The Zen Mountain Monastery Podcast

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/2/25 - Shugen Roshi introduces the theme of the MRO 90-day Spring Ango 2025 training period, "Mountain Training: The Eight Gates of Zen."

Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei - ZCNYC - 3/2/25 - Hojin Sensei opens the Spring Ango practice period at Fire Lotus Temple and introduces this Ango's theme: "Mountain Training: The Eight Gates of Zen."

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/1/25 - From the Blue Cliff Record, Case 43 - Tung Shan's No Cold or Heat - What are we holding on to? By facing rather than avoiding extremes, we take up the way to freedom. Using an ancient koan, Shugen Roshi explores the extremes and asks: can we see things as they are, not clouded by our preferences? This does not mean that there is nothing to be done, for there is. Practice is changing the way we use our minds, "down to the bone," so that we can be free in the world of duality.

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 2/23/25 - At the root of our ancestral lineage is reverence: for the Dharma, for practice and realization, and for all beings. In this talk Shugen Roshi explores the elements of faith and practice which “bring to life” the Buddha Dharma, and are central to the it’s transmission from generation to generation. Gokan Osho also shares some words on his practice of Denkai training—the priestly transmission—received from Shugen Roshi this week. 

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.”

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 2/2/25 - What do you see in front of you? Our perceptions are windows to the world, and provide material for how we create “the self” as a separate and seemingly solid entity. But all beings are fundamentally not fixed or solid, and to study this we can put an end to clinging and suffering. How do we live freely and compassionately? These instructions from Shugen Roshi point to our own wakefulness and freedom. (From the Blue Cliff Record, Case 40 - Nan Ch'uan's It's Like a Dream)

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

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/26/25 - The sole purpose of a koan is to help the student experience their true nature. As a skillful means, a koan helps us see where we are clinging, and the karma we carry in this life. Yet even an enlightened being has this karmic body to grapple with. The challenge is to be in complete intimacy with our true nature, as it is, as we are.  Part 3 of 3

Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Senior Monastic - ZCNYC - 1/26/25 - We all feel vulnerable and frightened when external circumstances change too fast and nothing feels certain. The Buddha guided his early community through disruption with the Metta Sutta, and this teaching gives us some helpful pointers for making our responses and actions skillful when based in lovingkindness.

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/25/25 - Like a gourd in water—push it down and it turns over and pops back up—we all begin practice easily unsettled. Shugen Roshi looks at this koan of Zhaozhou’s Dog from the Book of Serenity and asks: how do we work with our impulsive nature? With our underlying tendencies? *Part 2 of 3.

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.

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.

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/22/25 - From Master Wu-Men's Gateless Gate - Zhaozhou's "Mu" - Within the realm of words much can be known, but how do we study the realm which is inexpressible in words? The Buddha’s profound realization of true reality is accessible to everyone, but how do we walk that path? How does working with a koan take us beyond the words themselves?

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - 1/19/25 - Invoking the life and words of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., Shugen Roshi celebrates his "living legacy": the power of love and its manifestation in the Beloved Community to heal a troubled world. He draws from King's speech on the "new phase of the civil rights struggle", given the year before his assassination, and his calls for an equality based on love to address disparity, poverty and injustice. Speaking from a Christian perspective, King's views resonate with the universal religious truths of interrelatedness, and the true freedom and equity that is an expression of wisdom and compassion. Such is the Bodhisattva's vow to put an end to the suffering of all beings. - This dharma talk was preceded by this year's MLK tribute presentation:  https://vimeo.com/1048203464 - Also, see the presentation from a few years ago by the People of African Descent (PAD) Affinity Group: "From Refuge to Sanctuary: an MRO Tribute to Dr. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.": https://vimeo.com/666366222

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 1/12/25 - Gateless Gate, Case 16: The Bell's Sound and the Priest's Robe - We have these forms in Zen for meditation, for liturgy, for taking a meal and for practicing the dharma together. But what use is a form? How can we use forms without getting caught up in the form itself? To benefit from Zen practice as a vehicle to liberate ourselves from grasping at forms—or at anything—is to learn to shift as conditions change within every aspect of our lives.

Ikyo Love, MRO Student - 1/12/25 - "Making it my own."