Recordings

Concern with how our karma developed is sometimes compared to being shot with a poison arrow. Don’t ask who shot it or how it was made, just get it out. But practice pushes us to confront past events and how they shape us. How do we look at the past in a wholesome way?

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

Categories: Wednesday Classes

This week we welcome a guest teacher, Ryushin Hart. Ryushin’s talk will explore a pervasive and pernicious obstacle to wholeheartedly living our spiritual path and the steps to decrease its impact.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Twice a year, the sangha has an opportunity to hear from our governing bodies and to ask questions and give feedback. In the spring, the forum is sponsored by the Dharma Council, giving updates on liturgy, classes, etc. The Board, Dharma Garden Council, and DEI will also give updates.

Categories: Sangha Forum

Categories: Wednesday Classes

Kakumyo talks about discovering the absolute within the relative.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

There’s a Christian song that starts “Have Faith, Hope, and Charity; that’s the way to live successfully.” These somewhat old-fashioned words, Biblical words, words in a song, speak of values we cherish in Buddhism as well, though we may express it somewhat differently.

What are these three virtues, and how do they manifest in our lives? What does it mean to have faith, to have hope, to have charity? Genko explores these questions and more in her Dharma Talk.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

Sometimes the dharma rain seeps in and nourishes us in the way we’re hoping. Other times it seems to bounce off like a spring hail. Perhaps there’s no obvious button to push to change things. When we’re caught like this, we’re probably narrowing the range of our experience so the specific insult takes up more space than is warranted. This Sunday, Kakumyo will speak about how our basic relationship to emptiness subtly impacts virtually every other dharmic and life decision and perception. When we can make a little pivot in a very deep, central part of our experience, the effect can ripple through many different aspects of our life.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

All the qualities of our identity are empty of self-nature, especially the qualities of the body. Yet such things as skin color and gender are often treated as “real” – as permanent, fixed, and conveying value. Suffering is the result. The talk this week will focus on this ‘injury of identity,’ particularly in regard to gender, and what it means to ally on behalf of such identifiers even as we reject them as true identity. Why do we recite a women’s lineage? Why do we point out gender as a characteristic when the Dharma tells us all such characteristics are empty?

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

One of the barriers many people experience in meditation practice, and especially in the Zen tradition, are concerns about whether we are going to do it wrong. This shows up in many distinct flavors, sharing a common theme of anxiety. This Sunday Kakumyo will talk about how we meet this barrier and how it relates to sangha treasure and the ongoing, lifelong practice of awareness.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

A sense of spring is vibrating toward manifesting. Frogs are singing a symphony each night at Siskiyou Square. We spotted crocuses coming up in the garden, and there’s a hint of color in the plum grove. In spite of the recent ice and snow, and the fact that we could still get more cold weather, even snow, during the next couple of months, there’s a definite feeling of spring in the air. With new beginnings, it’s sometimes tempting to forget about the past and just forge ahead as if it never happened. Certainly I’ve seen a lot of people want to expunge 2020 from memory. It’s been almost a year since we closed the temple for a time during the first Covid lockdown. What have we learned during the past year to carry forward positively into these new beginnings?

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

Valentine’s Day, a day to profess romantic love to your special someone. Chocolate, cards, flowers, coziness, making that extra effort to show you care. What might this look like in a Zen context? Rather than making an extra effort for that special someone, what if you expressed your love for everyone? What if you cultivated compassion not only on one calendar day, but all days? What would that take?

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

This Sunday we commemorate the Buddha’s death. In the sutra that details his final teachings, there’s a discussion of the mind that seeks the way. We will look at the discovery, expression, and honing of this mind, and see why it is so pivotal in Zen practice.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

What is sustainable bodhisattva practice when the world is (often literally) on fire? How do we enact our bodhisattva vows in the face of all of this suffering – caused by racism, the global pandemic, the breakdown of earth’s natural life support systems, and global heating, among so many other things? Our vow is to “save all beings” but – at least in terms of an individual’s goal – that’s impossible. Domyo will offer a three-ingredient approach to honoring our bodhisattva vow in a tangible, rewarding, and sustainble way, as opposed to it being a largely irrelevant ideal.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

The long nights of winter are slowly giving way to our long days of spring and summer. Light has many meanings, and many functions. How do we experience the shift from shadow to light? What happens when there is so much light that we can see all the detail in the world?

Categories: Dharma Talks

Categories: Wednesday Classes

It can be said that Zen Buddhism, rather than being a system of belief, is a practice of exploration and self-discovery. Built on the teachings of the Buddha, Zen asks us to look deeply into our lives, habits, and relationships and learn to transform unwholesome action to wholesome action. Experiences of questions and answers have flavored Buddhism since its inception and have been carried onward throughout the millennia. Yet, sometimes we can get caught in a sense of uncertainty when it comes to asking spiritual questions. What do I say? Is this appropriate? Am I being nosy? I bet everyone knows this but me…

Categories: Dharma Talks

Class 2

Categories: Wednesday Classes

We all face many transitions, both big and small, during our lives. Some we choose and some seem to fall on us with an unwelcome thud. In either case it’s ours to meet these transitions in such a way that we can grow with them. In this dharma talk, Gyoshi will address various aspects of practicing with transition: how and why we often try to block change, how we know what is ours to do, embracing impermanence, forgiveness of self and others, and how we relate to our roles and responsibilities.

Categories: Dharma Talks

Class 1

Categories: Wednesday Classes

Now we have this new year full of hope and promise. With the turn of the calendar and the magic of new numbers we can imagine that we are living in a different, better world. And of course things continue to change. Many people’s thoughts turn to aligning their lives more closely with their true aspirations, and make resolutions to shape up in various ways. How can we do this skillfully, so that real change is likely, and likely to tend in the direction we intend? Genko addresses this and more in her talk this Sunday.

Categories: Dharma Talks

As we meet the longest night of the year, how do we enter into darkness? The dark is a rich image in Zen. Let us talk about those meanings, and the real dark and the real night of this winter.

Categories: Dharma Talks