Inspired by Mountain Cloud’s 40th anniversary celebration, Valerie offers some reflections on the occasion then turns to a koan about the core of this practice. The koan is case 62 in the Book of Equanimity or Shoyoroku, “Beiko’s ‘Enlightenment or Not.’” In this exchange, one master surreptitiously asks another, a close dharma sibling, “Do people these days rely on enlightenment or not?” The query and the response lead us to question: What is awakening? And why do we practice? Towards the end of the talk, Valerie turns to the letters of Yaeko Iwasaki, a young woman whose deep awakening watered the soil of Sanbo Zen and continues to inspire the endless path into an unknown future.
Recorded on September 4th, 2025
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