The Zen Studies Podcast

Domyo Burk
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Nov 12, 2021 • 35min

186 - Making Peace with Ghosts: Unresolved Karma and the Sejiki (Segaki) Festival

The annual Buddhist ceremony of “feeding the hungry ghosts,” or Sejiki, offers rich mythological imagery as a teaching. Metaphorically, a “ghost” is anything painful or difficult which continues to haunt the present although its causes lie in the past. Sejiki and its surrounding mythology encourages us to make peace with our ghosts: We acknowledge them, set appropriate boundaries, make an offering, and hope that, over time, the ghosts will be able to partake of some healing and liberating Dharma.
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Oct 29, 2021 • 29min

185 – 14 Ways to Enliven Your Zazen – Part 2

I share nine more ways to enliven your zazen without employing methods that introduce dualism and struggle into your sitting. See Episode 184 for why this is important, and for my first five approaches.
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Oct 22, 2021 • 27min

184 – 14 Ways to Enliven Your Zazen – Part 1

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Oct 11, 2021 • 44min

183 – Natural Koans: Engaging Our Limitations as Dharma Gates

Formal Zen koans are short stories or statements by past Chan/Zen masters which have been passed down through the generations for study and contemplation by Zen students. Each koan contains a Dharma teaching, and until you personally experience and digest that teaching, the koan remains a closed gate you need to pass through - on the other side of which is greater freedom, wisdom, and compassion. I discuss “natural koans,” or Dharma gates that arise in our everyday lives, and how to work with them.
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Sep 29, 2021 • 30min

182 - Answers to Interview Questions from Eastern Horizon Magazine

I share with you questions and answers from my 2020 written interview for Eastern Horizon, a tri-annual magazine of the Young Buddhist Association of Malaysia (YBAM). There are some basic questions about Zen, and then some questions about what Buddhism has to offer with respect to understanding and coping with the COVID-19 pandemic. Thought you might enjoy hearing a different kind of presentation, where I have kept my answers very succinct.
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Sep 22, 2021 • 39min

181 - Bodhicitta: Way-Seeking Mind, or the Mind of Enlightenment

Bodhicitta can be translated as Way-Seeking Mind, or the Mind of Enlightenment. It's the part of us that recognizes and seeks truth and goodness, inspiring our spiritual search and motivating our practice. In Mahayana Buddhism, bodhicitta is seen as essential to the path and a cause for gratitude. It also can be seen as the primary source of redemption for humankind, even when it seems the world is dominated by greed, hate, and delusion.
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Sep 10, 2021 • 36min

180 - The Dharma of Staying Calm When Facing Challenges

When we can't - or don't want to - avoid facing challenges (our own or those of others), what does the Dharma offer us in terms of preventing anxiety, fear, overwhelm, burnout, depression, or despair? I talk about what is really means to stay calm, the value of staying calm, and some practices that can help us do this.
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Aug 30, 2021 • 30min

179 - Inadequacy to Abundance: Rewriting Our Self-Narrative

As human beings we have a self-narrative, and for most - if not all - of us, this narrative includes a sense of inadequacy. When we conceive of ourselves as a "small self against the world" we will always feel inadequate, and consequently our generosity is inhibited. Fortunately, we can rewrite our self-narrative to include our buddha-nature, because the "boundless self with the world" is a conduit for abundance. The world needs and wants what you have to offer.
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Aug 21, 2021 • 32min

178 – Declaring War on Global Heating and What That Means to a Buddhist

I remind us of the reality of the climate emergency, and then argue that the most appropriate response to it is for us – as individuals, communities, states, and nations – to declare war on global heating and ecological breakdown. This is the only way we know of, as human beings, to shift into the "emergency mode" mindset we need. I then explain how the imagery of war and battle fits with Buddhist practice.
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Aug 13, 2021 • 34min

177 - Unconditional Strength and Gratitude: The Medicine of Suchness

The medicine of suchness is life-saving, because even the happiest and most fortunate human life inevitably contains suffering. Sometimes – in our personal lives or in the wider world – we face terrible things that arouse anxiety, depression, fear, despair, or rage, such as our climate and ecological emergency. Our Zen practice offers us suchness as a medicine that can alleviate our despair and help us access strength and gratitude.

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