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Geoffrey Shugen Arnold

Zen Mountain Monastery

religion & spirituality buddhism

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00:32:51

Fusatsu for the New Year

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2026/01/01

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

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00:43:59

Apparently Effortless

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/12/30

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"

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00:42:28

The Wind That Reaches Everywhere

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/11/22

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)

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00:40:32

Faith Verified Extends Our Faith

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/11/19

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

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01:24:06

Jukai Ceremony at ZMM, November 2025

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/11/09

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

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01:10:16

Dharma Encounter: Sustaining What is True

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/10/26

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

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00:35:30

Fusatsu: Encountering Our Own Completeness

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/10/24

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

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00:45:41

Tending the Lamp

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/10/12

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

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00:42:53

Firewood Does Not Become Ash

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/10/05

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

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00:45:20

Not Separate From Yourself

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/09/27

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

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00:41:10

To Study The Self, To Forget The Self

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/09/24

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

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00:47:21

Intimate Understanding

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/09/21

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

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00:47:10

When All Dharmas Are Buddhadharma

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/09/07

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

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00:50:19

Fall 2025 Ango Opening Talk – “The Way of Everyday...

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/08/31

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."

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00:37:12

What Limits Your Freedom?

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/08/30

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

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00:48:36

Turning Words: A Wood Buddha

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/08/24

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

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00:50:49

Turning Words: A Gold Buddha

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/08/23

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

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00:44:19

Turning Words: A Mud Buddha

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/08/20

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. -

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00:46:31

Buddhist Studies and Language

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/05/04

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 5/4/25 - How we take up the Dharma includes how we study, using words to go beyond words and concepts. How we see words being used in the world should give us an understanding of how we might get tangled in our own objectification of things. Freedom emerges hand in hand with how we learn to be free of grasping, even in the realm of language, and to apply what we hear in liturgy and the sutras to our own experience. - From the Book of Serenity, Case 45 - Four

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00:39:16

Fusatsu: Wholesome and Unwholesome Actions

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold ·

2025/03/28

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi - ZMM - 3/28/25 - Perfecting our actions is how we cultivate the qualities of a bodhisattva, and this is what is practiced in the moral and ethical teachings of Zen Buddhism. In this realm of existence, we can have a positive effect even on difficult circumstances. This talk by Shugen Roshi explores what is of benefit in this present life and how a practitioner can live in accord with this. - Teisho during the March 2025 Fusatsu at ZMM.

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Geoffrey Shugen Arnold

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