Earth Dreams: Zen Buddhism and the Soul of the World

Blessings!
My sanghas are currently practicing autumn Ango, a period of more intensified practice together in community. Here in Columbus the Mud Lotus Sangha did a half-day retreat, which consisted of five hours of zazen and walking meditation. We sat for 50-minutes, walked for 10 minutes and then repeated for a full afternoon. Sitting in the silence of mind’s nature as the city stirred. The vow of loving kindness illuminating my heart, as the body sat upright and we peered together into our aliveness.
The Zen Community of Oregon is studying the Diamond Sutra this Ango. This dharma talk explores the first chapter of that sutra.
This is what I once heard said. The Most Honored was residing near Shravasti in Jeta’s Grove at the Provider for the Defenseless Park along with a large gathering of twelve hundred and fifty monks and a great many bodhisattva-mahasattvas. That morning the Most Honored put on his robes, picked up his alms bowl, and went to the city of Shravasti to seek alms. When he returned from his alms round in Shravasti, he made offerings with the alms food, ate what remained, put away his robes and bowl, and washed his feet. He sat down on the seat prepared for him, crossed his legs, straightened his body, and rested in clear presence. Then many monks gathered around him. They bowed, touched their heads to his feet, walked around him three times, and sat down together.

Here we witness the Buddha performing ordinary daily life tasks. He puts on his clothes, he picks up his bowl, he walks, he has exchanges of giving and receiving on his alms round, he makes offerings, he eats, he puts away his robe and bow, he washes his feet.
Many of these activities are part of the flow of our daily life.
Part of the mythology surrounding the historical Buddha was that before he went on his alms round (which he did daily), he would scan the local area in the depth of his meditation and see if there was a being in the need of his visit. The Buddha was considered an unsurpassable field of merit. To give to the Buddha could transform someone’s life. To meet the Buddha may be healing, it may inspire someone to take refuge in the dharma, or to ordain, it might help them have an insight into the nature of suffering and thereby experience liberation.
In exchange for food, the Buddha taught the dharma. The Buddha offered the medicine of these teachings of compassion and wisdom. In this practice of alms, the giver was invited into generosity. They were invited to make an offering of food. Generosity was regarded as a practice that calms the heart and awakens faith.
This story isn’t just about the Buddha going on alms round. It’s about the alms round of our daily life. It’s an invitation to notice all of these exchanges we are a part of. How we give and receive, how we make offerings—what are the ways you practice generosity? Does it calm your heart, does giving awaken faith? How are you the recipient of generosity?
This passage of the sutra also encourages us to attend to the details of our daily life as dharma activity, as compassionate activity. To care for our bodies, our clothes, our bowls, our food, our relationships, our activity. This life is a ritual. This life is a sutra. We are writing this sutra with each breath, with each gesture, with each word we speak. This sutra is being chanted, being sung by all the beings that make up our life.
Listen! Listen!
Weekly Online Meditation Event through ZCO
Monday Night Dharma — 6P PT / 9P ET Join weekly for drop-in meditation and dharma talk. We are currently exploring the Diamond Sutra
Feel free to join anytime. Event lasts about 1.5 hours. ZOOM LINK
In-Person in Columbus, Ohio through Mud Lotus Sangha
Weekly Meditations every morning, Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday
I’m back in Columbus for a while, and we have a lot happening. Check out our website for retreats, weekly meditations and other events.
The Central Ohio Astrology Group is hosting our first big event a Venus Retrograde Gathering: An Immersive Evening of Astrology, Collage, Meditation & Ritual at ILLIO 17 E Tulane Rd on Saturday November 7 from 3P - 6:30P
1 Invocation of Venus with astrologer and astromage Eli Gamble
2 The Venus archetype and your natal Venus with astrologer Shawn Casey
3 Meditation on the retrograde cycle with astrologer Amy Kisei
4 Collage workshop with artist Alissa Ohashi
By the end of the afternoon, you’ll have created a unique planetary card filled with images and symbols that speak to Venus’s themes and your own experiences. Please RSVP by email to centralohioastrologygroup@gmail.com
I’m Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, Astrologer and Artist. I offer 1:1 Spiritual Counseling sessions using IFS and Hakomi (somatic mindfulness). I also offer astrology readings. Check out my website to learn more. I currently live in Columbus, OH and am a supporting teacher for the Mud Lotus Sangha.


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If we really allow ourselves to reflect on our direct experience of interconnection we can realize that this world is completely entangled with our own awareness. One analogy I appreciate is the analogy of bundles of reeds leaning against each other for support. If you remove one of the bundles, the others fall down.
We lean together in a tilty world.
Interconnection can be explored through each one of our senses. Notice how the world blossoms in your seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting.
Shitou says in the Sandokai:
All of the senses, all the things sensed—
they interact without interaction.
Interacting, they permeate one another.
yet each remains in its own place.

Notice how thoughts proliferate, taking us sometimes deeper into experience and other times down roads of confusion, anxiety, meanness.
Elizabeth Namgyal Mattis says this about interdepdence:
Since everything arises in dependence upon other factors, we can’t identify where one thing ends and another begins. We can’t find the edges of anything, and we begin to see that the world resists definition. This doesn’t mean our perceptions or thoughts are muddled. It’s just that, as much as we attempt to reach definitive conclusions about our selves, others, and our world, life continuously bursts from the seams of our beliefs and ideas. Because all things rely upon the ever-shifting nature of other elements, they will always remain uncapturable, beyond our ability to fathom them….
Yet because we are a part of the great nature of interdependence, everything we do influences life—everything matters.

In a leaning, tilty world your compassionate vow to liberate all beings from suffering goes deep. This is Jizo’s vow, and something trustworthy that we can lean into.
Weekly Online Meditation Event through ZCO
Monday Night Dharma — 6P PT / 9P ET Join weekly for drop-in meditation and dharma talk. We are currently exploring the Identity of Relative and Absolute.
Feel free to join anytime. Event lasts about 1.5 hours. ZOOM LINK
In-Person in Columbus, Ohio through Mud Lotus Sangha
Weekly Meditations on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
I’m back in Columbus for a while, and we have a lot happening. Check out our website for retreats, weekly meditations and other events.
I’m Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, Astrologer and Artist. I offer 1:1 Spiritual Counseling sessions using IFS and Hakomi (somatic mindfulness). I also offer astrology readings. Check out my website to learn more. I currently live in Columbus, OH and am a supporting teacher for the Mud Lotus Sangha.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

Greetings!
I am beginning a series of talks exploring the wisdom of Zen Master Shitou’s Sandokai, which is translated in various ways including: The Identity of Relative and Absolute, Being One and Many, The Harmony of Difference and Sameness.
In this podcast dharma talk I explore the first stanza of the poem using Nelson Foster’s translation:
The mind (heart) of the great sage of India
was intimately conveyed (transmitted) from west to east.
Though people may be sharp-witted or dull,
there's no north and south in the Way.
The deep spring sparkles in the pure light,
its branches streaming through the darkness.
Grasping at phenomena is the source of delusion;
uniting with the absolute falls short of awakening.
We explore the various ways one can point to our true nature—
May these pointings aid in the recognition of what you already deeply know—the freedom and love of your own heart-mind.
Dharma Talks from the Grasses, Trees and Great Earth Sesshin at Great Vow Zen Monastery are now posted. You can find them on the Zen Community of Oregon Website, as well as wherever you listen to podcasts.
Research Participant Request
I am taking classes in Buddhist Studies to complete my Mdiv. I am currently taking a class on Medicine and Healing, and one of my assignments is to conduct ethnographic research. I am looking for one volunteer who would be willing to be interviewed for three, 60-minute sessions. I will ask you questions about your experience with sickness, medicine and healing over the course of your life (this may be at times broad and at times specific). And I will hold space for you to tell your story. Please contact me if you are interested or if you have questions.
Weekly Online Meditation Event through ZCO
Monday Night Dharma — 6P PT / 9P ET Join weekly for drop-in meditation and dharma talk. We are currently exploring the Identity of Relative and Absolute.
Feel free to join anytime. Event lasts about 1.5 hours. ZOOM LINK
In-Person in Columbus, Ohio through Mud Lotus Sangha
Weekly Meditations on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
I’m back in Columbus for a while, and we have a lot happening. Check out our website for retreats, weekly meditations and other events.
I’m Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, Astrologer and Artist. I offer 1:1 Spiritual Counseling sessions using IFS and Hakomi (somatic mindfulness). I also offer astrology readings. Check out my website to learn more. I currently live in Columbus, OH and am a supporting teacher for the Mud Lotus Sangha.



This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

Greetings Friends,
I am returning from the Grasses, Trees and Great Earth Sesshin at Great Vow Zen Monastery. An outdoor sesshin I have had the deep pleasure of co-leading for the past six years. During the sesshin we practiced various ways of listening to the dharma of the natural world, including:
* Hearing with the eyes, heart, whole body.
* Letting ourselves be seen by the sky, ferns, rocks and queen ann’s lace.
* Becoming tree, black-berry, forest, ground.
The great earth and sky speak the dharma through their constancy, reminding us that we too belong to this world, that our presence is medicine, that we aren’t separate or alone.
Have you ever…(a poem)

Have you ever, sat down with a tree and said hello, as if greeting a friend?
And then listened to her story?
Have you ever gazed into the face of a flower,
with wonder and delight
and asked
how are you today?
Have you ever laid down on the earth, and kissed her dry grasses, or soggy soils
and let her touch you in 10k different ways?
Have you ever held open your heart to the sky, in astonishment
of their vastness
and let them fill you with their roaring absence?

Have you ever quieted your mind, and listened to the bird’s song
how it accompanies the wind
--as the grasses, leaves, flowers and trees
all add their music?

The natural world speaks
in a voice before human words
it is our native tongue
Listen
And you can almost remember
how to hear it

Another dharma theme that we explored during the sesshin was recognizing the contentment, pleasure and joy of meditation. This is a teaching that transformed the Buddha’s own path to liberation, and is such an important resource in our own practice. To know the satisfaction of not seeking satisfaction elsewhere.
Are you afraid of this happiness?
Lastly, I want to share the story of Senjo and her soul are separated, which is what we explore in this dharma talk. It is a Chinese folk-tale turned koan, that speaks to the sense of living a divided life and remembering home. The koan and it’s poem can be found below.
Once, in a village by a river, a girl and a boy, second cousins, grew up together as inseparable companions. They were so close that the girl’s father once joked that they seemed married already. Eventually, they did fall in love. However, the girl’s father announced that she was to marry a different man.
The girl, Senjo, and her sweetheart, Ochu, were devastated, and Ochu was so upset that he decided to take his boat and leave the village. Just as he began to sail down the river, he saw a shadowy figure standing on the riverbank. Senjo stepped into the boat and they escaped down river together.
Five years passed. They had two children and were very happy, except that from time to time Senjo would burst into tears because she missed her family. They decided to return, and when they arrived home, Ochu went up to Senjo’s house to ask forgiveness for leaving with her. Her father seemed surprised, and said, “What? From the day you left, Senjo has been upstairs lying on her bed, looking so sad, and she’s never said a word.”
Just then, Senjo from the boat arrived at the door, and suddenly the Senjo from upstairs appeared, smiling. The two Senjos looked at one another, smiled, and walked right into one another. Instantly, they became one.
So the question is: “Senjo and her soul are separated. Which is the true one?”
Mumon's Poem

The moon above the clouds is ever the same
mountains and valleys are separate from each other
all is blessed, all is blessed
are they one, or two?
Have you ever felt like you were living two lives? What has helped you resolve this tension? What helps you return home?
Weekly Online Meditation Event
Monday Night Dharma — 6P PT / 9P ET Join weekly for drop-in meditation and dharma talk. We are currently exploring the Identity of Relative and Absolute.
Feel free to join anytime. Event lasts about 1.5 hours. ZOOM LINK
In-Person in Columbus, Ohio through Mud Lotus Sangha
Weekly Meditations on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
I’m back in Columbus for a while, and we have a lot happening. Check out our website for retreats, weekly meditations and other events.
I’m Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, Astrologer and Artist. I offer 1:1 Spiritual Counseling sessions using IFS and Hakomi (somatic mindfulness). I also offer astrology readings. Check out my website to learn more. I currently live in Columbus, OH and am a supporting teacher for the Mud Lotus Sangha.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe

Greetings!
It’s Leo season (how is it the over 50% of people I know are Leos?) I have had the joy of some travel over the past month—Mud Lotus Sangha did our first weeklong sesshin at Saranam Retreat Center in WV, I saw Bob Dylan in concert in Cincinnati and spent a few days on the Atlantic shore immersed in Ocean Mudra Samadhi.
I’m back in Ohio for a couple of weeks and then I will be heading to Great Vow Zen Monastery for a jukai ceremony and our Grasses, Trees and the Great Earth Sesshin followed by a week of residency.
Today though I want to share a koan that has been a companion for these last few weeks. It’s Case 36 in the Hidden Lamp: The Old Woman, Joshu and the Tiger.
One day wehn Master Joshu was outside the monastery, he saw an old woman hoeing a field. He asked her, “What would you do if you suddenly met a fierce tiger?”
She replied, “Nothing in this world frightens me,” and turned back to her hoeing.
Joshu roared like a tiger. She roared back at him.
Joshu said, “There’s still this.”

One thing I love about koans like this is that they speak the language of awakening, right in the everyday activities of life.
Imagine weeding in your garden, and someone came up to you and said. What would you do if you suddenly met a fierce tiger?
What would you do?
So Joshu is a seasoned Zen teacher, and this old woman is seasoned in the wisdom of life and may also be a Zen master.
What is Joshu doing? Who is this tiger?
Is he talking about her? About himself? Another teacher with insight? Tigers can refer to a zen adapt/teacher who is wise, fierce—dangerous for the ego.
He also could be testing her. How do you stand with yourself? How do you stand with this fierce wilderness we call life/the world/spiritual path?
He is also talking to us. How do you stand with the wild unknown?
Nothing in this world frightens me. She says. She may also be saying, you don’t frighten me. I don’t frighten me.
Here is someone seasoned in the wisdom of life, loss, change. She has lived through the death of loved ones, famines, wars, times of abundance. She has been child, maiden, mother, sister, friend, elder.
And yet, she says, nothing in the world frightens me. That’s a powerful statement for anyone.
Feel into that for a moment. Try it on. Say the words. Nothing in the world frightens me.
Could that be true for you? Where do the words come from when you say them? What happens?
Is there a place in you that is fearless? That doesn’t suppress fear, but also isn’t afraid of it? Or does the statement invoke fear, call forward the things that are unsettled in your heart?
This koan invites us to study the dharma gate of fear. To truly study fear means we also study liberation, compassion, the refuge of the dharma, and everything else that is connected to fear.
In my experience some fears are hidden, they arise in the moment—a living tiger comes (ever have an encounter with a wild animal?) or it comes in the form of diagnosis, job loss, stomach sickness. When fear arises we get to see its shape, and what else arises in its wake. Some fears arise in relationship to other emotions, some fears wake us up and connect us to what matters most, some leave us deeply present, some send us worrying or bring the body into a panic state.
Other fears are more front and center. They are in response to the life we are living now. Do you have fears that you are navigating in your life now? How does fear arise? Do they come as images? Well acquainted worries? Memories? Parts of yourself?
What happens in your body? What does fear feel like? Are other emotions present as well? How does the mind react to fear?
Rilke says it this way in letters to a young poet, “Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.”
Dharma practice offers us supports in meeting fear. All the practices we have can be supports: mantra, breath, grounding in the senses, opening to spaciousness, feeling fear directly in the body.
Often when we stay with fear and try to get to know it we see that it too is made of sensations, thoughts, memories, feelings—that arise and pass. Sometimes compassion arises or we have insights about the nature of fear and what is it connected to. As we practice with fear, confidence develops that we can feel fear. That we don’t have to be afraid of it.
Tremendous inner power can come from this. Throughout spiritual traditions we see depictions of sages, buddhas, bodhisattvas, shamans, gods who have relationships with fierce animals, with tigers, lions, snakes, elephants.
When we are no longer afraid of our fear.
We can roar.
Nothing in the world can frighten you.
What is your experience practicing with fear? What practices support you in meeting the fears in your life?
I had the opportunity to talk to Father John Gribowich (a friend/mentor from my high school days at Central Catholic, before either of us were priests) and David Plisky about my spiritual path, Zen Buddhist practice and its intersections with Catholicism in a episode entitled: Finding God in the Zendo , as part of their Religion to Reality podcast that is themed around listening and interfaith dialogue.
Weekly Online Meditation Event
Monday Night Dharma — 6P PT / 9P ET Join weekly for drop-in meditation and dharma talk. We are currently exploring the Hidden Lamp: Teaching from the Buddhist Women Ancestors
Feel free to join anytime. Event lasts about 1.5 hours. ZOOM LINK
In-Person in Oregon
Grasses, Trees and the Great Earth Sesshin— August 10 - 16 at Great Vow Zen Monastery
In-Person in Columbus, Ohio through Mud Lotus Sangha
Weekly Meditations on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
Retreats, Meditation instruction and other events can be found on our website.
I’m Amy Kisei. I am a Zen Buddhist Teacher, Spiritual Counselor, Astrologer and Artist. I offer 1:1 Spiritual Counseling sessions using IFS and Hakomi (somatic mindfulness). I also offer astrology readings. Check out my website to learn more. I currently live in Columbus, OH and am a supporting teacher for the Mud Lotus Sangha.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amykisei.substack.com/subscribe