Teachings

  • Message from Valerie: An Invitation to Serve

    Valerie ForstmanJanuary 25, 20232 min read

    Mountain Cloud sangha members are currently coming together once each month to prepare and serve a delicious meal at the Interfaith Shelter, known as Pete’s Place, here in Santa Fe. For members interested in further engagement with vulnerable segments of our community, we have an opportunity to serve with fellow practitioners in Upaya’s Street Ministry project.  Upaya’s Street Ministry focuses on supporting member’s of Santa Fe’s community who are experiencing homelessness. Volunteers in the Street Ministry not only...

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  • Dharmatalk: No Other

    MCZCDecember 1, 20201 min read

    "... Just come and sit, and let the flower of your heart open ..."   Description: This talk explores the second two sentences of the Heart Sutra: “Form is no other than emptiness; emptiness no other than form…” The text is written this way to remind us not to think of emptiness as something other than the form within which it is hidden. How can anything be separate from its true nature? This is not a doctrine for...

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  • Talk 2 from the Original Love 4 Retreat, Just Compassion (Video)

    MCZCNovember 30, 20201 min read

    Our practice begins with suffering and ends with suffering. Valerie explores non dual experience in Case 46 in the Gateless Gate, Stepping Forward from the Top of the 100 Foot Pole. Vast and void, total emptiness, all gone, can be like sitting on top of a pole. No one is there beyond the unconditioned - this is bliss...or no bliss. [embed]https://youtu.be/FZ3d3YhLOe4[/embed] Find this and many other talks and discussions on the Mountain Cloud You Tube Channel. Image: Peace by...

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  • Talk 1 from Original Love 4 Retreat, The Fairytale is True (Video)

    MCZCNovember 29, 20201 min read

    Awakening ...  as the primary fairytale, is true. Henry describes the various ways we have been looking at love in the Original Love retreats: loving awareness, transcendent support, deepening states of mind (samadhi), and now in this retreat, awakening. This retreat explores the ways awakening can manifest. Awakening - as the thing we most yearn for is true, as the primary fairytale - is true. The ending is happy and boundless and has always been with...

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  • Message from Henry: Happiness

    MCZCNovember 25, 20202 min read

    If the problem is how to be happy, then most of us assume that we need to pacify the irritations, soothe the fears, and satisfy the desires of the self in its interactions with the world. But then we might get wind of “wisdom,” as it manifests in ancient philosophy. That means to be skeptical of our desires and aversions, to question the project of getting what we want, and getting rid of what we don't....

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  • Finding Love: Two Talks by Sanbo Zen Teacher Ruben Habito

    MCZCNovember 24, 20201 min read

    Infinite, conditional, boundless love...   Listen to Ruben Habito answer the question, What is Zen?  He explores how practicing Zen involves finding love everywhere, in all things. The desire to search for unconditional love lies deep in our heart. Four motivations bring people to zen practice... Curiosity Health benefits, stress reduction, practitioners find the the practice feeds the entire being. Searching for a deeper spiritual life, the search from our innermost being to discover the transcendent and ultimate, in...

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  • Dharmatalk: The Loving Fount of All

    MCZCNovember 24, 20201 min read

    "... dwelling in perfect wisdom, we too may begin to discover the eternally selflessly giving love that nourishes all of creation ..." "... True giving must mean relinquishing control ..." Description: The first line of the Heart Sutra invokes the bodhisattva Kanzeon, her name “Avalokiteshvara,” who represents infinite, boundless love and well-wishing for all beings. His/her name is in fact the first word of the text for a very good reason; because she is the love that is reaching...

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  • The Context of Practice, Henry Shukman (Video)

    MCZCNovember 23, 20201 min read

    Henry reminds us that Zen training is our own work, effort, commitment and investment of time and energy. Yet the context of practice pulls us outside of ourselves, out of what we know and allows us to uncover our authentic self. Retreats are a critical part of creating this context. Henry also reminds us that seeking an end to suffering is the reason we practice. Buddhism has the most clearly articulated meditation methodology that is...

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  • Message from Henry: The Most Important Thing

    MCZCNovember 18, 20201 min read

    The great teacher would teach us what is the most important thing of all, and that we should pay it our full attention as much as we can. So what is the most important thing of all? Love, maybe? But why is love important? Just because it makes us feel good? What is the key thing that feeling love allows us to pay our full attention to, if it's not love itself? There is one clear and...

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  • Dharmatalk: Great Mother Prajna Paramita

    MCZCNovember 17, 20201 min read

    "... Real knowing is not-knowing ..." Description: This talk explores the meanings of the word “Prajna.” Commonly translated as wisdom, the word etymologically comes from pra-jna. “Jna” is a root word meaning “know” (related both to the English know and to gnosis). The prefix pra can be an intensifier, suggesting “supreme” knowing, but can also be prepositional, suggesting either “beyond” or “before.” Hence prajna can indicate before knowing, beyond knowing, or supreme knowing. Either way, this talk...

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  • Returning to Square One: Talk 4 from the Original Love 3 Retreat, Henry Shukman

    MCZCNovember 15, 20201 min read

    Henry opens the final talk of the Original Love 3 Virtual retreat with: "The more we go into practice the more we are just beginning. We are always in square one". This talk explores the intrinsic beauty of each person as seen through the loving clarity of the Buddha eye. He also and acknowledges the enormous suffering that accompanies the beauty. This talk is about suffering, the causes of suffering and its ultimate end. [embed]https://youtu.be/L0J2o6eWMlA[/embed] Find this...

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  • The Unadjusted Step, Dharma Talk by Valerie Forstman

    MCZCNovember 12, 20201 min read

    Valerie offers this post-election talk and acknowledges our deeply divided nation. She introduces the taoist concept of the unadjusted step - stay where you are and don't move, as a way to face this moment. Despite our division, separation doesn't hold well. Valerie also explores the famous koan about Master Baa who is near death - Sun Faced Buddha, Moon Faced Buddha. [embed]https://youtu.be/n6gcMdUK648[/embed] Find this and many other talks and discussions on the Mountain Cloud You Tube...

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  • Dharmatalk: A Lineage of Humility

    MCZCNovember 10, 20201 min read

    "... To be you, fully alive, that’s your greatest offering to the universe ..." Description: A zen practitioner may spend decades studying under a teacher before they themselves can be authorized to teach. When our orientation toward needing outer things to be the way we want them shifts, through having released our grip on our separate sense of self, and having “found the dharma,” one may then be in a position to communicate the reality of “no-self”...

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  • What is Mu? Talk 2 from the Original Love 3 Retreat, Valerie Forstman

    MCZCNovember 9, 20201 min read

    Valerie gives the second talk for the Original Love 3 retreat. She unpacks the primary Zen koan Mu. What is Mu? asks Valerie. She quotes Sanbo Zen Teacher Ruben Habito: “It’s the sharpest sword that cuts through all delusion, and now it’s yours.” Valerie answers, "Every aspect of this question is you, originally You. Drop the figuring and calculus, become intimate with the sound. Whatever arises, Mu has the absolute capacity to handle it." [embed]https://youtu.be/2ShatPrzJoU[/embed] Find this...

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  • Message from Henry: The Great Teacher

    MCZCNovember 4, 20202 min read

    Who or what is the great teacher?        Is it love? Or our friends, partners, family, our spiritual guides, Jesus, Buddha? Our children if we have them? Loss? Beauty, art? This very moment? I guess there could be many fine answers. But before offering one (as of today) I want to reflect on what a great teacher would teach. Here is a random selection of possibilities: To fear less.To love more.To be able to appreciate this moment with gratitude.To...

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