Teachings

You can find all of our weekly Dharma talks for free right here on this page, as well as on our YouTube channel and podcast. Live talks take place every Thursday from 5:30–7:00pm MT, both in-person and on Zoom (sit.mountaincloud.org — password: mountain22). Members receive access to some special archival materials.

  • The Mysterious/Unsolvable Zen Koans: Henry interviewed by Kevin Rose

    MCZCAugust 18, 20201 min read

    A koan is a riddle or puzzle that Zen Buddhists use during meditation to help them unravel greater truths about the world and about themselves. Zen masters have been testing their students with these stories, questions, or phrases for centuries. Listen to this August 4 podcast interview/discussion with Henry Shukman on the Kevin Rose Show. Kevin interviews Henry Shukman, associate master of Sanbo Zen at the Mountain Cloud Zen Center. They discuss Koans, meditation, enlightenment,...

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  • Dharmatalk: Expanding Altruism

    MCZCAugust 18, 20201 min read

    "I want to devote my life to the wellbeing of the world" Description: Ongoing series on basic Buddhism. Do we have free will to act morally, or is our behavior merely a function of our social conditioning? We find that if we orient our behavior correctly, in accordance with the second step in the Noble Eightfold Path, our practice gets strengthened by the sense of wellbeing that our actions bring about in the world. We...

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  • Message from Henry: An Ordinary Morning Sit

    MCZCAugust 18, 20202 min read

    When I get quiet, when I meet the quiet already here, it seems there is no end to the beauty of it I hear a small plane crawling across the sky over the city, kind of scratching through the air. Now and then dogs bark. Something is moving in the grass outside the window – I hear a light scuffle. Then I notice these sounds have stopped. Their absence is peaceful. Because the room is...

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  • Message from Henry: Fully Awake

    MCZCAugust 15, 20202 min read

    A fuse has blown, there is only silence. Today's message is an excerpt from Henry's memoir, One Blade of Grass, describing an aspect of his path of training. Read Marvelous and Ordinary and The Fertile Void to put this week's piece in context.  I had been like a best stuck inside a haystack, pushing and thrashing, not knowing if it was getting anywhere. my teachers cajoled me, but not even they could tell me the way out. Eventually I burst...

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  • Zen, Neuroscience and Moral Awakening – Henry Shukman

    MCZCAugust 14, 20201 min read

    ... this practice is infinite, we want to share it and help to relieve suffering. That's really all this practice is about. [embed] Find this and many other talks and discussions on the

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  • Is Zen Buddhist? Dharma Talk by Henry Shukman

    MCZCAugust 11, 20201 min read

    In this dharma talk, Henry describes the tragic results of racism and exceptionalism in America and offers hope through Zen practice and how Zen relates to Buddhism. [embed] Find this and many other talks on the

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  • Dharmatalk: Gathering in to a Single Point

    MCZCAugust 11, 20201 min read

    "There isn’t any phenomenon at all that isn’t teaching or preaching the Dharma" Description: Ongoing series on basic Buddhism. Buddha taught that in order to cultivate Right Orientation, which is the second step on the Noble Eightfold Path, one must start with an intention toward renunciation, not generating any ill-will, and being a source of harmlessness. By doing so, our sense of humility deepens and we learn to let go of identification with the self....

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  • The Power of Mu, Dharma Talk by Maura Noone

    MCZCAugust 5, 20201 min read

    Senior Sanbo Zen student and long term MCZC sangha member Maura Noone offered a dharma talk, The Power of Mu, on Thursday evening July 30. Please watch this moving talk about the transformative impact of Mu and Zen practice. [embed] Check out our other videos on the Mountain Cloud YouTube Channel.

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  • Dharmatalk: Embarking on the Noble Eightfold Path

    MCZCAugust 4, 20201 min read

    "Right View is not so far away" Description: Ongoing series on basic Buddhism. Setting out on the Noble Eightfold Path, we begin with Right View. By developing an awareness of the roots of wholesomeness and unwholesomeness, we may orient ourselves toward proper conduct, skillful practice, and ultimately the cessation of suffering. The modern Zen practitioner may cultivate this sort of understanding by dropping any agenda and engaging in activities purely for the sake of doing...

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  • Message From Henry: Slow Down

    MCZCAugust 3, 20205 min read

    Becoming a meditator, opening up to a life in Zen, could be viewed as slowing down the car, parking it, getting out of it, and walking. Going through life at a pace where we can actually experience the sensory detail of every step we take. Imagine you're walking down an old track up a long valley. There are tufts of grass at the roadside, and you notice them clearly. There are stones underfoot embedded in...

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  • Message from Henry: The Fertile Void

    MCZCJuly 29, 20202 min read

    One touch and it sucked away the universe. Another, and all things were born. Today's message is an excerpt from Henry's memoir, One Blade of Grass, describing an aspect of his path of training. Read Marvelous and Ordinary to put this week's piece in context.  There's an enlightenment poem by Yamada Koun with the line: All my karmic sins were extinguished as if in a bolt of lightening. An ancient ax strikes the cranium. Suddenly it appears:...

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  • Dharmatalk: Subitist and Gradualist Awakening

    MCZCJuly 28, 20201 min read

    "This precious me. My me. This has been an invention" Description: Ongoing series on basic Buddhism. Continuing the discussion about the cessation of suffering, we examine two approaches toward awakening, the subitist, or sudden approach, and the gradualist one. Many Zen teachers, especially those using koans, assume the subitist approach. From a more gradualist perspective, we may through dedicated practice learn to reduce the causes of the negative emotional states that can generate stress and...

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  • Ryokan: Temporary Dwelling

    MCZCJuly 25, 20201 min read

    [caption id="attachment_21250" align="aligncenter" width="516"] Ryokan 1758-1831, self portrait[/caption]   Where you have beauty you have ugliness, too. Where you have right you will also have wrong. Knowledge and ignorance are each other’s cause. Delusion and enlightenment produce one another. It’s always been so, It didn’t start now. You get rid of this, then grab hold of that. Don’t you see how stupid it is! If you’re determined to find the innermost truth, Why trouble about the...

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  • Message from Henry: Marvelous and Ordinary

    MCZCJuly 22, 20201 min read

    Today's message is an excerpt from Henry's memoir One Blade of Grass describing as aspect of his path of training. Read Wondrous Being to put this week's piece in context.  The drama was over. The whole thing called "my life" had been just that: a drama, a story. A dream. I had woken from it. It had ended. Yakusan, in the ninth century, likened awakening to a snake shedding it's skin and the true body being revealed. The whole...

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