The Zen Studies Podcast

When we witness - or experience - suffering or injustice, the medicine of emptiness can give us strength and equanimity. It should also increase our compassion, allowing us to be open, sensitive, and responsive without getting overwhelmed by anxiety, depression, fear, anger, or hatred. I talk about what the "medicine of emptiness" is - and isn't - and how to access it.

Everyday life gives us countless opportunities for "awakening work." I discuss ways to practice each and every moment in order to awaken to the truth of Dukkha and the ending of Dukkha, and to the truth Emptiness. In Part 3 I will talk about how we can similarly work on a direct, personal experiences of Suchness, Buddha-Nature, and the Two Truths (absolute and relative) in the midst of our daily lives.

The formal aspects of Buddhist practice – the things you can look at and identify as “Buddhist practice” – are very important. These include meditation, Dharma study, and time with Sangha. However, unless you’re a monk in a really strict monastery, over 90% of your time is spent outside of formal practice. It’s important to remember that practice each and every moment – how we choose to live our life, just as it is – is the most important thing.

In my second episode reflecting on Dogen's “Bussho,” or “The Buddha-Nature," I discuss how Buddha-Nature is a teaching about our existential koan as human beings. I also talk about how Dogen says we have already got Buddha-Nature, and then explore more fully his teaching about "Total Existence."

In his essay "Bussho," or "The Buddha-Nature," Dogen explores and expands a classic Mahayana Buddhist teaching. I reflect on a few central concepts from the first paragraph.

In zazen we stop imposing ourselves on the world either through our habitual thinking or through any effort to control or judge our meditative experience. Only then can we meet the world us it is unfolding around, within, and through us - but this meeting requires energy and participation. This episode addresses the two essential aspects of zazen practice: What we are not doing, and what we are doing. Both are equally important and both are easily misunderstood.

In this second half of a two-episode discussion, I briefly review the limitations of sensual or worldly pleasures. Then I explore how engagement with the world, contrary to simply being a compromise, can be its own path of practice. Finally, I talk about how the Buddha’s teachings on renunciation are not only relevant but deeply meaningful and useful for householders.

The Buddha was pretty clear. If you wanted to experience complete liberation, it was best practice renunciation - to leave all worldly things behind: Family, sex, alcohol, fancy food, music, entertainment, frivolity, etc. Why did the Buddha recommend this? Why do fully ordained Buddhist monks and nuns still live this way? Are the Buddha’s teachings on renunciation relevant for householders?

In Part 3 of my “Sangha Challenges” discussion, I finish my list of reasons you may resist joining a Buddhist community or find it challenging to maintain your relationship with one over time. I present each challenge as an opportunity for growth and learning.

This is my third and final post during my 2023 sabbatical month. I'll be back soon with a full episode, but in the meantime I wanted to share two past episodes with you that multiple listeners have said were important to them.

Here again with recommended episodes for you to listen to while I'm on my August sabbatical from Zen teaching and writing. Your chosen form of meditation may be what I call "Directed Effort" meditation, or "Letting Go" meditation (I discuss Directed Effort versus letting go in Episodes 83 and 84: Two Paths to Meditative Concentration: Directed Effort Versus Letting Go – Part 1 and Part 2). In either case, you may find some useful tips in Episodes 184 and 185: 14 Ways to Enliven Your Zazen. When my zazen gets dull, lazy, restless, or distracted, these are the ways I try to engage my meditation more wholeheartedly.

I take a sabbatical from my Zen teaching one month a year, and this year it’s in August. In this announcement I explain (and thank you for your patience), and recommend one of my 236 past episodes to listen to (published six years ago!).

In Part 2 of my “Sangha Challenges” discussion, I talk about various reasons you may resist joining a Buddhist community or find it challenging to maintain your relationship with one over time. I present each challenge as an opportunity for growth and learning. I will finish up my list of challenges in the next episode, Part 3.

Should you join a Sangha? Sangha, or community, is one of the “Three Treasures” of Buddhism, but is it really necessary? How important is it? There are many "Sangha Challenges" - reasons you might feel resistance to joining a community, or difficulties you might face as you practice with one. I discuss ways to relate to various Sangha challenges as opportunities for practice and growth.

Seated Zen meditation – zazen – is less like the meditative practices of many other spiritual traditions, and more like prayer in theistic traditions. This is not because we believe in God (although we might), but because zazen can be seen as a “religious” act – if we define religion in one of the ways philosopher William James offered, as “our total response to life.”

Understanding the teachings of Buddhism starts with becoming familiar with the Buddha's life story. This isn't because he is believed to have been divine, or even a prophet. Instead, his story is important because it serves as an archetype for the Buddhist vision of spiritual seeking and development. There are many teachings embedded in the story of the Buddha, who is regarded as having been a remarkable human being – but just a human being, like you or me.

One of Zen master Dogen’s most beloved writings is a relatively short essay called “Sansuikyo,” or the Mountains and Waters Sutra. In this episode, I reflect on two aspects this work: The statement that mountains and waters are, in of themselves, words of the Buddha, and the fantastic imagery of “mountains walking.” I only cover a few paragraphs of the Sansuikyo, but it is enough to open up a profound spiritual inquiry.

Buddhist and Zen masters through the ages have begged us not to “waste time.” What does this really mean? How do we know if we’re wasting time, and does it really matter?

This is part four of my series called “One Reality, Many Descriptions,” Buddha-Nature Part 2. I first talk about Buddha-Nature as trust. Then I offer the requisite discussions of what Buddha-Nature is not, and how it is necessary for us to awaken to our own Buddha-Nature in order to fully partake of the associated joy, redemption, and faith.

This is part three of my series called “One Reality, Many Descriptions.” While experiences of Emptiness and Suchness (or Thusness) may be liberating and transformative, we may be left with the question of how our limited, embodied existence relates to these profound truths. Our natural inclination toward self-preservation, our appetites and shortcomings, our ingrained habits, our complacency – these things can seem at odds with the greater Reality we have started to perceive. The teaching of Buddha-Nature points to the marvelous and redemptive fact that we too – just as we are – are Thus: Luminous and miraculous in and of ourselves.