MCZC – Page 7 – Mountain Cloud Zen Center

Teisho: Valerie Forstman: You Are That Shining

This teisho by Valerie is offered on the night of the first full moon of the new year while a gentle snow settles on the piñon pines outside the zendo.

Teisho: Sean Murphy: The “Five Conditions”

This Dharma talk is presented by Zen master and author Sean Murphy. Drawing on his long career as a Zen teacher, he presents a reframing of the important Buddhist concept

Teisho: Ruben Habito: What is Zen?

In this rich and compelling teisho, Ruben starts with the question, “What is Zen Practice?” He broadens this, somewhat playfully, to “What’s it all about?” The koan he uses is

Valerie Forstman: Opening Hands in the New Year

In this heartfelt teisho, Valerie uses Case 25 of the Hekiganroku, or Blue Cliff Record, known as “The Hermit of Lotus Flower Peak Holds Up His Staff.” This koan was

Exploring a Koan by Touch, Carolyn Seburn

Carolyn speaks of an important case that appears in three koan collections, Gutei’s One Finger. It is the story of a Chinese monk and his attendant, who attained sudden enlightenment

The Ecological Crisis

David Loy discusses how the ecological crisis is much bigger than the climate emergency. In the Ecodharma movement, there is a lot of emphasis now on connecting the ecological crisis

Henry Shukman, Day 1: Past the Land’s End

Talk 1 Fall 2023 Sesshin In the opening talk of the 2023 autumn retreat at Mountain Cloud, Henry likens a sesshin to a journey of practice where growing means finding

Which Way to Mount Taizan? Valerie Forstman (Video)

Each step, each sound, every word is Mount Taizan, the highest peak – this landscape that we can’t, actually, fall out of. Entirety. Shoyoroku Case 10, “An Old Woman near

Mount Sumeru Vaporizes Mistakes, Scott Thornton

A monk asked, “Not a single thought arises. Is there any fault?” Unmon said: “Mount Sumeru.” Sumeru by tradition is higher than the stars, cosmically vast (much vaster than getting

Summer 2023: Sesshin Talk 6, Final Talk

Taste and See: Be what you are For the six days of this sesshin, as is typical of Zen, we’ve been talking about reality and experience, a fact that is

Summer 2023: Sesshin Talk 5

A World So Full it Can’t Accept One More Thing Valerie takes up Seppo’s “What is This” (Hekiganroku Case 51), together with earlier and later episodes in Seppo and Ganto’s

Summer 2023: Sesshin Talk 4

A sincere heart – just one – is simply the ten directions crystal clear… the ten directions themselves squeeze the marrow from the bone. A hawk travels many miles by

2023 Summer Sesshin Talk 3

The Radiant Light Allows the Radiant Light to Respond To examine “radiance,” Valerie takes up Mumonkan case 39, “Unmon and a Mistake in Speech.” She turns it in a kaleidoscope

2023 Summer Sesshin Talk 2

Practice-realization, suffering-compassion, wind-fan, and hyphenless reality Why do we practice, if our fundamental nature is unimprovable? Mu is a sun with stone-melting power, and the fact itself. A way and

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