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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  • Stephen Batchelor and Henry Shukman, A Conversation

    MCZCNovember 5, 20151 min read

    Description: Stephen Batchelor returned to Mountain Cloud on Thursday April 2  for a conversation on early Buddhism, the Zen tradition and ancient Greek Philosophy with Mountain Cloud’s guiding teacher, Henry Shukman. Their wide ranging discussion continued the exploration of contact, connection and congruence between the ancient East and West begun the previous June, when Stephen and Henry sat down for an engaging conversation on “Going Back to the Source.”   Stephen Batchelor is a contemporary Buddhist teacher...

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  • Message from Henry: Wound and Blessing

    MCZCNovember 3, 20152 min read

    To take the path of healing is to take the path of the wound. Our English word blessing is related to the French word blessée, meaning wounded, or blessure, meaning wound. The wound is a blessing; the blessing comes as a wound. The wound wants to change us. We cannot heal and stay the same. To change we have to surrender to what we do not yet know. We are going into something unknown. That is why it...

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  • Catching the Light

    MCZCNovember 2, 20151 min read

    ...koans are dark to the mind, yet radiant to the heart. Henry Shukman * * * photo and creation by Rosa Bellino

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  • The Three Refuges: Part 1, The Buddha

    MCZCOctober 30, 201513 min read

    Buddham saranam gacchami Dhammam saranam gacchami Sangham saranam gacchami Written By Ruben Habito Part I–The Buddha Refuge My task in the next three talks is to articulate what happens when we chant the three refuges, that we may be able to realize this and be able to embody it in our being. Incidentally, we also chant the four vows of the bodhisattva, and the fourth goes thus: “The enlightened way is unsurpassable. I vow to embody it.” What we are hoping...

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  • Teisho: Why Buddhism and the modern world need each other

    MCZCOctober 29, 20151 min read

    Description: David Loy made a special appearance at Mountain Cloud on Wednesday September 16, 2015. He spoke from topics discussed in his latest book, A New Buddhist Path, about the convergence of western traditions of social reform with Asian traditions of inner transformation. Loy’s talk contrasts moral ideals within the Abrahamic traditions with those in Buddhism and proposes that each of these ideals needs the other.  David Loy is a professor, writer, and Zen teacher in...

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  • Facing the Wall

    MCZCOctober 28, 20151 min read

    It’s me and my shadow again: the little night I cast on the wall looking cubist this morning, square-shouldered, pin-headed. All the trouble, all the pain, yearning and hope: all from that one square yard of darkness on the wall. Bodhidharma sat this way, a leaf of a man blown in from the West, light as dust, a quaver in the haze, for whom night and day were a memory, life and death a dream. He...

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  • Wind in Trees

    MCZCOctober 27, 20151 min read

    When trees toss in high wind and a suspicion of rain travels across their dark faces, I long for the old summers under smoky oaks. Whoever I am, it’s not who I thought. Who is it the rain and wind wake with their sighing? That tree-lover, summer-lover – try and find him, was he ever there? Did he love? Was he love? Shh, say the trees, listen closer, listen closer. Henry Shukman   Image: Farmland, by Unsplash, CC0 Public...

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  • One with the Clouds

    MCZCOctober 26, 20151 min read

    Wherever you are, you are one with the clouds and one with the sun and the stars you see. You are one with everything. That is more true than I can say, and more true than you can hear. ― Shunryu Suzuki Photo and creation by Rosa Bellino Quote by Shunryu Suzuki from Goodreads.com

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  • Good Morning from a Rose

    MCZCOctober 24, 20151 min read

    Form does not differ from emptiness; emptiness does not differ from form. Form itself is emptiness; emptiness itself is form. Heart Sutra Photo and creation by Rosa Bellino

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  • Was Descartes Right? by Yamada Ryuon

    MCZCOctober 23, 20154 min read

    The oak tree in the garden, but there is no I. Written by YAMADA Ryoun, the Abbot of the Sanbo Zen, from the "Opening Comments" of Kyôshô (Sanbô-Zen's official magazine) 342, 2011 (May/June). I think that there is no one who has not heard the name Descartes. Rene Descartes (1596-1650) was a great philosopher and mathematician born in France. He was a contemporary with the great Italian physicist, Galileo Galilei (1564-1642). In Discourse on the Method,...

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  • Teisho: Case 56 Book of Equanimity Misshi and the White Rabbit

    MCZCOctober 22, 20151 min read

    Description: In this koan, Uncle Misshi and Tozan see a white rabbit then have a short exchange about swiftness, white clothing, respect, nobility and poverty.  Using this case as a starting point, Henry explores, in depth, the purpose of studying koans, showing us how each koan addresses the most profound aspect of our experience—what it is to exist. Henry infuses this exploration with experiences and insights gained from his recent visit to Greece, which concludes with...

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  • Message from Henry: “Demons”

    MCZCOctober 21, 20154 min read

    From the point of view of practice, the overarching objective of these “demons” is to block our aspiration, and our natural quest in our path of practice, and indeed the extent to which we do practice. Best of all, for them, is to do it in ways we don’t recognize. In one of his writings, quoting from the Shoshikan, Yamada Koun Roshi talks about various kinds of “demon,” both internal and external. A “demon” is basically...

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  • Flowers are Silent

    MCZCOctober 19, 20151 min read

    Flowers are silent, Silence is silent, The Mind is a silent flower, The silent flower of the World Opens.   -Ikkyu Zenji Photo and composition by Rosa Bellino.

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  • People do not Die, by Yamada Ryoun

    MCZCOctober 16, 20155 min read

    To put it very simply we can say that Shakyamuni’s discovery was that we are not born. Written by YAMADA Ryoun, the Abbot of the Sanbo Zen, from the "Opening Comments" of Kyôshô (Sanbô-Zen's official magazine) 341, 2010 (Mar./Apr.). The New Year of 2010 has begun. I am sure that all of you have greeted the New Year with many different thoughts. The atmosphere surrounding the economic, financial, and industrial sectors continues to be very difficult. For myself...

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