Mountain Cloud Zen Podcasts

Dwelling no-where, mind comes forth
~ from the Diamond Sutra

Heart mind directs us to the fundamental point of who and what we are. In Chinese there is one term for Heart Mind. No hyphen necessary, simply one. Contemporary Sanbo Zen teacher Migaku Sato wrote a poem with this line: In nothing at all-ness, there is endlessly everything. Out of nothing, here we are practicing, says Valerie or That thou art, says Ruben Habito. To further open, Valerie looks at goneness and oneness in Case18 from the Blue Cliff Record, The National Teacher’s Gravestone.

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Valerie explores the clarity and simplicity of Master Hogen who came to be known as the dharma eye of deep clarity. Focusing on Case 51 from Book of Equanimity, Valerie illuminates mind and consciousness through Hogan’s clarity. If you want to study buddha-dharma, everything you see is buddha dharma, a door, a window and the exquisite beauty of the boat is on the river. For Hogan there is no difference between phenomena (worldly dharma) and essential reality (Buddhist dharma). Everything is put to rest.

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Something puts our feet on this path, starting from the ordinary dualistic world. Gradually, as we practice and practice, in some unguarded moment, everything falls away, and it’s just this. Heaven and Earth: without any space for a conjunction. Then we practice, practice, practice…. and return to the ordinary world, but it’s upside down. This great return is a bridge, a crossing over.

Continuing with Joshu from the previous day’s talk on Mu, Valerie looks at Case 52 from the Blue Cliff Record, about a log bridge that is actually a stone bridge once you are able to really see it. Keep in mind that every koan is nothing but Mu and about you.

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Crossing over to the other shore is the heart of our practice and the heart of Buddha’s teaching. Eventually we realize that we were always on the shore, here and now, in the moment at hand. In this first talk of our Spring sesshin, Valerie looks at the famous koan: Does a dog have Buddha Nature? the traditional first teisho in a Zen sesshin.

Valerie mentions a choral chant version of the Heart Sutra from Plum Village. Here is a link if you are interested.

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“Abiding no-where mind comes forth.”

Maria Habito returns to Mountain Cloud’s zoom zendo and talks about the Diamond Sutra. When we enter deep silence, the diamond cuts through every notion we carry. It can show us intimate awareness of no self, no other, no sentient beings and no time.

In this talk, Maria focuses on Living Beings, which refers to those who are not yet enlightened. However many species of living beings there are, Bodhisattvas lead all these species/beings to liberation. However once all these many beings are liberated, we must not think that a single being is liberated. Maria untangles this contradiction.

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For this final Rohatsu talk, Henry looks at three questions. What are we doing here, just sitting with each other? What is awakening? and What then? We are living “it” every moment.

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In this talk from day 5 of the Rohatsu sesshin, Valerie picks up on the previous day’s talk by Henry where he presents the title and first line of the Heart Sutra. Turning to the figure of Kannon, Kanzeon, or Avalokiteshvara, bodhisattva of great compassion, Valerie asks, “What is compassion?” In response, she lifts up the phrase, “Just compassion,” then turns to a koan that addresses the heart of the matter: who we truly are. The deep Sea of Ise – the sea of the world – calls to us, as does a single stone lying on its floor, a stone that cannot get wet and can never get dry; a single stone with one name inscribed on it. The koan asks, “How will you pick up that stone without wetting your hands?” And once you have it in the palm of your hand, what is the name?

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What is this practice? Why do it? Essentially, it’s all about slowing down and things falling away. Our very existence, our being gets simpler. Henry looks at the title and first lines of the central document of Mahayana Buddhism, The Heart Sutra. This document is a story about Avalokiteshvara going from contracted view, to full view.

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In celebration of Shakyamuni Buddha’s awakening, Valerie takes up the Head Chapter of the Denkoroku or Transmission of Light. “I and the great earth and all beings simultaneously attain the Way.” The invitation of this practice is to taste and see: Our sitting, standing, bowing, walking is nothing but that awakening – fully expressing it in every breath, every gesture.

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Henry asks the question, matters most? When you reflect on this question, have any open mind, beyond ordinary or day to day concerns. He asks, what is this experience and what is it to be alive? And… who is having this experience? Watch this exploration of what actually matters and why.

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In this talk from the first day of the Rohatsu sesshin, 2022, Valerie offers a tribute to Sr. Elaine MacInnes, Roshi, who died a week ago and whose celebration of life will be December 8. Drawing on the experience Sr. Elaine described as “light sitting in light,” Valerie turns to the koan, Mu – a tiny spark that can ignite an inexhaustible flame, opening our eyes to a world of boundless clarity and infinite love.

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Guest speaker Stephen Snyder of the Jhana tradition visits Mountain Cloud and offers a teisho on the Buddha’s first and last practice. Jhana practice predates the Buddha by at least 1000 years and is the origin of our Sanbo Zen lineage. Stephen offers an introduction: what is Jhana practice? How are the lineages entwined?

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It is said that the Buddha teaches only suffering and its end, but what is suffering? Guest speaker Rick Hanson attempts to define this suffering, challenging that suffering is only a small part of everything that exists. Understanding this can help break the pattern of seeing meditation and mindfulness practices as a solution to suffering, rather than a practice worth immersing yourself in. While there is suffering in this world, this world is not all suffering. Rick invites all listeners to embrace this and examine their own experiences with suffering in a new light.

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“We don’t study koans, we use koans to investigate our life.” ~ Maezumi Roshi

Guest teacher Peggy Sheehan from Zen Center Denver says that koans have been a life long practice, for her. In this talk she explores Case 3 from the Gateless Gate, Gutei’s Finger. Peggy’s work as a pediatrician informs her interest in this koan. Babies become interested in their finger from a young age; first simply pointing upward then, then pointing at things they want, expressing curiosity, often expecting a response.

Peggy asks, where is this finger when you are living your life? Don’t underestimate the universe of one finger. Stay with just one; with just this breath, with Mu, with this finger, with just sitting. When going about your daily activitiesy, how do you present one finger?

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On this first day of Fall, Teshin takes up case 27 of the Blue Cliff Record, Unmon’s Complete Exposure. The Case reads as follows: A monk asked Unmon, “What is it when the tree withers and the leaves fall?” Unmon answered, “Complete exposure of the golden wind”.

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Upon being welcomed home from Germany, Valerie describes briefly what it’s like being thrown immediately into the chaotic activity of moving from her home in Dallas to Santa Fe: “Constant activity… we are moving, all this activity and at the same time, so still.”

While taking a walk with co-teacher John Gaynor in Sonnenhoff, John offers Valerie this rather cerebral quote from Master Ummon, “The manifestation of the great function, knows no laws.” The great function, what is it? Valerie turns to Case 60, Ummon’s Staff from the Blue Cliff Record as a way of exploring this great function.

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In this talk – an offering of gratitude for the life of a beloved sangha member, Valerie turns to Case 41 in the Transmission of Light or Denkoroko. A monk who has put to rest love of worldly attachments asks, “What, master, do you love?” The master’s response is an invitation to us to realize love beyond any measure.

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Scott explores Case 32 from the Gateless Gate, A non-buddhist questions the Buddha. The non-buddhist says, in all earnestness to the Buddha: I do not ask about words, I do not ask about no-words.

The world honored one, just sat still.

The non-buddhist experiences a great opening as he witnesses the Buddha’s stillness and says, The world-honored one on his great benevolence and great mercy has opened the clouds of my delusion and enabled me to enter the way. Bowing, the non-Buddhist took his leave.

The Buddha answered every question in his silence, Who am I? Why are we here? What happens when we die? Why do we suffer? Buddha’s sitting isn’t just answering the question, his sitting is the question. Scott digs into additional gems form this koan. Be sure to watch, listen and absorb.

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In this talk from our Thursday night series, Valerie takes up Case 26 of the Gateless Gate, Hogen’s “Two Monks Roll Up the Blinds.” The setting is in Master Hogen’s teaching room and the issue at hand is our propensity to judgment. What freedom is unleashed when the boundaries we imagine don’t hold up? And what compassion. Hogen points to the blinds, presenting the bright clarity that has been there all along.

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“Your sitting is not for the world, it is the world.”

How can our practice be an offering to the world? asks meditation teacher Shana Smith. The question arose from the Florida Sanbo Zen Sangha as response to Russian’s invasion of Ukraine. Like all koans this question lived on in the weeks to follow. A number of koans came to mind as Shana thought about giving a talk to the MCZC community that addressed how our practice can be an offering to the world. Having a performance background, she considered the talk to be a presentation of the shout, a performance of sorts. Instead, however, Shana got quite ill with Covid. A strong NO resounded through her being. The dharma waits for no other time but now, to be ready.

Still wanting to explore this life koan, “How can our practice be an offering to the world?” Shana turned to another well known koan from both the Gateless Gate and the Book of equanimity, Wash your Bowl, for support.

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“Showing their backs then their fronts – falling maple leafs.”  ~ Ryokan

“Resolving the matter of Life and death is of prime importance.” To explore this phrase which is recited at the close of Zen Sesshins, Valerie turns to Dogen’s Genjokoan and digs into two truths, conventional and absolute, which are actually one truth. Dogen believes that in Zazen, we are practicing realizing, “ripening the sweet milk of the long rivers.” The entire Genjokoan essay funnels into this single phrase which perfectly expresses the two fold truth that shows up in every koan.

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“Your consciousness does not exist separately from what it contains”

Henry explores presence from several different angles, including Internal Family Systems (IFS). The word presence includes some of what mindfulness means, and more. All you have to do is taste it. Presence is really about coming back to yourself, to your own experience.

I am here. It requires no blistering kensho experience, but presence softens the way we cling to ourselves.

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Guest Speaker Karin Kempe of the Zen Center of Denver joins our Thursday Night Sit to offer a talk on Dogen’s statement, “Practice is Enlightenment, Enlightenment is Practice.” While this sounds great, it doesn’t always feel easy. We face resistance that comes up over and over again. Karin offers perspective on the Genjokoan and reminds us that the way is already here. It is not contingent on some method of practice, but within us.

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Valerie takes up case 29 of the Denkoroku, the record of the ‘transmission of light’ from Bodhidharma to Eka or Huike, as a way to explore the boundless clarity that is none other than this immediate world. One clarity, void of any separation. Hearing a turning word, Eka awakens to the reality Bodhidharma called “vast and void,” and illumines the way.

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“Love sitting in Zazen, as if putting out a fire on top of your head” ~ Dogen

Valerie Forstman gives the second talk during the April Intro to Meditation weekend. What are you practicing for? We sit in the midst of it all, the pandemic, climate change, suffering and joy… all.

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Description: This is Question & Answer session 1 from the Introduction to Meditation Virtual Weekend. Valerie Forstman is the speaker and teacher for this session.

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Listen to this talk by Valerie Forstman from the April 2021 Introduction to Meditation Weekend Retreat. A talk at a Zen retreat is traditionally called a teisho which means, Presentation of the Shout. Valerie asks What is the Shout? It’s just this, presenting the fact of who we truly are and offering pointers on how to practice.

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Valerie examines beginner’s mind and explores the question”what is Zen?” during our March 2021 one-day Introduction to Meditation retreat.

Suzuki Roshi – a Japanese Zen master who brought Zen teaching to America in the mid 20th century – said: Beginner’s mind is the mind of compassion. As Zen practitioners we turn this compassion toward ourselves.

Valerie describes the four motivations that bring people to Zen meditation.
1. Curiosity
2. Seeking well-being
3. Wanting to develop a practice or commit to a spiritual path.
4. Looking urgently for answers to the question Who am I?

Suffering brings most of us to practice. The sense that things in our life are fundamentally out of kilter creates an urgency to find clarity about our life.

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