Zen Community of Oregon Dharma Talks

In this talk, Jogen Sensei explores the opening stanzas of Affirming Faith in Mind, illuminating what the poem calls “the Great Way”—life itself, unobscured by picking and choosing. Through clear examples of conditioned happiness, the wobbling of preference, and the subtle ways we strobe in and out of wholehearted engagement, he shows how resistance divides us from the peace inherent in each moment. Jogen emphasizes that dropping even slight distinctions allows the spacious, undivided nature of experience to appear, revealing the “one taste” running through all conditions. With warmth and humor, he invites practitioners to directly feel life as it is, free from the mind’s disease of constant like-and-dislike. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this talk, Hogen Roshi explores the opening line of Affirming Faith in Mind—“The Great Way is easy”—and shows how quickly the mind complicates even the simplest instruction: just feeling our toes or our breath. Through humor, examples, and vivid demonstrations of how attention creates our experience moment by moment, he reveals how the body, thoughts, and sense of self arise and disappear with each flicker of awareness. He encourages practitioners to return again and again to direct experience—free of belief, story, or self-image—so the primal source of life can reveal itself. With clarity and compassion, Hogen emphasizes that the Way is both the easiest and the hardest thing in the world: resting with things exactly as they are.This talk was given during the 2025 Ancient Way Sesshin. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this talk, Jogen Sensei explores the paradox of longing—the pain and medicine of our deepest yearning. Drawing from Dōgen, the Faith in Mind poem, and ancient teachings, he illuminates how our wanting, striving, and efforts to understand can either bind us or open us to freedom. Through stories, humor, and grounded guidance, Jogen invites us to practice with wholeheartedness for its own sake—not as a transaction, but as intimacy with life itself. This talk moves through themes of determination, innocence, and the living rhythm of practice that carries us beyond “easy” or “hard.” This talk was given during the 2025 Ancient Way Sesshin at Great Vow. ★ Support this podcast ★

In the second week of the Ango practice period, Jomon Sensei reflects on verses from Affirming Faith in Mind—“The Great Way is without limit, beyond the easy and the hard.” Through multiple translations and the koan Ling Zhao’s Grass Tips, she explores how our preferences and narrow views create tension, while the Way itself remains relaxed, spacious, and clear. Drawing on vivid imagery of dewdrops, grass, and the natural world, Jomon encourages us to meet both difficulty and ease with open presence. This talk reminds us that in stillness and in motion, the teachings of the ancestors are shining everywhere—even in the most ordinary momentsThis talk was given at the Plum Blossom Zendo in Vancouver, WA on October 14th 2025. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this talk Jogen Sensei introduces Affirming Faith in Mind as a mirror for practice and a reminder that the Great Way is neither easy nor difficult. Moving through the themes of impermanence, longing, and the poignancy of being human, he invites practitioners to meet life directly on the ground of reality. Jogen speaks of sesshin as a sacred vessel for awakening, describing three ingredients of transcendent insight: the desire to go beyond, a vivid steady mind, and bowing to what is. With clarity and humor, he shows how sesshin reveals our suffering and our freedom—teaching us to yield completely to the immediacy of this fleeting life.This is talk two of the 2025 Ancient Way Sesshin. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this opening talk of 2025 Ancient Way Sesshin, Hogen Roshi introduces the Affirming Faith in Mind chant—an ancient poem pointing to non-dual awareness and the ease of the great way. He reminds us that our suffering begins when we believe our thoughts, and peace appears when we let them flow without grasping. Through humor, reflection, and simple body-based practices, Hogen shows how inclusivity, satisfaction, and faith in the “heart-mind” reveal a stability beyond our judgments and preferences. The talk weaves ancient teaching, modern psychology, and poetry into a living encouragement to trust this very moment. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this episode, Kisei Sensei explores Koan 25, Nyozin’s Pale Moon of Dawn, and Koan 33, Bodhidharma’s Flesh, examining how Zen teaching passes through time, poetry, and the body. She reflects on Chyono’s poem about the pale moon and the bucket, showing how our sense of self can be patched together and then fall away in practice. Drawing connections to Bodhidharma’s transmission to his students, she emphasizes how awakening is both a lived, embodied experience and a study of ancestral teachings. Listeners are invited to reflect on the moon, their own practice, and the questions of body, awakening, and interconnection that these koans present.This talk was given during Kisei's online Tuesday night program. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this talk, Jomon Sensei continues the autumn Ango practice period by exploring passages from the ancient Zen poem Affirming Faith in Mind. Through multiple translations and reflections, she examines how striving—whether for worldly success or inner enlightenment—entangles us in duality. She invites us to rest in simplicity and let the “way be invisible,” seeing that stillness and motion, comfort and discomfort, are inseparable expressions of oneness. With warmth and humor, she shows how retreat practice and daily life both reveal the same truth: reality is not perfect, permanent, or personal.This talk was given at the Vancouver Zen Group on October 21st 2025. ★ Support this podcast ★

Jogen explores the Buddha’s teaching of right thought. Through vivid metaphors and down-to-earth humor, he invites us to notice what we hold onto that tethers us to unhappiness and how readiness to release can arise naturally, like ripe fruit. The talk moves from the monastic renunciate ideal to the subtler, everyday practice of relinquishment in relationships, habits, and self-images. Letting go, he says, is not moralistic or forced, but an alchemy of honesty, compassion, and faith in a deeper happiness.This talk was given on October 1st 2025 at Heart of Wisdom Zen Temple. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this episode, Kisei explores the unique Zen practice of mirror meditation at Tokeji, a thirteenth-century Japanese convent. Practitioners sit before a mirror, asking, “Where is a single feeling, a single thought in the mirror image at which I gaze?” Through historical stories, personal experiences, and reflections from teachers like Zenju Earthlyn Manuel and Ruth Ozeki, we witness how this practice reveals habitual judgments, fear, grief, and ultimately compassion and equanimity. By sitting with the reflection, we learn to see ourselves as nature itself, discovering clarity, openness, and our original heart-mind. ★ Support this podcast ★