by Domyo | Dec 28, 2024 | Buddhist Practice, Ten Fields of Zen Practice
The eighth Field of Zen Practice is Realization, gaining a direct, personal experience of the truth. Realization helps you respond appropriately, allowing you to live by choice instead of by karma. Even more importantly, it gives you a larger perspective that can result in equanimity, even joy. There are different levels of truth, and the Dharma – Reality-with-a-Capital-R – is the biggest truth of all. Fortunately, it is a wonderful and liberating truth to wake up to. However, it’s important to understand that there is no “Realization” you can attain that means you know everything. The truth is infinite and there is always more to awaken to and embody.
by Domyo | Dec 18, 2024 | Buddhist Practice, Ten Fields of Zen Practice
This episode is the second half of the seventh chapter of my book-in-progress, The Ten Fields of Zen: A Primer for Practitioners. Listen to/read the previous episode (288) first, where I talk about the importance of Opening Your Heart and how that effort is viewed in the Buddhist tradition. In that episode I also discussed the four Brahmaviharas – goodwill, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity. I finish the chapter in this episode by covering self-acceptance, practicing with the real, human relationships in your life, and Opening Your Heart in Sangha.
by Domyo | Nov 29, 2024 | Buddhist Practice, Ten Fields of Zen Practice
The seventh Field of Zen Practice is Opening Your Heart. Working explicitly to open your heart not only benefits other living beings, it puts you in accord with the Dharma and supports all other aspects of your practice. You work on radical self-acceptance to make Awakening and compassion possible. You work on real and personal relationships with other beings – overcoming your social fears, becoming more willing to be seen and known, learning to be authentic, and recognizing the Buddha-Nature manifested in others. Ultimately, self and other are not separate; in practice, you seek to manifest and realize this simultaneously.
by Domyo | Nov 16, 2024 | Buddhist Practice, Ten Fields of Zen Practice
This episode is the second part of the sixth chapter of my book-in-progress, The Ten Fields of Zen: A Primer for Practitioners. In the last episode, I offered seven points about the role of Dukkha in our life and practice and discussed the first five points. In this episode I’ll finish the discussion with points six and seven.
by Domyo | Oct 31, 2024 | Buddhist Practice, Ten Fields of Zen Practice
The sixth Field of Zen Practice is ending Dukkha. While physical and emotional pain, discomfort, and longing are an inevitable part of human life, Dukkha is existential angst we add to such experiences, ranging from subtle uneasiness to acute anguish. It drives our unhealthy or harmful behaviors, so we seek to end Dukkha for the sake of self and others. Buddhism offers a holistic approach to doing this, including maximizing our overall spiritual health and working with our karma. However, Buddhism’s radical teaching is that Dukkha is a symptom of underlying spiritual illness caused by false views – so, through practice, our spiritual illness can be cured, and Dukkha ended.
by Domyo | Sep 21, 2024 | Buddhist Practice
This is part two of my discussion “Cutting Moral Corners: Is Buddhism Compatible with 21st-Century Life?” In Part 1 I talked about the moral stress that arises from living a modern life, where almost every decision we make becomes a moral choice. I discussed how home leaving – or monasticism – was early Buddhism’s prescription for avoiding moral stress, and then how the Mahayana bodhisattva ideal become a model for lay practice. In this episode I address the matter of moral stress and how we might practice in the midst of it in order to free ourselves from dukkha, or suffering.
by Domyo | Sep 11, 2024 | Buddhist Practice
As long as we remain engaged in 21st-century life, at least in any industrialized society, we are part of an infinitely complex web of karma that covers our planet. Even the details of our lives become moral choices, and it becomes increasingly difficult to live in a way that does no harm or that fulfills the ideal of the selfless Buddhist contemplative. Because of our interconnectedness with all things, we feel pain and moral stress when we act out of accord with our ideals. What does lay Buddhist practice look like in the midst of all of this?
by Domyo | Aug 27, 2024 | Buddhist Practice
In a lineage tradition like Zen, your understanding, manifestation, and expression of the Dharma is deeply influenced by your teachers, and by their teachers. Whether you are a member of my Zen Center, Bright Way Zen, or a fan of this podcast, you may appreciate stories of my teachers Kyogen and Gyokuko Carlson in this live talk.* (*Most of my episodes are produced specifically for podcast listeners, but I am on sabbatical in August.)
by Domyo | Aug 8, 2024 | Buddhist Practice
This August sabbatical offering is an informal, live talk* I gave in response to a question someone: Is everything a Zen teacher does a “teaching”? How do you know? This led to discussion of other topics as well, related to having a formal relationship with a Zen teacher – What does it mean? What does it look like? Why would someone want this? (*Most of my episodes are produced specifically for podcast listeners.)
by Domyo | Jul 31, 2024 | Buddhist Practice
In this episode and the previous one, I do something radical and share my experience of a sesshin I recently attended, describing it day by day. There are many reasons not to do this, and I went into those reasons in the last episode (part one), where I also described my first two full days of retreat. In this episode I describe days 3-5 and make some closing remarks.
