Zen Mind – Details, episodes & analysis

While Zenki Roshi is teaching the Fall Practice Course 'Developing Embodiment' at the Boulder Zen Center, we are re-airing three dharma talks that address fundamental topics and practices related to embodiment.

The second one is "No Inside, No Outside" which was originally published on September 27, 2023. This talk explores how to make use of the turning phrase "No inside, no outside." A turning phrase is a verbal expression that can transform our sense of self and being in the world. The phrase is held in mind as an antidote to culturally or personally ingrained views. When we investigate common sense distinctions such as internal/external and self/other, we come face to face with our tendency to objectify what is perceived to be outside and the resulting sense of alienation. The talk provides embodied practices for entering a space of intimacy so that sight and sounds as well as thoughts and feelings can be perceived as appearing in the same undivided space.

Welcome to Zen Mind! 

Love the dharma talks and want to hear more? Become a Premium Podcast subscriber for only $9/month. Dive deeper into the topics through Q&A sessions related to each of the talks. You can even ask questions of your own through the 'Ask Me Anything' platform and gain access to previously unpublished talks from intensives. Learn more here: https://zenmind.supercast.com/

See all events, programs, and how to become a member at www.boulderzen.org. Reach out and email us at office@boulderzen.org.

If you're enjoying these talks, please subscribe and leave us a rating or review!

Zenki Christian Dillo Roshi is the the guiding teacher at the Boulder Zen Center in Colorado, USA. This podcast shares the regular dharma talks given at the center. Zenki Roshi approaches Zen practice as a craft of transformation, liberation, wisdom and compassionate action. His interest is to bring Buddhism alive within the Western cultural context, while staying committed to the traditional emphasis on embodiment.

While Zenki Roshi is teaching the Fall Practice Course 'Developing Embodiment' at the Boulder Zen Center, we are re-airing three dharma talks that address fundamental topics and practices related to embodiment.

The first one is "Pause for the Pause" which was originally published on June 27, 2024. This talk was given as part of a Weekend Sitting. It highlights the distinction between the contents of mind and the field of mind. Dogen encouraged his students "to be continuously intimate with the field of mind." The talk presents two attentional practices to discover and establish oneself in the field of mind: (1) "To pause for the particular," a version of mindfulness practice that emphasizes the creation of a dharmic pulse within one's perceptual process, and (2) "to pause for the pause," which invites the stillness of the field to come to the foreground. Perceiving sensorial contents within the context of the field trains the mind in non-attachment and non-identification. Based on these practices, the talk suggests to view Zen rituals as a succession of still points and action, ultimately fostering an embodied integration of stillness and activity.

Welcome to Zen Mind! 

Love the dharma talks and want to hear more? Become a Premium Podcast subscriber for only $9/month. Dive deeper into the topics through Q&A sessions related to each of the talks. You can even ask questions of your own through the 'Ask Me Anything' platform and gain access to previously unpublished talks from intensives. Learn more here: https://zenmind.supercast.com/

See all events and join our mailing list at www.boulderzen.org. Email us at office@boulderzen.org.

If you're enjoying these talks, please subscribe and leave us a rating or review!

Zenki Christian Dillo Roshi is the the guiding teacher at the Boulder Zen Center in Colorado, USA. This podcast shares the regular dharma talks given at the center. Zenki Roshi approaches Zen practice as a craft of transformation, liberation, wisdom and compassionate action. His interest is to bring Buddhism alive within the Western cultural context, while staying committed to the traditional emphasis on embodiment.

This talk was given as part of a Weekend Sitting at the Boulder Zen Center. It examines the feeling of alienation that comes from the mental construction of a separate self with an internal and an external space. What is the cure for such alienation? Learning to locate ourselves in an experiential space, in which all the contents of our lives (the physical world as well as our feelings and thoughts) are allowed to happen just as they are happening. Despite the serious personal and societal problems we face in this complicated world, we can discover that the experience of being alive is magnificent and luminous. This is intimacy! – the feeling that all that appears right now is my life right now. This intimacy exists before thought and thus separation arises. Zazen is a way to make this intimate, luminous space before thought arises our true home.

Welcome to Zen Mind!

Love the dharma talks and want to hear more? Become a Premium Podcast subscriber for only $9/month. Dive deeper into the topics through Q&A sessions related to each of the talks. You can even ask questions of your own through the 'Ask Me Anything' platform and gain access to previously unpublished talks from intensives. Learn more here: https://zenmind.supercast.com/

We have a NEW, self-paced course, "Undivided Activity", now available! In this course, Zenki Roshi offers a complete commentary and experiential translation in a series of talks on Dogen's essay 'Undivided Activity'. Learn more and purchase the course here: https://www.boulderzen.org/undivided-activity

See all events and join our mailing list at www.boulderzen.org. Email us at office@boulderzen.org.

If you're enjoying these talks, please subscribe and leave us a rating or review!

Zenki Christian Dillo Roshi is the the guiding teacher at the Boulder Zen Center in Colorado, USA. This podcast shares the regular dharma talks given at the center. Zenki Roshi approaches Zen practice as a craft of transformation, liberation, wisdom and compassionate action. His interest is to bring Buddhism alive within the Western cultural context, while staying committed to the traditional emphasis on embodiment.

It's worth building a regular and diligent practice of disentangling sensation from interpretation/thinking. This is true for the sense perceptions of the phenomenal world and for the proprioceptive intensities that arise within us as we live our life. When thinking is disentangled from sensation with some stability, the structures of the discursive and narrative self collapse. We can begin to discover the field of awareness as the ultimate fact of our aliveness and a source of intimacy and joy. Welcome to Zen Mind! New talks will be published bi-weekly on Wednesdays throughout the summer. See all events and join our mailing list at www.boulderzen.org. If you're enjoying these talks, please subscribe and leave us a review! Zenki Christian Dillo Roshi is the the guiding teacher at the Boulder Zen Center in Colorado, USA. This podcast shares the regular dharma talks given at the center. Zenki Roshi approaches Zen practice as a craft of transformation, liberation, wisdom and compassionate action. His interest is to bring Buddhism alive within the Western cultural context, while staying committed to the traditional emphasis on yogic embodiment.

In the first half, this talk continues the exploration of the "Modalities of Mind" from last week. The mind (our sentient presence) is like an orchestra with different instruments. We can learn to listen to and conduct these instruments in the service of our deepest intentions. In the second half, the talk presents examples and practices for distinguishing the modalities of “sensation” and “interpretation.” Making a commitment to our sensations (pleasant, unpleasant or neutral) decreases our investment in interpretations as real and increases our freedom for alternative interpretations. Welcome to a NEW SEASON of Zen Mind! New talks will be published bi-weekly on Wednesdays throughout the summer. See all events and join our mailing list at www.boulderzen.org. If you're enjoying these talks, please subscribe and leave us a review! Zenki Christian Dillo Roshi is the the guiding teacher at the Boulder Zen Center in Colorado, USA. This podcast shares the regular dharma talks given at the center. Zenki Roshi approaches Zen practice as a craft of transformation, liberation, wisdom and compassionate action. His interest is to bring Buddhism alive within the Western cultural context, while staying committed to the traditional emphasis on yogic embodiment.

This talk describes five modalities of mind that we can learn to distinguish when we commit to a path of meditation and mindfulness: (1) discursive thinking (2) applied thinking (3) attentional consciousness (4) felt sense (5) awareness We encounter the modality of discursive thinking when we first sit down in meditation. We begin to see that it obscures, blocks, obstructs the other modalities. By learning to be less invested in discursiveness, over time, we can become more and more familiar with each of the other modalities and see their value, interrelatedness, and limitations. This increasing granularity allows us to employ our minds more and more skillfully on our path of transformation, liberation, wisdom, and compassion. Welcome to a NEW SEASON of Zen Mind! New talks will be published bi-weekly on Wednesdays throughout the summer. See all events and join our mailing list at www.boulderzen.org. If you're enjoying these talks, please subscribe and leave us a review! Zenki Christian Dillo Roshi is the the guiding teacher at the Boulder Zen Center in Colorado, USA. This podcast shares the regular dharma talks given at the center. Zenki Roshi approaches Zen practice as a craft of transformation, liberation, wisdom and compassionate action. His interest is to bring Buddhism alive within the Western cultural context, while staying committed to the traditional emphasis on yogic embodiment.

This talk is about how to put a regular zazen practice together in one's daily life. It starts out with a look at the two sicknesses of meditation: Treating meditation as a means to an end. Using meditation as a way to escape difficulty. The antidote to the two sicknesses is seeing zazen as the repeated gesture of "opening up around" our experience as it is from moment to moment. By committing to this gesture as the essential enactment of zazen, we can discover zazen as an expression of buddha mind. The talk concludes with some very basic and practical ideas for how to set up a daily meditation practice. Welcome to a NEW SEASON of Zen Mind! New talks will be published bi-weekly on Wednesdays throughout the summer. See all events and join our mailing list at www.boulderzen.org. If you're enjoying these talks, please subscribe and leave us a review! Zenki Christian Dillo Roshi is the the guiding teacher at the Boulder Zen Center in Colorado, USA. This podcast shares the regular dharma talks given at the center. Zenki Roshi approaches Zen practice as a craft of transformation, liberation, wisdom and compassionate action. His interest is to bring Buddhism alive within the Western cultural context, while staying committed to the traditional emphasis on yogic embodiment.

Discipline is not a popular word. To most people, it feels like something imposed from the outside, an expectation others have of us or one we have internalized. This talk is about reframing the concept of "discipline" as the ability to hold an intention over time. Intention is most deeply rooted in satisfaction—not in willpower.

This talk looks at "nourishment" as the other side of suffering. When is an experience nourishing-independent of whether it is pleasant or unpleasant? The answer lies In the practice or completing that which appears: allowing our experience to be exactly what It Is at this time and also allowing it to become what it wants to become.

What is enlightenment? And what is the relationship to habits and karma? This talk examines what the words "enlightenment," "awakening," and "realization" point to. It presents a "practice of enlightenment" based on Dogen's instruction "to be steadily intimate with the field of mind." The practice of enlightenment is not a self-improvement or self-actualization project. However, improvement is a valid interest; so how do we approach it in the context of enlightenment?