PODCAST

Other MRO Talks

Zen Mountain Monastery

religion & spirituality buddhism

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00:40:35

Eight Qualities of a Great Person

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2025/12/29

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

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00:39:40

Only Don’t Know

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2025/10/23

Linda Shinji Hoffman, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 10/23/25 - 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 to the fullness of life. Lay senior student Shinji shares teachings and stories to bring us back to the beneficial mind of not knowing.

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00:44:20

Concerns of the Human World

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2025/09/28

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.

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00:48:38

The Secret Ingredient

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2025/09/25

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

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00:48:33

Deepening of Faith, Doubt & Determination

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2025/08/22

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

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00:29:32

A Coin Before It’s Stamped

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2025/08/21

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

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00:39:16

Letting Go and Allowing In

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2025/07/13

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

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00:31:34

Practicing Doubt

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2025/06/27

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

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00:57:17

Silent Illumination

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2025/06/08

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

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00:21:04

Being One With: Fusatsu

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2025/05/09

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

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00:24:53

In Darkness It Is Most Bright

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2025/04/27

Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Senior Monastic - ZCNYC - 4/27/25 - Can we use our direct experience to express what words cannot adequately convey? Using a teaching from zen master Hongzhi, monastic Taikyo takes up this question of how to explore the vast universe within ourselves and share our dark fears, our vulnerability, and our joys, in traveling this path.

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00:38:27

Reverence for the Three Treasures

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2025/02/23

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.

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00:34:27

Within the Grass Roof Hermitage

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2025/02/16

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.

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00:45:35

Lesson from a Goddess

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2025/02/16

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

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00:29:09

The Power Of Stillness

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2025/02/15

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.

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00:35:43

Meeting Every Moment With Lovingkindness

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2025/01/26

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.

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00:21:27

The Practice of True Reality

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2025/01/11

Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Dharma Holder - 1/11/25 - Freeing ourselves of the suffering born of strong emotions, how do we keep the heart open and able to feel without overwhelm or shutting down? And how do we establish concentration and find the vast capacity of our minds? Gokan brings forth the grounded, supported way of being awake to all that is unfolding in “the immense reality” that is our lives.

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00:30:03

How Are We Doing Right Now?

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2024/12/28

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.

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00:41:49

What Is Peaceful Abiding?

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2024/11/22

Katie Yosha Scott-Childress, Senior Lay Student - ZMM - 11/22/24 - Exploring the focus of the 90-day training period as “peaceful dwelling,” senior lay student Yosha looks at how we can bring our presence and practice to all situations, even worldly activity which is fraught with disagreements and controversy.

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00:32:39

Imagine It Real

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2024/10/27

Suzanne Taikyo Gilman, Senior Monastic - ZCNYC - 10/27/24 - How can we use our imaginations to manifest good for the benefit of others, rather than getting caught in a swirl of fantasy, fear or anger? Senior monastic Taikyo explores how the teachings of bodhicitta can help us recognize our reality as distinct from the fruits of delusion, and to use our intentions to imagine real benefit and goodness for ourselves and others.

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