ to meet those things you’d rather hurry by, or bring under control and fix? Hojin Sensei reminds us that a simple pause can skillfully hold this tension of opposites, which calls on a deeper intimacy with the self through practice. In this way our actions align with the aspiration to Patience Paramita as practice itself. - Hojin Sensei's Saturday Zazenkai Talk 18th October at Fire Lotus Temple.
- [Atonement: Gate of Creation / Gate of Cessation](https://zmm.org/podcast/atonement-gate-of-creation-gate-of-cessation/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 10/19/25 - Hojin Sensei reminds us of the power of our heart-minds to heal, and shares helpful words from Maezumi Roshi, who noted our important “response-ability” to meet the harm created by ourselves and others. In the atonement practice of Fusatsu, we create a new path forward to open our hearts, be at ease and heal. - Hojin Sensei's Dharma Talk During the Fusatsu Ceremony.
- [Gaining Enlightenment](https://zmm.org/podcast/genjokoan-part-7-gaining-enlightenment/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 10/19/25 - We may aspire to enlightenment, or we may simply have faith in this path that seems to be leading us in a good direction. Enlightenment can seem a far away concept from the daily struggles of being human, but that sense of distance comes from seeking something outside of ourselves. The bright, luminous mind of enlightenment, Roshi reminds us, is always so much closer than we can imagine. (Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 7)
- [Come Closer](https://zmm.org/podcast/come-closer-2/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 10/22/25 - Our biggest challenges often take form in how we create or perpetuate suffering, and these are likely to be in stark contrast to the peace and groundedness experienced in zazen. In zazen we experience our true nature up close, but it often doesn’t seem to be in alignment with our restless and uneasy mind. How do we close the distance, take responsibility for the rift that seems impassable, and continue to move closer? - From the Master Dogen's True Dharma Eye - Case 10 - Qingyuan's "Come Closer"
- [Fusatsu: Encountering Our Own Completeness](https://zmm.org/podcast/fusatsu-encountering-our-own-completeness/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 10/24/25 - From Master Dogen’s Genjokoan, our environment is not separate from our basic nature, and all creatures move within their element. When we feel separate or create schisms, we are going to suffer until we can bring ourselves to practice in accord with reality as it is. In this talk given during a Renewal of Vows ceremony, Shugen Roshi teaches that when we have a sense of completeness with what is, what is real, there is joy and ease. And then we are free to be unhindered in bringing good into our world. (Dharma Talk during the Harvest Sesshin Fusatsu Ceremony. And from the Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 9)
- [Beyond Our View](https://zmm.org/podcast/beyond-our-view/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 10/25/25 - When we realize that we may not fully understand something, there is room to learn more. But if we think “I’ve got this,” we stop listening and there is very little room to learn anything. In order to access this profound dharma in a way that is transformative, we have to recognize when it's time to listen more deeply. Shugen Roshi continues exploring these profound teachings on practice and enlightenment contained in Genjokoan. - Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 8
- [Dharma Encounter: Sustaining What is True](https://zmm.org/podcast/dharma-encounter-sustaining-what-is-true/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 10/26/25 - Shugen Roshi explores how we and all beings strive to live in harmony with our environment, with our universe. With the capacity to choose, we also have a basic ethical sense of right and wrong arising within, from our true, non-dual nature. Skillful and unskillful actions are made by us continuously, and we do sense the difference. So how do we meet ourselves, and meet others, when it matters most? Roshi meets the sangha in a tender and lively exchange. (Dharma Encounter at the conclusion of the October 2025 Harvest Sesshin.)
- [Air is Life, Water is Life](https://zmm.org/podcast/air-is-life-water-is-life/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 11/2/25 - Genjokoan presents Dōgen’s perspective that practice and realization are not two separate stages but one seamless activity. This unified, non-dual nature is what every thing in the world moves within, like a bird in the air or a fish in the water. How do we practice being within our human element, the mind of concepts and ideas, a sense of self and others, of separation and difference, as not separate from anything at all? - Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 10
- [Fusatsu: Pure Heart Pure Mind](https://zmm.org/podcast/fusatsu-pure-heart-pure-mind/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - ZMM - 11/6/25 - The beautiful activity of Fusatsu, taking the time to recognize/acknowledge harm, atone (become one-with), and thereby shore up our footing on the Path. It's a way to bring to the fore the Buddha's earliest teaching: the pure precepts; To not create evil, to practice good, and to purify the mind (practice good for others.) In those terms, how do we do that? Shoan Osho talks about an aspect of the 4 immeasurables: vowing to "know the root of our suffering." How is that for each of us?
- [Jukai Ceremony at ZMM, November 2025](https://zmm.org/podcast/jukai-ceremony-at-zmm-november-2025/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 11/9/25 - Shugen Roshi officiates the November 2025 Ango Jukai ceremony at Zen Mountain Monastery. Today, five students formally receive the sixteen Buddhist precepts, taking up these living teachings, living vows in the company of the sangha with family and friends: Rami Dokyo Eskelin (The Way of Reverence), Sushravya Jigo Raghunath (Compassionate Strength), Josh Tokumon Dittmar (Sincere Inquiry), Robert Kyobu Pile (Dance the Unborn), Joshua Musho Weiner (To Illuminate the Dream).
- [Shoan Sensei's Dharma Transmission Vows and a Talk with Shugen Roshi and Shoan Sensei](https://zmm.org/podcast/shoan-senseis-dharma-transmission-vows-and-a-talk-with-shugen-roshi-and-shoan-sensei/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi and Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - ZMM - 11/16/25 - After introducing Shoan Sensei, and after Shoan offers her Vows to the sangha, Shugen Roshi begins his discourse with the story of one of our great women ancestors, Moshan Liaoran Daiosho. It is a story pointing to the intimacy of the path itself, and to the question of how we understand "transformation." Told on the morning after Shoan Sensei received dharma transmission, the story becomes a beautiful acknowledgment of lineage—how each of us steps forward, intimately entering the life of the Way—and the responsibility of each of us to be a student first and foremost. After sharing his words, Shugen Roshi warmly invites Shoan Sensei to finish the talk.
- [Faith Verified Extends Our Faith](https://zmm.org/podcast/faith-verified-extends-our-faith/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 11/19/25 - Our personal experience is what guides and corrects our steps on a dharma path, and this section of Genjokoan provides this reminder again of the deep conviction that arises only from experience, the verification that truly liberates, within our everyday lives. - Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 11
- [The Journey We are On](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-journey-we-are-on/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 10/20/25 - The moment when each person decides to step into the unknown, to an authentic life where our karma does not determine our choices, is a turning point. Hogen Sensei picks up the opening line from Genjokoan, ”When all dharmas are Buddhadharma…” as that moment when everything has the great potential to change.
- [Coming Together - Falling Apart](https://zmm.org/podcast/coming-together-falling-apart/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 2/8/26 - Coming together, falling apart, are these the same? Different? Practice can show us the freedom of mind responding according to circumstance. In this talk, Hojin Sensei reflects on the koan from the Hidden Lamp, Chiyono’s No Water, No Moon, and what it means to keep practicing the dharma, to keep caring for something— even when it seems fragile, broken. How sometimes falling apart, or experiencing a heart breaking situation might be just the turning point needed to open up completely. Where do we find the self?
- [Circle of the Way Is Never Cut Off](https://zmm.org/podcast/circle-of-the-way-is-never-cut-off/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - ZMM - 2/8/26 - Invoking Dogen’s fascicle on Continuous Practice, Shoan Sensei reminds us that we turn toward spiritual practice to take refuge. In doing so, we take our seat as Buddha, taking refuge in the Dharma and relying on the Sangha all around us. From this refuge arises a continuous, sustained, real practice, even when it is uncomfortable or difficult. Here, grace is found within our actual experience, and together we discover a true refuge in one another.
- [Do Not Disappoint Yourself](https://zmm.org/podcast/do-not-disappoint-yourself/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 2/15/26 - All along the bodhisattva path, we make vows to serve others. When the conditions of our lives grow difficult—when stress feels real and urgent—these vows become more vivid and deeply personal. Shugen Roshi shares stories and leads a renewal of our commitment to the well-being of all who seek refuge in the Sangha. On this long path, however often we fall short, we return to and rely upon our vows.
- [Aspects of Giving](https://zmm.org/podcast/aspects-of-giving/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/15/26 - As the first of the Paramitas, or perfections, generosity is a virtue that leads to releasing the suffering we all experience, which was the primary focus of the Buddha’s teaching. Shugen Roshi reminds us that when we practice the dharma with the mind of generosity, we can hold everything that arises, and let diminish the disconnection between ourselves and all others.
- [What's Ordinary?](https://zmm.org/podcast/whats-ordinary/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - ZMM - 11/21/25 - How do we know what is ultimately true? In this koan from the Mumonkan, Shoan Sensei delves into the ordinariness of profound truth that is everywhere; its depth and benefits within reach. And yet there is still practice and investigation that must be engaged to feel into the distinction. - From Master Wu-men's Gateless Gate, Case 19 - Nan-sh'uan: "Ordinary Mind Is the Tao"
- [The Wind That Reaches Everywhere](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-wind-that-reaches-everywhere/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 11/22/25 - This final section of Shugen Roshi’s Genjokoan commentary looks at the dynamic tension between conceptual learning and the experience of insight. Insight brings clarity, but it is practice which allows the space to open, so that wisdom and compassion arise together. When we experience what reaches everywhere, the tyrannical repetition of samsara begins to slip away. - Fall 2025 Ango - Genjokoan Series of Talks - Part 12 (final)
- [Ordinary Mind is the Way](https://zmm.org/podcast/ordinary-mind-is-the-way-4/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - 11/23/25 - How do we know what is ultimately true? In this koan from the Mumonkan, Shoan Sensei delves into the ordinariness of profound truth that is everywhere, its depth and benefits within reach. And yet there is still practice and investigation that must be engaged to feel into the distinction. - From Master Wu-men's Gateless Gate, Case 19 - Nan-sh'uan: "Ordinary Mind Is the Tao"
- [The Wind Or The Flag](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-wind-or-the-flag/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - ZMM - 12/28/25 - During the year-end Rohatsu sesshin, Shoan Sensei offered this koan talk on the nature of mind as it’s experienced and expressed in Zen Buddhist practice. The koan offered from the Gateless Gate points to "turning the light around", beholding the nature of what we call reality, and learning through experience how we can rely on this to navigate our lives. - From Master Wu-men's Gateless Gate, Case 29 - Hui-neng's "Not the Wind; Not the Flag"
- [Ascending The Mountain Seat](https://zmm.org/podcast/ascending-the-mountain-seat/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 12/21/25 - In celebration of Hojin Sensei's formal installation as abbot of Zen Center of New York City and Fire Lotus Temple, Shugen Roshi takes up Master Wu-Men's Gateless Gate Case 22—Mahākāśyapa’s Flagpole—unfolding its historical resonance to illuminate the journey of women in Buddhism and their enduring place in the living tradition of Buddhist practice.
- [Dana Paramita, Bodhisattva Practice](https://zmm.org/podcast/dana-paramita-bodhisattva-practice/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 12/14/25 - In this season of giving, we naturally think of celebration, connection, and gratitude for the family, friends, and community that sustains us. Dana Paramita invites us to open our awareness and our hearts to those around us who may be struggling, alone, or lacking what we ourselves enjoy. So... these days we might ask ourselves: What does a Bodhisattva do at this time of year? Shugen Roshi recalls a fundamental teaching of the Buddha, reiterated by Master Dogen in the Bodhisattva’s Four Methods of Guidance: Giving, Kind Speech, Beneficial Action, and Identity Action.
- [Path of Enlightenment: Stage 3 – Seeing the Ox](https://zmm.org/podcast/path-of-enlightenment-stage-3-seeing-the-ox/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 12/14/25 - “In spring the sun in the green willow strands— See its timeless form.” - In this talk Hojin Sensei takes us on the journey of the third stage on the Path of Enlightenment—Seeing the OX. This is where we actually catch a first direct glimpse of our vast, boundless, ungraspable true nature. Why is the OX not ever showing its head? - There's a short video of Hojin painting this ox herding image prior to her talk which we'll post on our website soon. For now, enjoy the talk.
- [Bodhi Day: The Source of Milk at the Shake Shack](https://zmm.org/podcast/bodhi-day-the-source-of-milk-at-the-shake-shack/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 12/07/25 - Celebrating Buddha’s Enlightenment, enjoy this talk of Hojin Sensei’s in looking at Buddha’s most important teaching —the story of his own journey to enlightenment. It is worth repeating as an essential guide for our own spiritual journey. In order to do this well we have to learn how to lean in. Rumi writes: You are the source of milk. Don’t milk others! We have a channel into the ocean, Beg for that love expansion. Meditate on this” If we are willing, ability is given.
- [Novice Ordination for Shindo Kisch](https://zmm.org/podcast/novice-ordination-for-shindo-kisch/) - ZMM - 12/07/25 - Shugen Roshi officiates the Novice Monastic Ordination ceremony for Rebecca Shindo Kisch; a joyful occasion - both a home-leaving and a homecoming - that Master Dogen described as "a day for turning cartwheels." Shindo is currently the Monastery's Gardener, and helps coordinate the National Buddhist Prison Sangha. She became a formal student (Tangaryo) in 2020, received the Bodhisattva Precepts (Jukai), and her dharma name Shindo, in 2022 and became a Postulant in 2023. Today she receives the robe of a monastic and provisionally takes on the five monastic vows. Those vows being simplicity, service, selflessness, stability, and "to live the Buddha's Way." In this new context she will continue her discernment and exploration and training for the role of a full monastic before choosing to ask for full ordination.
- [Forget Government, Forget Anarchy](https://zmm.org/podcast/forget-government-forget-anarchy/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 11/30/25 - This talk on a koan from an early Chan teacher is taken up by Shugen Roshi to look at the ubiquity of our dualistic habits of mind. Koans work with language to help us see our minds more clearly, to see where we cloud ourselves with judgements and bias and distract ourselves with endless arguments. Just forget the two sides and see into the true reality right before our eyes. - From the Book of Serenity - Case 27 - Fayan Points to a Blind
- [Let’s Become Enlightened Together](https://zmm.org/podcast/lets-become-enlightened-together/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 11/30/25 - Into this season of gatherings with family, friends, communities, Hojin Sensei illuminates ways we might practice relationships on this noble path in taking up this koan and Dogen’s guiding practices on embracing the ways as a Bodhisattva. This practice of choosing the larger heart. - From The Hidden Lamp: Stories of Awakened Women - Case 99 - Let’s Become Enlightened Together.
- [Shaping the World of Experience](https://zmm.org/podcast/shaping-the-world-of-experience/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 2/19/26 - Coming into the experience of our emotions and thoughts, we can find the way our minds shape our experience from one moment to the next. If we’re not grounded in this embodied experience, and willing to feel our feelings, we may tend to push them away or numb ourselves. This informal talk given during February sesshin invites us to gently and directly feel what we are experiencing, body and mind, and begin to free ourselves from the endless proliferation and ruminating, and rather lead us toward spaciousness and freedom.
- [Practicing the Path: Right Effort](https://zmm.org/podcast/practicing-the-path-right-effort/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 1/18/26 - In a series of talks on the Eightfold Path, Gokan Osho looks at effort, one of the core concentration factors of the path. Early on in our lives we mostly overreach, becoming competitive or extremely self-critical, and sometimes give up all together. We get ourselves in tangles before we can learn through practice to undo the expectations and measurements, to find the right amount of effort needed to continue on the path and develop the clarity and stability we need.
- [Apparently Effortless](https://zmm.org/podcast/apparently-effortless/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 12/30/25 - Harmonizing inner and outer life is the essence of our practice, says Shugen Roshi in this koan talk from Rohatsu sesshin. Those habits of mind which obstruct our harmonious equanimity, keeping us from feeling whole and at-ease, are the very grist of practice. When we settle the mind, even in the midst of discord, we become clearer and more able to trust in our true nature. - From the Book of Serenity - Case 68 - Jiashan "Swinging the Sword"
- [Fusatsu: Renewal of Stillness](https://zmm.org/podcast/fusatsu-renewal-of-stillness/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 12/31/2025 - Here, in a Fusatsu ceremony—a renewal of vows and an atoning for our transgressions—the foundation is stillness. Zazen is the activity through which we continually return to that stillness. Hojin Sensei encourages us to listen deeply, so that morality is not imposed but received, and our true nature can be discovered. From this place, grace naturally infuses our everyday actions.
- [Fusatsu for the New Year](https://zmm.org/podcast/fusatsu-for-the-new-year/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - New Year's Eve 12/31/25 - Moral and ethical conduct in Zen practice involves the ongoing work of recognizing when we have fallen short of kindness, compassion, or honesty. The Renewal of Vows ceremony is an ancient Buddhist ritual that addresses the harm we cause. Through atonement, we acknowledge our transgressions—an essential act of turning karma and bringing benefit to the world, and of renewing our commitment to the vows we live by. Offered on the threshold of the new year, this talk brings Shugen Roshi's Dharma teaching directly into the realities of everyday life.
- [Stillness Within the Pulses of the Pattern](https://zmm.org/podcast/stillness-within-the-pulses-of-the-pattern/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 1/4/26 - In this talk Hojin draws on the teachings of Zen Master Bankei and the importance of allowing the still point to find us. All so very relevant. His teachings point to something very simple and very radical: before thought, before preference, before judgment—seeing happens, hearing happens, smelling, tasting, touching happens. And none of that needs a self to make it happen. How curious!
- [An Auspicious Year](https://zmm.org/podcast/an-auspicious-year/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 01/04/2026 - With a new year upon us we all have the chance to start fresh. This is always true because nothing is fixed, everything is subject to change, a truth of the dharma which we can verify for ourselves. We have accumulated experiences, memories, expectations, but those are not fixed either. In this perspective, the new year is auspicious because it is full of possibilities, revealing its potential as we take up life fully, with integrity, commitment and kindness. - From Master Dogen's 300 Koan Shobogenzo (The True Dharma Eye), Case 39 - Jingqing's "Buddhadharma at the New Year"
- [Pursuing The Buddha Way - Bendowa](https://zmm.org/podcast/pursuing-the-buddha-way-bendowa/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/28/26 - Freeing ourselves through seated meditation, zazen, is the foundational practice at the heart of Zen Buddhism. In this exploratory talk, Shugen Roshi encourages us to be clear about what we’re doing, and how to do it, as well as why we are aiming to free ourselves and others from the suffering of this world.
- [Meditation and Wisdom, Function and Essence](https://zmm.org/podcast/meditation-and-wisdom-function-and-essence/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/31/26 - The wellspring of wisdom in Zen is meditation. Yet wisdom alone is not enough; the path of liberation must also fully embody compassion. Compassion is not separate from awakening but an essential and indivisible expression of it, permeating every aspect of practice and life. In this Sesshin talk, Shugen Roshi encourages us to draw compassion close within our zazen, leaving nothing outside our practice.
- [Metta Sutra As Instructions](https://zmm.org/podcast/metta-sutra-as-instructions/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 2/18/26 - This early sutra of the Buddha describes the practice of metta, offered as a beneficial aid to settle the mind and body and ease fear and vexation. Even within the wild restlessness of our minds, the troubles of our hearts and ways in which we struggle, taking these instructions to heart and understanding it’s intent can help us settle into the refuge of a zazen. - The text of the Karaniya Metta Sutta is here on the ZMM Liturgy page: zmm.org/liturgy/
- [Metta Sutra As Practice](https://zmm.org/podcast/metta-sutra-as-practice/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 2/21/26 - Our unified being—seeing body and mind as one reality—is profoundly affected by outside circumstances. Zazen practice turns us inward, to meet ourselves and what is arising in this mind-body. Shugen Roshi brings The Metta Sutta alive as the Buddha’s instructions on how to practice this dynamic flow of both inward and outward with loving-kindness. It speaks to the heart of spiritual work and the transformation possible, when a practitioner can bring these qualities outward to meet the world. - The text of the Karaniya Metta Sutta is here on the ZMM Liturgy page: zmm.org/liturgy/
- [Bodhisattva of Great Compassion](https://zmm.org/podcast/bodhisattva-of-great-compassion/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 2/22/26 - Known by many different names throughout the Buddhist world—Avalokitesvara, Kwan Yin, Kannon—they are the hearer of the cries of the world. This being embodies that compelling ability to relieve all suffering and lead beings to complete, perfect enlightenment. Unburdened, we are thereby able to free others and ourselves from suffering. Learning to not create these states in the first place, is the hard work of practice. Perfection is a given, but we still need to realize it ourselves. The third talk on metta, lovingkindness, given by Shugen Roshi during the February sesshin.
- [Mirror, Mirror ! - Reflecting without Division](https://zmm.org/podcast/mirror-mirror-reflecting-without-division/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/1/26 - Listen to this invitation from a small convent in medieval Japan—Tōkeiji—where generations of nuns practiced zazen before a mirror, contemplating this question: “Where is a single feeling, a single thought, in the mirror image at which I gaze?” Awareness does not stand apart from experience. What might this mean in a world that so often feels divided? - From The Hidden Lamp: Stories from Twenty-Five Centuries of Awakened Women: #34 — The Zen Mirror of Tōkeiji.
- [Vimalakirti's Gate of Non-Duality](https://zmm.org/podcast/vimalakirtis-gate-of-non-duality/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/1/26 - What did Vimalakirti say when Manjushri asked him to speak? In our own lives, how do we find freedom amid the dualities we encounter—sick or well, right or wrong, left or right? And what does the nonduality of form and emptiness reveal? When nothing stands opposed, where is the other side? In this talk, Shugen Roshi explores the nonduality of wisdom and compassion, and the selfless quality that makes each inseparable from the other. - From The Blue Cliff Record, Case 84: Vimalakirti's Gate of Nonduality.
- [Come to Rest in Actuality](https://zmm.org/podcast/come-to-rest-in-actuality/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei and Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/15/26 - Buddha and Mara are figurative ways of portraying a fundamental seeming opposition within our human nature: Buddha stands for a capacity for awareness, openness, and freedom; with Mara representing a capacity for confusion, closure, and restriction. In this collaborative Dharma Talk Shoan and Hojin explore the four traditional teachings of the ways Mara appears. - This talk followed the Meeting Mara : the Art of Fearless Presence Retreat.
- [It's Right Here](https://zmm.org/podcast/its-right-here/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/8/26 - From The Hidden Lamp, Case #1: The Old Woman of Mt. Wutai - What is this desire to have a defined path in life and might the pointing in this koan give some friction to ask the larger question of what is moving us? Hojin takes up this teaching to address the mind that leans forward — imagining fulfillment later, somewhere else.
- [So Many Hands and Eyes](https://zmm.org/podcast/so-many-hands-and-eyes/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/8/26 - When we are complete within ourselves, nothing is left aside as unimportant. All of it is important. We can look to the great bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokiteshvara, as one who does not make any distinctions whatsoever. All things have their skillful use, can be turned toward benefit, even those most difficult things, those most challenging moments. What we do moment to moment is what makes the path of practice and realization possible. How do we manifest compassion? By looking to what we do, moment to moment, as a very real living vow. - From Master Dogen's 300 Koan Shobogenzo (The True Dharma Eye), Case 105 - "The Hands and Eyes of Great Compassion"
- [Allowing Death to Teach Us How To Live](https://zmm.org/podcast/allowing-death-to-teach-us-how-to-live/) - Rev. Trudi Jinpu Hirsch-Abramson - ZMM - 7/21/24 - Rev. Jinpu offers her engaging stories about the practice of grief, aging, dying and living in the now. An ordained Buddhist priest and chaplain, Jinpu has over twenty-five years of experience in practicing and teaching others to care for and celebrate all of life.
- [Opening to Darkness](https://zmm.org/podcast/opening-to-darkness/) - Zenju Earthlyn Manuel, Osho - 9/22/24 - Zenju Osho visited the Monastery for two weeks of teaching and concluded her second retreat, "Opening to Darkness," with this offering of the Sunday Dharma talk. To learn more about Zenju Osho's writings, poetry and teachings, visit www.zenju.org
- [Cultivating Faith - Kien Martin](https://zmm.org/podcast/cultivating-faith/) - Kien Martin, MRO Monastic Zen Center of New York City, Fire Lotus Temple, Brooklyn 6/22/2025
- [Letting Go of Being Right](https://zmm.org/podcast/letting-go-of-being-right/) - Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Senior Monastic - ZCNYC - 7/27/25 - Letting go of being right can be one of the hardest things to do. What happens if, instead of defending our views, we notice the suffering underneath and ask, Where is compassion right now? Becoming conscious through our zazen, on the street or in the zendo, allows us to heal ourselves and benefit others.
- [Missing It, Seeing It](https://zmm.org/podcast/missing-it-seeing-it/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/11/26 - Three core aspects of Zen practice are morality, calming the mind, and insight into the nature of reality. Without this third element, wisdom-insight, Zen isn’t truly a liberating practice. Shugen Roshi explains that insight differs from analytical or conceptual thinking; it’s a direct, lived experience. The path requires that these three aspects be cultivated together, so that a settled, unobstructed mind becomes capable of seeing more clearly and of realizing insight that is genuinely transformative. - From Master Wu-Men's Gateless Gate, Case 39: Yun-men Says You Missed It
- [What You Ought To Be](https://zmm.org/podcast/what-you-ought-to-be/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/25/26 - The bodhisattva path is not known as such to everyone who walks it, and this was especially true for Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., who dedicated all his efforts to bringing about a renewed commitment to liberty and justice in our troubled country. His life was a bodhisattva life. Our own efforts to change the streams of harmful conditioning, bias and habitual formations require our own clarity and commitment, and so these lessons must be applied to all that we do. This talk was given on occasion of the Sangha Harmony Advisory Committee (SHAC) member retreat at ZMM.
- [Fusatsu: The Three Pure Precepts](https://zmm.org/podcast/fusatsu-the-three-pure-precepts-2/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 4/6/25 - Hojin Sensei explores the heart of the three pure precepts; the simple path of clarity, kindness and love; this perennial wisdom that flows through all of us. (We apologise for the audio/mic glitches in some parts of the recording.)
- [A Question of Practice](https://zmm.org/podcast/a-question-of-practice/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 4/19/25 - Being a practitioner of the Buddha dharma, how do you know practice works? Without commenting or evaluating; without looking for progress, look at how it operates -- how you operate -- right here and now.
- [Right Imagination](https://zmm.org/podcast/right-imagination/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 5/4/25 - To truly engage the many skillful means to awakening, we must imagine the possibility of moving beyond reactive patterns and socially imposed norms—to free the clinging mind from suffering. Hojin Sensei explores imagination as an essential part of the dharmic path, through which we begin to recognize, as the Buddha taught, what is true by direct experience. Can we imagine it?
- [Indra's Net With Entanglements](https://zmm.org/podcast/indras-net-with-entanglements/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 6/1/25 - Hojin Sensei invokes the Diamond Net of Indra, a vast net on whose every node hangs a glittering diamond-On the surface of this diamond, every other diamond is reflected, multiplying the reflection into infinity. Each diamond exists both in its own right and also connected to every other diamond on the net just as each one of us is unique and connected to every other being and thing in the universe. This means we’re constantly affecting one another in ways known and unknown. Is this liberating? What do we do with this kind of knowledge?
- [Luckily No One is Looking?](https://zmm.org/podcast/luckily-no-one-is-looking/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 6/8/25 - Hojin takes up one of her favorite koans from The Hidden Lamp: Lingzhao Pang’s Helping. How free and generous it is when we are not keeping score, watching as a third person judging, monitoring, distancing ourselves from interactions. We seem to not want to let go of the idea we are not separate. Here, father and daughter demonstrate what it is to be fully alive to interconnection outside of language. We’re never far off!
- [Steadying, Staying, Befriending](https://zmm.org/podcast/steadying-staying-befriending/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 6/14/25 - In this talk Hojin speaks of this gentle approach with ourselves called Maitrī in Sanskrit or Metta in Pali. Essentially the same concept, both refer to "loving-kindness", "friendliness", "benevolence", befriending -- What is it to befriend ourselves? For real? How does that steady us? (A Saturday Zazenkai Dharma talk.)
- [Dignified Still Point](https://zmm.org/podcast/dignified-still-point/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 6/15/25 - Here we are sincerely and directly acting on this urge to be still -quiet. We will most likely sense that THIS is a good desire—it seems to settle and ground us rather than pull us into yet further desire. When we sit still and quiet with nothing else to do or be —except ourselves, we often meet, if only briefly, a deep satisfaction. In that moment, whatever we are is enough. Joko Beck writes: “Only in that instant when we and the object become one can we see what our life is."
- [A Reading of the Genjo Koan](https://zmm.org/podcast/a-reading-of-the-genjo-koan/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 9/14/25 - In this talk, Hojin Sensei offers a full recitation of the Genjo Koan by Zen Master Eihei Dogen—keeping his living relics warm within our hearts. Before beginning, she pauses to recall how Buddhism first flowed through oral tradition, carried mind to mind, committed to memory. She invites us to take up this same practice: to steep ourselves in the Dharma by reading quietly or aloud, by copying, by chanting, and by listening.
- [Where is the Other?](https://zmm.org/podcast/where-is-the-other/) - Horace Kaishu Moody, Senior Lay Student Zen Mountain Monastery, 06/28/2019 Going in to the heart of the Bodhisattva precepts, this talk asks "what is other?" – much like we often ask in relationship with the world, "what is self?" How is this apparent self and other, in fact, not clearly separate at all? Sharing the
- [The Five Remembrances](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-five-remembrances/) - Susan Seien Wilder, Senior Lay Practitioner Zen Mountain Monastery, 7/22/2020 In the teaching of the Five Remembrances, the Buddha urges us to recall that we are subject to old age, illness, death, and loss, and that our only power to shift our karmic experience is through our actions. Speaking from her home via Zoom, senior
- [Compassion Embodied](https://zmm.org/podcast/compassion-embodied/) - Susan Seien Wilder, Senior Lay Student - Zen Mountain Monastery, Wednesday 08/26/2021 - Seien begins her heartfelt talk by inviting the Sangha to chant the Sutra of Great Compassion together. She goes on to ask who are we invoking? Who is Kanzeon? Who could it be but ourselves?
- [Using the 24 Hours](https://zmm.org/podcast/using-the-24-hours/) - Valerie Meiju Linet, Senior Lay Student Zen Center of New York City, 08/04/2019 How do we best use our minds throughout the day? Taking up an exchange between Zen master Joshu and a student, senior lay student Meiju explores the urgency we feel at not wasting our lives, or our time, as a place that
- [Ceaseless Becoming](https://zmm.org/podcast/ceaseless-becoming/) - Ely Seiryu Rayek, Senior Lay Student - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Wednesday 09/28/2022 - Seiryu offers his understanding of the dharma of everyday life, dependent co-origination; the practical reality of ceaseless becoming.
- [The Dharma Is You](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-dharma-is-you/) - Judy Lief - Zen Mountain Monastery - 04/16/2023 - Judy Lief, in speaking about our Buddha Nature, gives her humble, direct commentary on the Four Immeasurables**... How do we practice them within our ordinary activity? towards our own sacred selves? - **May all beings be free from suffering and the root of suffering; May all beings know happiness and the root of happiness; May all beings live in sympathetic joy, rejoicing in the happiness of others; May all beings live in equanimity, free from passion, aggression and delusion. These are also called "The Four Limitless Ones". - Judy Lief is a Buddhist teacher who trained under the Tibetan meditation master, Ven. Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. You can learn more about her at judylief.com. She led a retreat at ZMM this weekend entitled "Just So—An Introduction to Mahamudra Teachings".
- [Lady Midnight](https://zmm.org/podcast/yaza/) - Robert Rakusan Ricci, Senior Monastic - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Thursday 01/26/2023 - Rakusan delivered this talk in the midst of a sesshin retreat, asking, what is the relationship between prayer and zazen? Both involve reverence, devotion, faith and a willingness to be open to whatever arises in our experience. Rakusan draws on an essay by Ken McLeod called, “Where the Thinking Stops,” and goes on from there to tap several mystic voices, including St. John of the Cross. Another mystic, Leonard Cohen, provides the soundtrack, as it were, to this talk with his 1969 incantation, “Lady Midnight.” Through it all, Rakusan encourages us to keep going above and beyond ourselves and see how and where prayer fills our lives.
- [Stayin' Alive](https://zmm.org/podcast/stayin-alive/) - Robert Rakusan Ricci, Senior Monastic - ZMM 6/21/2023 - What is it in me that wants to persist? Is that what being "me" is? Throughout our lives so much in our culture is teaching us to desire; reinforcing our desires... to continue being "me", to have a "full life"; stayin' alive as the song goes. Where is freedom and liberation in this? Rakusan examines this quandary. What if instead, we STOP and rest from all this activity of Stayin' Alive?
- [Is This Your Last Sesshin?](https://zmm.org/podcast/is-this-your-last-sesshin/) - Maureen Jisho Ford, Senior Lay Student - Zen Mountain Monastery - 04/28/2023 - Senior lay student Jisho gives a lively talk about her experience with sickness, death, and letting go of that which is ultimately empty of 'self'.
- [Working with Shame](https://zmm.org/podcast/working-with-shame/) - Maureen Jisho Ford, Senior Lay Student - ZMM, Friday 11/17/23 - "We mistake the story for who we are." Senior lay student Jisho gives a very personal talk about her experience with shame.
- [Only Don't Know](https://zmm.org/podcast/only-dont-know/) - Linda Shinji Hoffman, Senior Lay Student Zen Mountain Monastery, Mt Tremper, New York, Thursday 10/23/2025 Central to our practice is cultivating an openness to what we don’t yet know. Sounds simple? To continuously return to this openness means to face the habits we have of thinking small, “knowing things,” and return again with an open awareness
- [Be Careful What You Ask For](https://zmm.org/podcast/be-careful-what-you-ask-for/) - Michael Yukon Grody, Senior Monastic Zen Center of New York City, 03/01/2020 Senior Monastic Yukon makes us a gift of his perspective on practice after 37 years, focused on the skillful means we employ to maintain our practice. Be careful what you ask for, he says: This is a constant practice of releasing what we
- [Garden Dharma](https://zmm.org/podcast/garden-dharma/) - Michael Yukon Grody, Senor Monastic Zen Mountain Monastery, 8/20/2020 Each year the Monastery gardener, Yukon, says he makes a deal with the seed packets he's planting to ask for their commitment: he will nurture them tirelessly, and they just have to put down good roots and then give themselves away, entirely. This is our practice
- [Taking Refuge](https://zmm.org/podcast/taking-refuge/) - Chris Yudo Abraham - ZMM - 8/23/2023 - Yudo speaks about the practice of taking refuge, or "throwing ourselves unreservedly" into something, using examples from his own life. What do we take refuge in? And are the things we take refuge in worthy of our precious human life?
- [Face to Face](https://zmm.org/podcast/face-to-face/) - Chris Yudo Abraham, Senior Lay Student - ZCNYC - 10/13/24 - Before the internet invaded our personal spaces, relationships had a different flavor. Now, we can have most of our relationships with people we never see in person. How does Zen practice and training help us break through the intimacy barrier, and recognize the richness of face to face contact? Senior lay student Yudo, himself a “digital nomad,” explores.
- [Not Holding to Fixed Views](https://zmm.org/podcast/not-holding-to-fixed-views/) - Frank Kyosho Fallon, Lay Senior Zen Mountain Monastery, 05/27/2020 In this talk, Frank Kyosho Fallon, a senior student in the MRO, examines the suffering caused by the mind of self-righteousness. Invoking the final lines of the Metta Sutta, "By not holding to fixed views, the pure-hearted one, having clarity of vision, being freed from all
- [Right Speech](https://zmm.org/podcast/right-speech/) - Joel Sansho Benton, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 6/26/25 - How do we practice Right Speech, and how do we practice mindfulness in our everyday language? We use language all the time, often reacting to circumstances without much thought or reflection about how our words are landing. So how can we make the switch and use language as a valuable tool which can express compassion, and not create harm, despite our conditioning?
- [Letting Go and Allowing In](https://zmm.org/podcast/letting-go-and-allowing-in/) - Sarah Taisho Sands, Senior Lay Student - ZCNYC - 7/13/25 - See the thought, acknowledge it, let it go. Almost everyone knows this central teaching on how to work with thoughts and ideas we get attached to or distracted by. Taisho looks at the many ways this can show up in our life away from the cushion, and how changing the emphasis from 'let it go' to 'let go of it' can give us a fresh perspective on its meaning. And perhaps most importantly, how letting go is intimately connected to what we can invite in, and the ways that can nurture compassion and break down barriers.
- [The Butterfly Effect](https://zmm.org/podcast/a-shift-in-perspective/) - Degna Chikei Levister, MRO Senior Lay Student - ZCNYC - 8/25/24 - Chikei talks about the subtle shift in perspective brought about through her Zen practice and the big difference that has made in her life.
- [Silent Illumination](https://zmm.org/podcast/silent-illumination/) - Dr. Rebecca Li - ZMM - 6/8/25 - This talk from visiting Dharma teacher Rebecca Li explores Silent Illumination, a practice where stillness and clarity are cultivated simultaneously through the process of recognizing and releasing layers of ever more subtle habitual reactivities that cause suffering. This practice allows us to live more in accordance with wisdom and compassion, as we suffer less and become more present, kind and connected with everyone in our lives, enhancing our capacity to bring benefits to the world. Professor Li is a Dharma heir in the lineage of Chan Master Sheng Yen and the founder and guiding teacher of Chan Dharma Community.
- [A Soft Place To Land](https://zmm.org/podcast/a-soft-place-to-land/) - Degna Chikei Levister, MRO Senior Lay Student - ZCNYC - 1/28/24 - Chikei offers a glimpse of why she came to Zen Practice, and why she has stayed—this commitment to living a life in harmony.
- [From the Archives: The Dance in Your Bones](https://zmm.org/podcast/from-the-archives-the-dance-in-your-bones/) - John Daido Loori, Roshi Zen Mountain Monastery, 9/11/2005 The True Dharma Eye, Case #55 There is a music in us, an inner voice which is audible to our teachers, but not always to us. We can’t express this music using other’s words or other’s ways of seeing things. Yet the expression of it is the vital
- [Awakening to Forms, See the Mind](https://zmm.org/podcast/awakening-to-forms-see-the-mind/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 5/11/25 - The connection between the creative process and the Dharma is an important entranceway to deepening our Zen practice. Engaging creative expression as a practice helps us leap free of the constraints of intellect, experiencing a resonance with the world beyond what we think of as “myself.” Our senses take in the whole world. So how are we not overwhelmed or deceived by our perceptions? How do we inhabit this “dharma body” with clarity, and commune with all reality? - From the Book of Serenity, Case 82 - Yunmen's Sound and Form.
- [Possibilities](https://zmm.org/podcast/possibilities/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 5/21/25 - Becoming aware of our minds’ potential, it often seems like we’re causing ourselves more trouble, because we get caught up in the same old patterns and habits. But learning to honestly recognize ourselves, we also can see that it’s possible to live another way, in greater freedom and ease. In this challenging learning process, we can take care of persistent suffering in a new, liberating way, creating the potential and conditions for others to liberate themselves too. - From the Record of Layman Pang.
- [What Do You Use For Food?](https://zmm.org/podcast/what-do-you-use-for-food/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 5/24/25 - What is real strength? Putting to good use all of our obstructions and old habits, we can cultivate our ability to meet whatever arises with pliancy, flexibility, to find our real strength. Zen practice and training is indeed the daily, moment to moment experience of our lives, and learning to find nourishment there. Shugen Roshi encourages us to “meet it simply, honestly” and learn to free ourselves and others. - From the Book of Serenity, Case 33 - Sansheng's "Golden Fish"
- [Not Clinging To Anything](https://zmm.org/podcast/not-clinging-to-anything/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 6/1/25 - Why does Buddhism so emphasize life and death? When we begin to see the depths of our attachments to this “self," we have to face the jarring fact that there really isn’t anything permanent to attach to. But then, what is this? Shugen Roshi reminds us that our vital life energy can be immediate, compassionate, not clinging to anything. And so within life and death we are liberated from life and death. - From the Entangling Vines Koan Collection, Case 38 - The Wise Women in the Charnel Grove.
- [Dance of Wind and Grasses](https://zmm.org/podcast/dance-of-wind-and-grasses/) - Linda Shinji Hoffman, Senior Lay Student - ZCNYC - 4/28/24 - How can we practice meeting physical pain and discomfort of all kinds? In this talk, senior student Shinji Hoffman invites us to consider dancing with these challenges. Through poetry, reflection on her experience, and Buddhist teachings, she weaves together many offerings to support us in working through the inevitable discomforts of life.
- [Fish Enjoy Water, Humans Enjoy the Dao](https://zmm.org/podcast/fish-enjoy-water-humans-enjoy-the-dao/) - Linda Shinji Hoffman, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 1/24/25 - What is enjoyment of being within our element, such as fish enjoying water? All suffering comes from the activity of the mind, whereas the mind itself is free. Drawing on words of Xuansha and Dogen, lay senior Shinji calls forth the enjoyment and freedom that our practice brings us to address.
- [How Are We Doing Right Now?](https://zmm.org/podcast/how-are-we-doing-right-now/) - Prabu Gikon Vasan, Senior Lay Practitioner - ZMM - 12/28/24 - In the Buddha’s early sutras there are teachings which encourage an honest assessment of our state of being, no matter what the circumstances, as the very stuff of our liberation. Senior lay student Gikon explores how dharma practice supports this sometimes difficult but deeply freeing inquiry into our state of being, be it health or any mind state, and the liberating practice at our fingertips within samsara.
- [A Path That Can't Be Named](https://zmm.org/podcast/a-path-that-cant-be-named/) - Patrick Yunen Kelly, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 6/27/24 - Yunen explores the fundamental instructions on zazen from Dogen and the spiritual path of a Buddhist practitioner. To help us develop our understanding of its depth and breadth he brings forth analogies in language and nature, and especially to the evolution of the mountain ranges of the northeast.
- [Reverence for Others](https://zmm.org/podcast/reverence-for-others/) - Patrick Yunen Kelly, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 10/24/24 - Within a poem by the monastic Ryōkan, senior lay student Yunen finds encouragement to practice for the benefit of others, with heartfelt reverence. He explores dharma teachings on how we construct our sense of a separate self, and the simple and wholly human tendency to benefit others before oneself, which is also the raising of bodhicitta.
- [Practicing Doubt](https://zmm.org/podcast/practicing-doubt/) - Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Senior Monastic - ZMM - 6/27/25 - Doubt in some early Buddhist sutras carried a negative connotation, as doubt of the truth of the Dharma itself, and yet Great Doubt has become a foundational practice in Zen as well as other spiritual traditions. Monastic Taikyo shares her exploration of doubt in its healthy form: as integral to our daily practice of awareness and mindfulness. When we look below the surface of our thoughts and actions and examine our habitual patterns of thought, we can begin to see into the nature of our own suffering, and the ground of our liberation. Doubt as inquiry, rather than debilitating self-doubt or self criticism, can help us avoid unhealthy mind states when they arise.
- [Within the Grass Roof Hermitage](https://zmm.org/podcast/within-the-grass-roof-hermitage/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Senior Monastic and Dharma Holder - ZMM - 2/16/25 - Taking up this teaching from Shitou, Gokan delves into how an ancient Zen song-poem can help us find our way in our present world of turmoil and stress. “Let go of hundreds of years and relax completely,” the teaching tells us. Don’t separate from this person who you are, this body and mind here and now. In this way we come into accord with our thoughts, words and actions, for the benefit of all beings.
- [Gentle and Strong](https://zmm.org/podcast/song-of-the-grass-roof-hermitage/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Dharma Holder - 1/23/25 - The dharma song of Shitou describes the simplicity possible in the mind of practice. With this settled awareness we can see how habits are formed and re-formed again and again. Gokan brings alive the ease and gentleness that can become the mind of zazen as we practice letting go of habitual thoughts and tendencies.
- [Gently Working With Distraction](https://zmm.org/podcast/gently-working-with-distraction/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZCNYC - 3/30/25 - Gokan talks about the ways of distraction. Whether blatant or very subtle, they are us, they are mind, and it's so important to be gentle as we work with them.
- [Relaxing Completely](https://zmm.org/podcast/relaxing-completely/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 5/22/25 - When we can see how we use our minds, we can see where our life is really happening. As we enter into practice and continue to relax into our zazen, we develop our capacity to see our habits and conditioning. With notes from the Surangama Sutra teaching on “purifying the mind” of obscurations, Gokan explores how we can relax completely, with awareness, and really take care of our lives.
- [Practice Instructions](https://zmm.org/podcast/practice-instructions/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 4/13/25 - Gokan Osho takes us through Master Hongzhi's Practice instructions, reminding us to appreciate whatever's arising without grasping.
- [Being One With: Fusatsu](https://zmm.org/podcast/being-one-with-fusatsu/) - Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho - ZMM - 5/9/25 - What is it we wish to cultivate in our lives, to give energy to? Fusatsu is a chance to bring our intentions alive—especially where we have done harm—by taking responsibility for our actions. Being at one with our transgressions as well as our aspirations are at the heart of this ancient practice of atonement, or “being one with,” and allowing ourselves to resolve, forgive and release what burdens us. - Dharma Talk during the Fusatsu Ceremony at the Spring Ango Intensive.
- [Heartbreak and Wholeness](https://zmm.org/podcast/heartbreak-and-wholeness/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 10/20/24 - Exploring vow, presence, and contact with the sacred mystery of our precious human lives, Shoan Osho encourages us to see the medicine in how we encounter the world and what can feel like relentless suffering. Rather than shutting down or feeling hopeless when your heart breaks, she encourages, you can let it break wide open to meet all beings with presence and wholeness.
- [A Lifetime of Alchemy—Fusatsu Talk](https://zmm.org/podcast/a-lifetime-of-alchemy-fusatsu-talk/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - 11/15/24 - Our ordinary life experiences are what we work with in practice; “a lifetime of alchemy” as Shoan Osho notes in this Fusatsu talk. This ancient practice gives us the tools with which to transform karma, in how we can recognize, acknowledge, and atone for our actions. In this way we can heal and live fully in accord with reality: our true Buddha nature.
- [Everything is in the Heart](https://zmm.org/podcast/everything-is-in-the-heart/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 12/15/24 - A poem by Zen monastic hermit Ryokan brings inspiration for this talk from Shoan Osho. Ryokan communicated Zen and Buddhist teachings through everyday encounters, directly expressing awakened nature, or Buddha nature. Shoan explores how this awakened nature, inseparable from the natural world, comes to life in taking care of what is around us and from taking care of ourselves and each other.
- [Space Beyond Knowing](https://zmm.org/podcast/space-beyond-knowing/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 12/29/24 - On a liberative path, we know we want to feel better but the enormity of the task, and the continuous “undoing” that it promises, can give pause. Shoan Osho explores the conditions of the Buddha’s enlightenment experience, and brings to the center Sujata’s role as the nourisher of life, as well as the cosmic female image of Prajna Paramita, the Mother of all Buddhas. Such images are in fact an emanation of each of us, our many forms of no-form, and are as limitless as space.
- [The Bodhisattva's World](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-bodhisattvas-world/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 2/9/25 - A timely reminder from Shoan Osho that a bodhisattva is one who interrupts the cycle of samsara, to stop creating and perpetuating greed, anger and ignorance, for the benefit of all beings. This “inner revolution” that practice offers is how we can calm the spinning mind and bring the light of wisdom and compassionate action to meet the challenges of the “outer world.”
- [The Power Of Stillness](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-power-of-stillness/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZCNYC - 2/15/25 - When the heart becomes heavy, can we see how our minds tend to run in circles? Seeing this clearly we can have space to stop, breathe, and return to stillness. In this way we can touch the wisdom of being fully embodied, and recognize our inherent spiritual power which is always present within us, right here and now.
- [Lesson from a Goddess](https://zmm.org/podcast/lesson-from-a-goddess/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZCNYC - 2/16/25 - When polarization seems to surround us, it's imperative to recognize our own dualistic thinking in its many forms, and cultivate a habit of perspective-shifting. Shoan Osho weaves the Zen teachings on stillness and fluidity as seen in the Vimalakirti Sutra chapter, "The Goddess" to help clarify that everything is groundless, impermanent, and subject to change, and therefore will always benefit from impartiality and the goodness of bodhisattva activity.
- [Sincerity in Practice](https://zmm.org/podcast/sincerity-in-practice/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 3/27/25 - Master Hongzhou says, "Contact phenomena with total sincerity - not a single atom of dust outside yourself." How we connect with the world of beings and things can be seen as caring, and within zazen the energy of steady presence and attention is what we offer those we love. It is a potent mix of awareness and sincerity, and it doesn’t take much of that to bring everything to life.
- [Entering the Gate of Wonder](https://zmm.org/podcast/entering-the-gate-of-wonder/) - Danica Shoan Ankele, Osho - ZMM - 5/23/25 - Gates of entry are enticing and sometimes overwhelming to enter, but we can gather our courage and bring ourselves forward to experience the world which is revealed there. Drawing on teachings from the Lankavatara Sutra and the Heart Sutra, Shoan Osho tells the story of “Enid in Zendoland,” whereby Enid becomes adept at distinguishing the perceptions of their own mind, and enters a marvelous gate of ease and joy.
- [The Real Way Circulates Everywhere](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-real-way-circulates-everywhere/) - Michelle Seigei Spark, Lay Senior MRO Student - ZMM - 1/26/24 - Inspired by Master Dogen's writings on zazen as well as Daido Roshi's teachings, Seigei presents us with what can bring us to meditation and what can motivate us to continue to meditate.
- [Eight Qualities of a Great Person](https://zmm.org/podcast/eight-qualities-of-a-great-person/) - Katie Yosha Scott-Childress, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 12/29/25 - From Dogen’s final teachings, a commentary on passages of the Parinirvana Sutra given before the Buddha died is offered by lay senior student Yosha. These teachings focus on what the Buddha himself said were the most essential aspects of what he taught. Rather than being abstract or distant, they speak directly to our ordinary yearnings and lived experience, encouraging us to stay close to the Dharma—through both study and practice—and to discover within that closeness a reliable source of guidance and refuge.
- [Path of Enlightenment: Stage 1 - Searching for the Ox](https://zmm.org/podcast/path-of-enlightenment-stage-1-searching-for-the-ox/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 1/5/2025 - What are we seeking? The spiritual journey is a path of discovering our true nature. The Ten Ox Herding pictures are a pictorial depiction of the Zen training path of enlightenment. Hojin begins this talk with a live painting of the first oxherding picture: Searching for the Ox, followed by a talk on this beginning stage of training: feeling an "offness" in our life, the raising of the Bodhi Mind, and the sense that some kind of search is on! Watch Hojin Sensei draw the first ox-herding picture: https://vimeo.com/1044299063
- [Path of Enlightenment:  Stage 2 - Finding the Traces of the Ox](https://zmm.org/podcast/path-of-enlightenment-stage-2-finding-the-traces-of-the-ox/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 2/2/25 - The spiritual journey is a path of discovering our true nature. The Ten Ox Herding pictures are a pictorial depiction of the training we each have to put together in our own body mind from the methods and teaching offered in this wisdom tradition. Hojin begins this talk with a live painting of the second ox herding picture: Finding the Traces of the Ox. As the preface to this stage says: "With the aid of the sutras, we gain understanding; through the study of the teaching, we find the traces. The many vessels are clearly all of one gold; and we ourselves, are the embodiment of the ten thousand things. But unable to recognize correct from incorrect, how are we to distinguish true from false? Since we have yet to pass through the gate, only tentatively have we seen the traces." We follow the tracks until we catch it! -- Watch Hojin Sensei paint the second ox-herding picture: https://vimeo.com/1054251015
- [Right Here At Home In One Breath](https://zmm.org/podcast/right-here-at-home-in-one-breath/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 2/9/25 - Bringing together Rumi's poem "Only Breath" and The Ānāpānasati Sutta (Sutra on Mindful Breathing), Hojin Sensei takes us through a thorough reckoning of this physical and profound practice, and how it is fundamental to being awake.
- [Thunderous Silence](https://zmm.org/podcast/thunderous-silence/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/1/25 - Hojin Sensei talks about Master Hakuin; his "Song of Zazen", and how his art - brushwork and poetry - was integral with his zazen and teaching process. Hojin explains the importance of art in Zen practice and talks about finding herself drawn to a similar teaching path.
- [The Creative Life Force](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-creative-life-force/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/9/25 - Hojin Sensei stresses the universality of creativity; we're creating every minute of our lives. i.e. "creativity is not just about art." Or "Our whole life is art." Furthermore, we can approach the three pure precepts (do not create evil, practice good, actualize good for others) as the practice of creativity in our everyday lives. So the questions become "What and how are we creating?" "What are we connecting with?" Hojin Sensei comments on Daido Roshi's teachings from his book "The Zen of Creativity" and talks about the meaning of her own prolific art practice.
- [Cooking Our Supreme Meal](https://zmm.org/podcast/cooking-our-supreme-meal/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - 3/16/25 - What do we create out of the karma that we have now? How do we "actualize good for others"? Hojin Sensei takes us through Dogen's Fascicle "Tenzo Kyokun" (Instructions for the Zen Cook), which is an instruction assigned to all successive cooks at ZMM, and is a deep teaching for all of us, to use all of our life, moment to moment, down to the intricate details.
- [Opening to Liturgy](https://zmm.org/podcast/opening-to-liturgy/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/23/25 - What's Liturgy? What's not Liturgy? Hojin Sensei talks about it's place, not just as a function in the Zendo, but as a down to earth, profound opening, right now, in our life.
- [Fusatsu: Skillful Means In the Forms of Practice](https://zmm.org/podcast/skillful-means-in-the-forms-of-practice/) - Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZMM - 4/25/25 - Skillful means, “Upaya,” are forms that the teachings take throughout our practice. How do we take up everything, including the edges that appear, rather than fight against them? How do we use our practice to explore and expand our capacity to be alive, fulfilled, and responsive to the world? - Dharma Talk during the Apple Blossom Sesshin 2025 Fusatsu Ceremony.
- [The Sisters of Mercy](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-sisters-of-mercy/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Sunday 05/22/2022 - What is true compassion and how do we develop it? If Buddhist teachings say a compassionate heart is our birthright, what must we do to reveal it? With Leonard Cohen's song Sisters of Mercy as a muse, Hogen Sensei explores the nature of compassion, its relationship to wisdom and loving-kindness, and the vital role our own suffering plays.
- [Sometimes……](https://zmm.org/podcast/sometimes/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Thursday 10/21/2021 - From the poetry of David Whyte - Hogen Sensei asks us to consider the questions - we all have - that, As David Whyte puts it, "can make or unmake a life." What are they? How do we respond? Can we let them be, let them stay with us? Can we live with them without grasping for answers?
- [Dharma Encounter: Vows](https://zmm.org/podcast/dharma-encounter-vow/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Sunday 10/24/2021 - Dharma Encounter at the Conclusion of the Harvest Moon Sesshin.
- [Everyone Has Their Own Light](https://zmm.org/podcast/everyone-has-their-own-light/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Thursday 11/18/2021 - From The Blue Cliff Record, Case 86 - Everyone Has Their Own Light - Hogen Sensei asks us: "how can we talk about enlightenment when there is nothing to understand about enlightenment?". We are inherently enlightened but our conditioning, karma and unskillful ways prevent us seeing it. We should remember that we all have own light and that zazen is the process for cultivating this light.
- [What Am I Missing?  The Fire God Comes Looking For Fire](https://zmm.org/podcast/what-am-i-missing-the-fire-god-comes-looking-for-fire/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Wednesday 03/30/2022 - From Master Dogen's 300 Koan Shobogenzo (True Dharma Eye), Case 122 - Fayan's Fire God - As practitioners of the Dharma, are we truly on the edge of our practice? Is peace and calm an indicator that we can rest in our accomplishment? Or is this just a transitory experience and there is more to be seen? When we reside firmly in our knowledge and don't step forth to continue inquiring more deeply, what could we be missing?
- [Fusatsu: Experience the Intimacy of Things](https://zmm.org/podcast/fusatsu-experience-the-intimacy-of-things/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Friday Evening 04/01/2022 - Dharma Talk during the Founder's Sesshin 2022 Fusatsu Ceremony - The tenth Buddhist Precept is to "Experience the intimacy of things; Do not defile the Three Treasures." How do we understand and apply this Precept? In this talk, Hogen Sensei takes up this profound teaching, imploring us to look closely at our practice and our lives.
- [Dharma Encounter: Taking Refuge in the Buddha](https://zmm.org/podcast/dharma-encounter-taking-refuge-in-the-buddha/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Sunday 04/03/2022 - This Dharma Encounter with Hogen Sensei took place at the conclusion of the March Founding Sesshin. What does it mean to take refuge in the Buddha? What does it mean to take refuge and what exactly are we taking refuge in? Hogen Sensei takes this question up with Ango participants in a lively discussion.
- [Lotus in the Fire](https://zmm.org/podcast/lotus-in-the-fire/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Thursday 04/28/2022 - The Buddha pointed to our desires as the origin of our suffering. But how do we understand desire? Does having wants guarantee us pain? In this talk, Hogen Sensei discusses the nature of desire and investigates the difference between having attachments and liking certain things. How can we determine if we are bound by desire? And how do we hold the things in life we do like?
- [How to Lose Momentum](https://zmm.org/podcast/how-to-lose-momentum/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Friday 05/27/2022 - Dharma Talk during the Ocean Gathering Sesshin - Drawing on the lyrics of the song 'Momentum' by Aimee Mann, Hogen Sensei illuminates how much our lives are driven by fear. What is the alternative to fear? When we are fearful, what is it that we do not want to feel? Instead of a strategy of numbness, how do we turn towards and disrupt the momentum of our fearful karmic patterns?
- [Dancing with the Moon](https://zmm.org/podcast/dancing-with-the-moon/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Friday 10/28/2022 - From The Blue Cliff Record, Case 74 - Chin Niu's Rice Pail - Hogen Sensei begins with the dancing, laughing Master Chin Niu. There are routines in and throughout our lives, as it is in the life of the monastery. How do we understand these routines? How do we practice them? And what is it that's reflected in our actions? Is there receiving? Is there offering? Within each of our unique karmic lives, we bring forth our true nature, with awareness or not.
- [Jukai Ceremony at Fire Lotus Temple, August 2023](https://zmm.org/podcast/jukai-ceremony-at-fire-lotus-temple-august-2023/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZCNYC 8/6/2023 - Hogen Sensei officiates a Jukai Ceremony for three MRO students. Amidst a full zendo at Fire Lotus Temple, these students received the 16 Bodhisattva precepts and the following dharma names: Gale Onjan ("Peaceful Faith") Delaney, Beverly Kyokei ("Offering Kindness") Corbett, and Ravi Baike ("Cultivating Prajna") Mishra.
- [In one, there is many. In many, only one.](https://zmm.org/podcast/in-one-there-is-many-in-many-only-one/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 9/27/23 - From the Book of Equanimity, Case 17 - Fayan's "Hairsbreadth" - What's the difference between conveying knowledge and conveying the non-dual dharma? How do we directly experience the distinctiveness and the oneness of things, and convey this to each other, in the activity of our everyday lives? Is that "Intimate Language"?
- [Our Practice of Awakening: Endless Pivot Points](https://zmm.org/podcast/dharma-encounter-pivot-points/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 10/29/23 - How do you understand "Intimate Speech"? How and when does it occur? What happens, inside and outside, when it does? Hogen Sensei takes up these questions and others with Ango participants in a heartfelt discussion.
- [Living An Appropriate Life](https://zmm.org/podcast/living-an-appropriate-life/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 11/16/23 - From the Blue Cliff Record, Case 14 - "Yunmen's Appropriate Statement" - With this pithy koan by Yunmen, in light of Atisha's slogan #55, "Liberate yourself by examining and analyzing", Hogen Sensei encourages us to clarify, on an ongoing basis, why we're practicing and to trust our direct experience as a "way in", a "journey of no distance."
- [Who Is The Other?](https://zmm.org/podcast/who-is-the-other/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Thursday 11/17/22 - Mumonkan (Gateless Gate) Case 45 - Wu-tsu: "Who Is That Other?" - "Who am I?" and "Who is the Other?" These questions continuously show up in our lives. How do we live them, live with them? Hogen Sensei encourages us to keep them present and open, and alive.
- [Living and Dying as Your Life](https://zmm.org/podcast/living-and-dying-as-your-life/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM 05/25/2023 - From Dogen's Extensive Record, # 391: "Life and Death Without Abode" - Hogen Sensei asks... Can we directly look at our life? Which is what we mean when we say "Strive to Awaken"....
- [The World is not Conclusion](https://zmm.org/podcast/not-all-bodhisattvas-are-buddhists/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 6/25/2023 - The Bodhisattva Path calls for the kind of understanding/view at the outset which will support/inspire/guide our activity on that path. Hogen Sensei comments on Emily Dickinson's poem "This World is not Conclusion" to help us to see the deep aspects of this understanding.
- [The Lion's Roar: Your Roar](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-lions-roar-your-roar/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 3/27/24 - From The Record of the Transmission of the Light, Case 1 - Shakyamuni Buddha - Hogen Sensei reminds us that we are all inherently buddhas and have the ability to realize ourselves in our lifetime.
- [Leading the People](https://zmm.org/podcast/leading-the-people/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 4/21/24 - Inspired by Master Dogen’s poem “Snow”, Hogen Sensei asks us what makes us whole? What can we rely on to face what is before us with clear intention?
- [Doing Wrong on the Road to Blessedness](https://zmm.org/podcast/doing-wrong-on-the-road-to-blessedness/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 4/27/24 - From the Book of Equanimity, Case 67 - The Wisdom of the Flower Garland Sutra - The base of our practice is to realize our own true nature. Hogen Sensei exhorts us to not defile it by clinging to our deluded opinions; we are all fundamentally endowed with the virtues of the Buddha.
- [Dharma Encounter: On the Courage to Listen](https://zmm.org/podcast/dharma-encounter-on-the-courage-to-listen/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 4/28/24 - A foundational aspect of relationship: listening in all it's myriad forms... How do we practice it? How do we understand it in terms of the Precepts, or the Four Noble Truths, with Vow? What's missing when we're not listening? Hogen Sensei engages the Sangha with this theme, presenting a koan from the Book of Equanimity, "The Wisdom of the Flower Garland Sutra," along with the poem "Listening" by David Ignatow.
- [Your Relationship With Mt Tremper](https://zmm.org/podcast/your-relationship-with-mt-tremper/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 5/23/24 - From The True Dharma Eye, Case 75 - Yantou's "Sit Still" - How do we respond to life’s complications? Sitting in stillness is the simple practice, but in itself can become a hiding place. The Three Worlds—form, formlessness and desire—all arrive together at once, so how do we practice stillness in the midst of it all? Using a koan from Master Yantou, Hogen Sensei reminds us that true freedom, to let go and be totally alive to the suchness of this moment, is within our capacity to let go of fixed views about anything.
- [Having Power on the Road](https://zmm.org/podcast/step-into-your-life/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 09/26/2024 - What is it to be empowered on the path? What is your potential? Realizing our true nature, personally, requires trust, an intuitive trust that must be developed over time. In this exploration of dharma practice, Hogen Sensei brings forward the virtues of selflessness and compassion that can empower us on the path.
- [Do I Die, Or Do I Live?](https://zmm.org/podcast/do-i-die-or-do-i-live/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 11/21/24 - From The Book of Equanimity, Case 30 - Daizui's Fire at the End of the Kalpa - Practice offers a way for cutting through dualities within which we tend to get lost, as all of our lives are based on these dualities. Hogen Sensei challenges us to see from a larger perspective, a way which inherently challenges dualistic ways of being in the world. Within this practice, how do we understand the permanence of Buddha Nature which is not a “thing”?
- [Practicing With Intention](https://zmm.org/podcast/practicing-with-intention/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 4/24/25 - Honesty is essential to serious spiritual practice. We need to become honest with ourselves about the nature of our suffering, our habitual reactivity and our fear, so that we can acknowledge them before being able to release them. This level of integrity is needed for the entrance to a loving and compassionate relationship with ourselves and others. As Hogen Sensei says, this intention affects every aspect of living and dying, and the choices we’re free to make along the way. - From Master Dogen's Treasury of the True Dharma Eye - Fascicle 31 - Continuous Practice (Gyoji)
- [Dharma Encounter with Hogen Sensei](https://zmm.org/podcast/dharma-encounter-with-hogen-sensei/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 10/27/24 - Bodhicitta is simply the aspiration to save all others from suffering. Along the way, how do we go forward on an ever shifting and bumpy path? This lively dharma encounter with Hogen Sensei and the sangha is tender and encouraging of all our aspirations to be of benefit in an ever changing world.
- [Hogen Sensei: Dharma Encounter on Non-Deception](https://zmm.org/podcast/hogen-sensei-dharma-encounter-on-the-precepts/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - ZMM - 3/30/25 - To not deceive oneself is the fundamental ground of all moral and ethical action, and to do that we need to go deep into the roots of our greed, aggression and ignorance. How do we work with this? How has our zazen practice helped us become more skillful and to take responsibility even when we resist that? This Dharma Encounter with the sangha brings out the integrity and courage we work with throughout our Zen training.
- [Dharma Language & Dharma Study](https://zmm.org/podcast/dharma-language-dharma-study/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 6/15/25 - We acquire language as we become more conscious of what surrounds us—people and things and concepts—and the language we learn to use is inextricable from our conscious sense of ourselves. In this sense we are co-creating our reality moment by moment as we use language. In Dharma study, one of the Eight Gates of Zen, we learn to work with some skill in appreciating the necessity of language as well as the constructed and thereby provisional nature of language. Our capacity to use words toward realization is not limited by words themselves.
- [Returning to the Great Earth](https://zmm.org/podcast/returning-to-the-great-earth/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 6/22/25 - Getting caught up in the many distractions that we encounter daily contributes to our confusion, our sense of overwhelm. How do we cultivate practice in such a way that we can turn it back, to inquire, and not be overwhelmed? With honesty and persistence, practice can help reveal the true nature of the self and of all things. Using Dharma words from Eihei Dogen, Shugen Roshi encourages us to turn the light around, calm our busy minds, and see things as they truly are. - From Master Dogen's 300 Koan Shobogenzo (The True Dharma Eye), Case 16 Changsha's "Returning to Mountains, Rivers, and the Great Earth"
- [The Perfection of What Is](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-perfection-of-what-is/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - Wednesday 6/25/25 - Shugen Roshi explores a passage from the Prajnaparamita Sutra and its emphasis on the “unconditioned” nature of things. When this is realized within our zazen, the unconditioned state has the potential to liberate our minds. If we can meet our minds and what arises without adding extra, without grasping and rejecting, we can begin to sense the deep wisdom we seek in the dharma.
- [Abiding Well In The Mountains](https://zmm.org/podcast/abiding-well-in-the-mountains/) - Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - Saturday 6/28/25 - How do we make the dharma our own? In Zen training, we have to fully let go of the expectations and ideas of what it will look like once we realize ourselves. And importantly, we need to let go of our self-criticism and other kinds of self-centered preoccupation. As we continue to build confidence in our abilities and the practice itself, we learn to abide well anywhere we go, in all aspects of our lives. - From the Koans of the Way of Reality - Yunju's "Abiding in the Mountains"
- [From the Archives: Perfection Revealed](https://zmm.org/podcast/from-the-archives-perfection-revealed/) - John Daido Loori, Roshi Zen Mountain Monastery, 10/5/1995 The Gateless Gate, Case #9 The teachings tell us we’re already perfect and complete. But why don’t we feel that way? Our sense of separation from our perfection is the root of our suffering. The aim of practice is to make this truth alive and real in our
- [From the Archives: Going Beyond Buddha](https://zmm.org/podcast/going-beyond-buddha/) - John Daido Loori, Roshi Zen Mountain Monastery, 6/26/1998 True Dharma Eye, Case #12 Zen points us toward a direct realization of our true nature that surpasses any ideas we might have. In this talk Daido Roshi looks at the path of Zen training, teaching that at every point along the way, our practice is deeply personal
- [From the Archives: Intimate Expression](https://zmm.org/podcast/from-the-archives-intimate-expression/) - John Daido Loori, Roshi Zen Mountain Monastery, 9/27/2003 Koans of the Way of Reality, Case #109 How do we perceive the truth? If we look for it with our eyes and our ears, we'll miss it. In this talk, Daido Roshi takes up the intuitive nature of expression and understanding, and reminds us, once again, that
- [From the Archives: The Original Source](https://zmm.org/podcast/from-the-archives-the-original-source/) - John Daido Loori, Roshi Zen Mountain Monastery, 11/28/2004 Koans of the Way of Reality Religious traditions all over the world have always had to deal with the question of “the source.” If God created the world, then who, or what created God? Is there anything outside of God, outside the universe? It is this mystery
- [Feeding Your Demons](https://zmm.org/podcast/feeding-your-demons/) - Lopön Karla Jackson-Brewer - ZMM - 5/18/2025 - This talk from dharma teacher Lopön Karla was offered at the conclusion of the weekend retreat. Feeding your Demons brings an 11th century Tibetan practice to the West in an accessible and effective approach for dealing with negative emotions, fears, illness, self-defeating patterns, and beliefs that hinder our expression of our highest humanity as individuals and as a society.
- [Pure Perception](https://zmm.org/podcast/pure-perception/) - Michelle Seigei Spark, Lay Senior MRO Student - ZMM - 7/20/25 - Our six senses can be an entry to the whole entire mind of practice and provide us direct dharma teachings of the world in which we exist. While our thinking minds might hurry right past what our senses are perceiving, we have the capacity to take in much more. Immersing ourselves in the wonders of sound, touch, taste—and even awareness of our aging bodies, illness, and the impermanence of all life—we can allow pure perception help consciousness shift.
- [A Coin Before It’s Stamped](https://zmm.org/podcast/a-coin-before-its-stamped/) - Prabu Gikon Vasan, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 8/21/25 - Understanding the many negations in the Heart Sutra, and the concept of “emptiness,” requires effort and faith. It asks us to examine what we take as true, and to verify that through practice. Buddhism does not limit this inquiry to abstract concepts; it directly engages our lived experiences and beliefs in order to ease suffering. If there is no value put on something--like a coin before it’s stamped--then what is it worth? Senior lay student Gikon takes up the path of practice, clarifying the essential teachings of form and emptiness.
- [Concerns of the Human World](https://zmm.org/podcast/concerns-of-the-human-world/) - Katie Yosha Scott-Childress, Senior Lay Student - ZCNYC - 9/28/25 - The Eight Worldly Conditions are core teachings of the Buddha and provide us with some guidelines in working with the habitual energies of gain and loss, fame and disrepute, praise and blame, and pleasure and pain. Senior lay student Yosha offers ways of taking up our resistances and clinging as ways to enter a newer freedom through a close study of these habits of mind.
- [Noble Path Talk - Ikyo Love](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-ikyo-love/) - Ikyo Love, MRO Student - 1/12/25 - "Making it my own."
- [Noble Path Talk - Kien Martin](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-kien-martin/) - Kien Martin, MRO Monastic - ZCNYC - 12/29/24 - A Path of Faith, Doubt and Determination.
- [Noble Path Talk — Sandy Joshin Del Valle - September 2024](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-september-2024/) - Sandy Joshin Del Valle, Lay Student - ZCNYC - 9/29/24 - Joshin offers words of encouragement to take with us on our path, as she recounts her own experience in her Zen practice.
- [Noble Path Talk - Tenfu Loisel - June 2024](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-tenfu-loisel-june-2024/) - Zabeth Tenfu Loisel, Lay Student - ZCNYC - 6/30/24 - How precious! The sangha treasure.
- [Living Dharma In Ease And Joy](https://zmm.org/podcast/living-dharma-in-ease-and-joy/) - Chimyo Simone Atkinson, Sensei - ZMM - 6/9/24 - Chimyo Sensei explores the essential practice of zazen, and our genuine capacity to realize Buddha Nature. This practice can challenge us to face our own barriers, tapping into our innate ability to yield, like a dragon taking to the water, and the courage to move freely, like a tiger entering the mountains. Chimyo Sensei offers guidance to live the dharma with whatever is arising, with grace, ease and joy.
- [Noble Path Talk - Chikyuu - June 2024](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-chikyuu-june-2024/) - Chikyuu Donohue, Lay Student Zen Center of New York City, Fire Lotus Temple, Sunday 06/02/2024
- [A Conversation with Butoh Teacher Vangeline](https://zmm.org/podcast/vangeline-butoh/) - In this podcast interview, Monastic Hokyu Aronson speaks with guest instructor Vangeline about embodied movement and healing. Along the way, they discuss some of the deep history of butoh and how trauma-informed guidance can help students settle their nervous systems, whether they are pursuing Zen, butoh, or life itself. Although Vangeline emphasizes this approach in
- [Noble Path Talk — Sandy Joshin Del Valle, May 2024](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-sandy-joshin-del-valle-may-2024/) - Sandy Joshin Del Valle, Lay Student - ZCNYC - 5/26/24 - Joshin offers words of encouragement to take with us on our path, as she recounts her own stories of coming into Zen practice, and how developing constancy in this practice has transformed her life.
- [Decolonizing Awakening On Turtle Mountain - Interview with Ed Duran](https://zmm.org/podcast/decolonizing-awakening-on-turtle-mountain-interview-with-ed-duran/) - Dr Eduardo Duran, PhD - 01/31/2023 - An interview with Dr. Ed Duran conducted in January 2023 by MRO students Daniel Onren Latorre and monastic Taikyo Gilman. The topics considered were drawn from previous conversations Ed offered in recent years: with the MRO BIAPoC Sangha on Decolonizing Buddha; and, with the MRO sangha at large, on Decolonizing Awakening On Turtle Mountain. - Ed Duran (Apache/Tewa/Lakota) is a psychologist who has been working in indigenous communities most of his professional career. He is a Vietnam Veteran who started his academic training after being discharged from the US Navy. He has been involved in Buddhist and traditional Native practices for many years, and his work is informed by traditional Indigenous understanding of heart knowing. - Eduardo is the author of Buddha in Redface (Writers Club Press, 2003), a story that deals with these traditions as well as our karmic relationship to the Earth. He is also the author of Healing the Soul Wound: Trauma-informed Counseling for Indigenous Communities and Native American Postcolonial Psychology. He presently lives outside of Bozeman, Montana.
- [Noble Path Talk - Taisho Sands](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-taisho-sands/) - Taisho Sands, Lay Student - Zen Center of New York City, Fire Lotus Temple, Brooklyn 03/19/2023
- [Noble Path Talk - Chikyuu Donohue](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-chikyuu-donohue/) - Chikyuu Donohue, Lay Student - Zen Center of New York City, Fire Lotus Temple, Brooklyn 08/14/2022
- [Noble Path Talk - Tenfu Loisel - July 2022](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-tenfu-loisel-july-2022/) - Tenfu Loisel, Lay Student - Zen Center of New York City, Fire Lotus Temple, Brooklyn 07/24/2022
- [The All Pervading Subtlety of Karma](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-all-pervading-subtlety-of-karma/) - Ron Hogen Green, Sensei - Zen Mountain Monastery, New York, Friday 09/24/2021 - The Book of Equanimity, Case 18 - Zhaozhou's "Dog"
- [Noble Path Talk - Virginia Black](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-virginia-black/) - Virginia Black, Sangha Member - Zen Center of New York City, 05/20/2021
- [Noble Path Talk – Tenfu Loisel - April 2021](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-tenfu-loisel/) - Zabeth Tenfu Loisel, Lay Student - Zen Center of New York City, 04/15/2021
- [Noble Path Talk - Diego Antoni](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-diego-antoni/) - Diego Antoni, Lay Student - Zen Center of New York City, 03/18/2021
- [Noble Path Talk - Tommy Smoot](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-tommy/) - Tommy Smoot, Sangha Member - Zen Center of New York City, 10/29/2020
- [ZMM Podcast Presents: An Interview with Bethany Senkyu Saltman](https://zmm.org/podcast/strange-situation/) - [vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The ZMM Podcast is pleased to present this conversation about the practice of parenting and how informed self-inquiry can lead us to true intimacy. These are just two of the topics explored by Bethany Senkyu Saltman in her new book, Strange Situation: A Mother’s Journey into the Science of Attachment. Senkyu is a poet, essayist,
- [Noble Path Talk - Oliver Hartman](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-oliver/) - Oliver Jay Hartman, Lay Student - Zen Center of New York City, 10/01/2020
- [Noble Path Talk - Joshin Del Valle - Sept 2020](https://zmm.org/podcast/noble-path-talk-joshin/) - Sandy Joshin Del Valle, Lay Student - Zen Center of New York City, 09/29/2020
- [Vast Is The Robe of Liberation](https://zmm.org/podcast/vast-is-the-robe-of-liberation/) - [vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] Gwitha Kaido Nash, Senior Lay Practitioner Delivered to Zen Mountain Monastery from New Zealand, via Zoom, 8/19/2020 How the Buddhadharma came to Aotearoa/New Zealand is part of Kaido’s story. Another important aspect is how this now 32-year old sangha reflects its own place and time. The sangha made a collective decision to incorporate the
- [ZMM PODCAST: An Interview with Yogacara Scholar William Waldron](https://zmm.org/podcast/interview-with-william-waldron/) - Thinking about emptiness might seem like a misguided approach to spiritual practice or perhaps just a poor use of one's time. But that is exactly what was advocated by the Indian philosophers who developed Abhidharma, Madyamika, and Yogācāra. As Buddhist scholar William S. Waldron points out in his work, these developments were merely a further
- [The Diamond Net Presents: A Conversation About Honoring Death](https://zmm.org/podcast/the-diamond-net-presents-a-conversation-about-honoring-death/) - First the podcast, an abridged version of a longer conversation you can find at the bottom of this page. There’s a saying about modern religious practice in Japan. “When there’s a birth, go to the Shinto temple for a blessing. When there’s a marriage, go to a church for the ceremony. When there’s a death,
- [The ZMM Podcast Presents: Mountains & Rivers Annual Journal](https://zmm.org/podcast/new-journal-podcast/) - Our newly launched journal—Mountains and Rivers: Zen Dharma and Practice—is now available. Just ahead of the February 2020 release date, journal editor Suzanne Taikyo Gilman and the journal’s designer, Kristin Keimu Adolphson, sat down for a conversation about this exciting project with Valerie Meiju Linet, a former editor of Mountain Record quarterly. Here's a bit
- [ZMM Podcast: Lawrence Shainberg](https://zmm.org/podcast/lawrenceshainberg/) - Author Lawrence Shainberg will be at the Zen Center of NYC on Saturday, October 5th for a reading from his new book, Four Men Shaking. Shainberg began formal Zen practice in 1973, first at the Zen Studies Center, on Manhattan's Upper East Side as well as its Catskills-based training center, Daibosatsu Zendo. Later, he became
- [Clear Spirit Breeze, Breath of our Song](https://zmm.org/podcast/clear-spirit-breeze-breath-of-our-life/) - Michael Chizen Brown, Senior Lay Practitioner Zen Mountain Monastery, 08/21/2019 A universal spiritual element, the breath of life is also the basis of zazen practice as taught in Zen Buddhism. The breath as a practice is fundamental in working with the mind, letting go of conceptual thought, practicing bodhicitta, and raising the Buddha Mind. Long-time
- [David Hinton at the Buddhist Poetry Festival](https://zmm.org/podcast/david-hinton-bpf/) - When launching the Buddhist Poetry Festival in 2018, David Hinton was one of the first writers who came to mind and it was no accident that we scheduled him to open up the event on the first morning. Hinton bridges past and present, distinguishing himself as one of the foremost translators of ancient Chinese poetry
- [From the Archives: A Vow of Service](https://zmm.org/podcast/from-the-archives-a-vow-of-service/) - Bernard Tetsugen Glassman, Roshi Zen Mountain Monastery, 10/26/1991 This is an excerpt of a retreat given by Bernie Tetsugen Glassman at Zen Mountain Monastery on October 26. 1991. Bernie Roshi, who passed away this past Sunday, was Taizan Maezumi Roshi's first dharma heir at Zen Center of Los Angeles and played a key role
- [Body Wisdom: the Miracle of Aliveness](https://zmm.org/podcast/body-wisdom-the-miracle-of-aliveness/) - Michael Chizen Brown, Senior Lay Practitioner Zen Mountain Monastery, 10/25/2018 Chizen. a senior lay practitioner in the Mountains and Rivers Order, reminds us that we are neither separate from our own bodies nor from the great earth itself.
- [The Soto Zen Buddhist Association at ZMM](https://zmm.org/podcast/szba-interview/) - In September, Zen Mountain Monastery hosted the biannual conference of the Soto Zen Buddhist Association for three full days of practice, discussion and exploration. Close to 70 ordained priests and transmitted teachers joined the conference, representing dozens of training centers and sitting groups throughout North America. Following the conference, we spoke with Tenku Ruff who
- [Margaret Gibson at the Buddhist Poetry Festival](https://zmm.org/podcast/margaret-gibson-interview/) - Margaret Gibson in conversation with Zuisei Goddard, Sensei Zen Mountain Monastery, 7/6/2018 Over the course of four decades, Margaret Gibson has amassed a body of work as rich and varied as it is consistent in aspiration. One reads a poem by Margaret Gibson and comes away having shared in the yearning to see deeply, often
- [Podcast Interview: Zuisei Goddard on Mindfulness](https://zmm.org/podcast/zuisei-mindfulness-interview-2017/) - ​In this March 2017 interview with Zuisei Sensei, we talk about the misunderstandings and true potential of cultivating—and maintaining—awareness​. This conversation was recorded ahead of Zuisei's April 2017 retreat, "Taming the Mind."

## Categories

- [Uncategorized](https://zmm.org/category/uncategorized/)
- [ANGO](https://zmm.org/category/ango/)
- [In Memoriam](https://zmm.org/category/in-memoriam/)

## Tags

- [yunen](https://zmm.org/tag/yunen/)
- [zcnyc](https://zmm.org/tag/zcnyc/)
- [Shinji](https://zmm.org/tag/shinji/)
- [Hojin](https://zmm.org/tag/hojin/)
- [fusatsu](https://zmm.org/tag/fusatsu/)
- [Jukai](https://zmm.org/tag/jukai/)
- [ango](https://zmm.org/tag/ango/)
- [dharma encounter](https://zmm.org/tag/dharma-encounter/)
- [zazenkai](https://zmm.org/tag/zazenkai/)
- [Gokan](https://zmm.org/tag/gokan/)
- [zmm](https://zmm.org/tag/zmm/)
- [Shoan](https://zmm.org/tag/shoan/)
- [Shugen](https://zmm.org/tag/shugen/)
- [Gikon](https://zmm.org/tag/gikon/)
- [Yosha](https://zmm.org/tag/yosha/)
- [Taikyo](https://zmm.org/tag/taikyo/)
- [Taisho](https://zmm.org/tag/taisho/)
- [Hogen](https://zmm.org/tag/hogen/)
- [Daido](https://zmm.org/tag/daido/)
- [Seigei](https://zmm.org/tag/seigei/)
- [noble path talk](https://zmm.org/tag/noble-path-talk/)
- [Kien](https://zmm.org/tag/kien/)
- [Sansho](https://zmm.org/tag/sansho/)
- [recent](https://zmm.org/tag/recent/)
- [mro](https://zmm.org/tag/mro/)
- [kyosho](https://zmm.org/tag/kyosho/)

## Series

- [The Zen Mountain Monastery Podcast](https://zmm.org/series/the-zen-mountain-monastery-podcast/) - The Mountains and Rivers Order (MRO) is a Western Zen Buddhist lineage established by the late John Daido Loori Roshi and dedicated to sharing the dharma as it has been passed down, generation to generation, since the time of Shakyamuni Buddha. Zen Mountain Monastery, the main house of the Mountains and Rivers Order, is one of the West’s most respected Zen Buddhist monasteries and training centers. Nestled in New York’s beautiful Catskill Mountains, the Monastery draws its strength from the ancient tradition of Buddhist monasticism. Since 1980, the Monastery has offered spiritual practitioners traditional and innovative ways to engage the dharma through a wide range of retreats and residential programs that unfold within the context of authentic, full-time Zen monastic training. The Zen Center of New York City: Fire Lotus Temple is the city branch of Zen Mountain Monastery. Supporting home practitioners in the metropolitan area, ZCNYC offers varied practice opportunities within the Eight Gates training matrix.
- [From the Archives](https://zmm.org/series/from-the-archives/)
- [John Daido Loori](https://zmm.org/series/john-daido-loori/)
- [Noble Path Talks](https://zmm.org/series/noble-path-talks/)
- [Other MRO Talks](https://zmm.org/series/other-mro-talks/)
- [Recent Teacher Talks](https://zmm.org/series/recent-teacher-talks/)
- [Ron Hogen Green](https://zmm.org/series/ron-hogen-green/)
- [Zen Center of NYC](https://zmm.org/series/zcnyc/)
- [Danica Shoan Sensei](https://zmm.org/series/danica-shoan-ankele/)