200 – Story of My Spiritual Journey Part 4: Enlightenments
This episode is the story of my spiritual journey, part 4. I start sharing a series of what I'm calling "enlightenments" I experienced over the course of the first ten years or so of my monastic train...
15 Apr 202226min
199 - Is My Practice Languishing? If So, What Can I Do About It?
It's not unusual for our practice to languish at times. "Languish" means to be or become weak or feeble, to lose vigor or vitality, to be subjected to neglect or prolonged inactivity. How do we recogn...
30 Mars 202226min
198 - Renunciation as an Act of Love
Buddhism is a path of renunciation. Many people assume this means we aim to separate ourselves from the things and beings of the world and work ourselves into a state where we no longer care about the...
22 Mars 202241min
197 – Neither Avoidance nor Identification: Being with the Reality of Painful Situations
Sometimes there is no avoiding painful situations, whether the difficulty is arising in our own life or from witnessing suffering in the world around us. How can we respond to troubling conditions wit...
11 Mars 202227min
196 - Death and the Emptiness of Self: What's the Meaning of Life If You've Got No Soul?
Do we think there's life after death in Soto Zen? I discuss the Soto Zen perspective on consciousness and whether some kind of consciousness continues after our physical death, and where we find meani...
27 Feb 202228min
195 - Hongzhi's "Wander into the Center of the Circle of Wonder"
In this episode I explore a teaching from 12th-century Chan master Hongzhi, in which he instructs us to "wander into the center of the circle of wonder." I propose that the whole of the Dharma can be ...
21 Feb 202231min
194 - Pain in Meditation 2: Adjustments to Posture and When to Tolerate Discomfort
This is episode 2 in my discussion of physical discomfort in seated meditation. I discuss how to do it with a minimum of discomfort, including tips on spinal position and different kinds of meditation...
15 Feb 202240min
193 - Pain in Meditation 1: Why the Seated Posture?
Most meditators experience some physical discomfort during seated meditation, ranging from restlessness to severe pain. In this episode I talk about why the seated meditation posture is so important, ...
28 Jan 202226min
