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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  • Dwelling nowhere – pointing the way, Valerie Forstman (Video)

    MCZCFebruary 26, 20231 min read

    Come, come, whoever you are,wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving, it doesn't matter.Ours is not a caravan of despair.Come, even if you have broken your vow a hundred times.Come, come again, come. ~ Rumi In this talk from our February Zazenkai, Valerie turns to two Zen women, centuries apart. One, a wise old woman, known to us through a single encounter with a turning word; the other, a young Irish woman who entered a Japanese monastery, practiced wholeheartedly, awakened...

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  • Buddha’s Parinirvana – The Great Unbinding,Teshin Matt Sweger (Video)

    MCZCFebruary 23, 20231 min read

    Celebrated on February 15, Teshin commemorates the passing on of the Buddha - parinirvana - and looks at the ways we understand death, the central question to be resolved in our lives. Teishin explores how we, as Zen practitioners, approach our own unbinding - how do we untangle the knot of self? What is it to be unbound? https://youtu.be/2CjkNhGbH08 Teshin Matt Sweger is the resident teacher at the North Carolina Zen Center. He began his Zen practice...

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  • Message from Valerie: Beneficial Action

    Valerie ForstmanFebruary 21, 20232 min read

    Foolish people think that if they help others first, their own benefit will be lost, but this is not so. Beneficial action is an act of oneness, benefiting self and others together. – Eihei Dogen Years ago, I was at a seven-day intensive Zen retreat, asked to step in and serve as jiki or monitor just before the retreat began. The first day of the sesshin we were all settling in, adjusting to the forms, finding the...

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  • Nursing the Ill in an Indivisible World, Valerie Forstman (Video)

    MCZCFebruary 20, 20231 min read

    In this talk, Valerie begins with an imperative from the masters – ancient and alive – to see and be the catastrophes of the world. Can there be any real solace that doesn’t spring from uncompromising oneness? As a response to the litany of suffering, personal and collective, Valerie turns to case 83 of the Book of Equanimity. “Where do you come from?” one master asks another. “I come from nursing the ill.” This is...

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  • Everyday a Good Day, Valerie Forstman

    MCZCFebruary 18, 20231 min read

    Speaking in the wake of multiple mass shootings, Valerie turns to Unmon (Yunmen) and his living koan, “Every Day is a Good Day.” The talk begins and ends in music - the “grant us peace” from a chorus performing while masked to the thunderous silence of a typhoon’s downpour on a small teahouse in Japan, an awakening moment. In between, the talk explores the fulcrum experience that plunges us into the heart of this broken...

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  • Message from Valerie: Freedom and Support in the Forms of Zen

    Valerie ForstmanFebruary 15, 20232 min read

    Every week in the Intro Class we talk about posture, breathing, and stilling the mind – the three basic components of zazen. It’s a repetition that never grows old, an instruction that brings to mind the adage from Zen (and from linguistics), “It’s impossible to say the same this twice.” Zen is an embodied practice, on the cushion - or bench, or chair - and off. Our bodies are the vehicle for practice as well as...

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  • The Heart of Dogen’s Fukanzazengi

    MCZCFebruary 13, 20231 min read

    Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced. ~ Soren Kierkegaard Valerie unpacks the first paragraph of Dogen’s Fukanzazengi, Universally Recommended Instructions on Doing Zazen. This opening paragraph makes four statements, each followed by a challenging question. The Fukanzazengi is the first essay Dogen wrote, at age 27, after returning to Japan from China where he had deep awakening experiences guided by Chinese master Rujing. Valerie looks at this paragraph within the...

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  • The Capacity to Awaken, Valerie Forstman

    MCZCFebruary 12, 20231 min read

    In this talk from the first Zazenkai of 2023 at Mountain Cloud, Valerie turns to Mahapajapati, mother to Siddhartha Gautama after his birth mother dies and the first female dharma ancestor of the Buddha. After a long absence, Mahapajapati sees the Buddha and recognizes his deep transformation. Her heart is pierced. She asks – for herself and on behalf of the many women gathered in practice - for the chance to be ordained and enter...

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  • The Advantage of New Years, Valerie Forstman

    MCZCFebruary 11, 20231 min read

    In this first talk of 2023 at Mountain Cloud, Valerie opens with a dedication of the year to hearing the cries of the world, responding in wisdom and compassion, and realizing the Way of awakening that calls to us moment-to-moment. She then turns to a new year’s Dharma Hall Discourse by Dogen, “The Advantage of New Years.” Dogen celebrates the newness of the year, the day, and the morning by raising the question, “Is there...

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  • Message from Valerie: Alive!

    Valerie ForstmanFebruary 8, 20232 min read

    The ‘Recorded Sayings of Joshu’ include an exchange where a monk - possibly a newcomer to practice, asks Joshu or Chao-chou, “What is meditation?” (The question could be translated, “What is zazen?”) Joshu responds, “It’s not meditation.” The monk asks, “What is it?” Joshu says, “It’s alive! It’s alive!” Yesterday morning, some 50 people gathered in the Mountain Cloud zendo to explore Zen meditation. What is it? What difference does it make? How to plant a...

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  • Rohatsu 2022: Day 4, Prajnaparamitra, The Heart Sutra with Henry Shukman

    MC PodcastFebruary 7, 20231 min read

    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. And, here's a link to our YouTube video of this talk. Also, check out our Upcoming Events: Daylong Sit / ZazenkaiSaturday February...

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  • Structure, Natalie Goldberg

    MCZCFebruary 6, 20231 min read

    Natalie gives a personal talk about her experiences as a student of Japanese Zen Master, Katagiri Roshi. His example and presence, his consistent daily "showing up" and sitting for all sentient beings, taught Natalie about structure, practice and mind. This talk is filled with anecdotes - which were often unexpected Zen teachings - from Natalie's life long practice as a teacher and a student. https://youtu.be/kRq5W0qy8HI Photo by Michael on Unsplash...

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  • To Infinity and Beyond, Ruben Habito

    MCZCFebruary 6, 20231 min read

    Ruben’s talk at our January 19, Thursday Evening Event, examines how we are made for the infinite. Zen practice is an invitation to experience the infinite. Ruben explores how religion is the human search to find and experience something beyond this finite, fragile and temporary life. The heart that longs for this is embedded in all of us and is found in all traditions. Nothing will satisfy this longing except for the mysterious infinite or,...

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  • Message from Valerie: Suffering and Beauty

    Valerie ForstmanFebruary 1, 20232 min read

    How is it possible to reconcile suffering and beauty? In his first sermon after awakening, the Buddha said: “Within this fathom-long body is found all of the teachings, is found suffering, the cause of suffering, and the ending to suffering.” That’s this discrete body, with its sense-gates, experience, hindrances, and intrinsic potential to awaken - to realize what this ‘body’ really is. This very body. There’s another quote from the Pali canon, where the Buddha says of this...

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