In our individualistic culture, it is all about “me”. Often this has been referred to as the age of narcissism. A common form of suffering in our affluent culture is variations on the sense of shame, the sense of not being good enough, of being inadequate, of being a failure. This is to be contrasted with the zen teaching that we are okay just as we are.

How we relate to our pain, physical or emotion, is the key to ending suffering or escalating our suffering. Our competitive culture can also create shame-based forms of suffering such as personal failure, Developmental and relational trauma also creates shame-based forms of suffering. The practice of Zazen is the best antidote to self-rejection, founded in profound self-acceptance.

This is the first talk I gave at the Promised Land Zendo. It is my “Christmas” talk on the meaning of giving and receiving in the context of Zen Buddhist practice. Ultimately, from the perspective of the Absolute, when we are “giving” we are “receiving” and when we are receiving with gratitude we are giving.

This talk is a commentary on the poem “The Guest House” by Rumi, a 13th century Islamic scholar and Sufi mystic.

This talk begins with a summary discussion of the four noble truths and the four practice principles before moving onto a commentary on the story of the Sixth Patriarch and his poem about the mirror.

This talk is about how the scandals in western zen and subsequent disillusionment led to the increasing awareness of the need to integrate a psychological mindedness into traditional zen practice to ensure that zen could not be used as a form of “spiritual bypassing” or means of dissociation from psychological problems.

This talk is the first talk given at the Sawtell Zendo, and is a commentary on a famous zen story. In this story, the teacher asks the student, “what is your purpose or intention in doing Zazen?” and the student replies, “I seek to become a Buddha”. Thereupon the teacher picks up a roofing tile and begins to rub it with a stone. The student asks, “Teacher, what are you doing that for?” and the teacher replies, I am polishing this tile to make a mirror”. The student replies aghast, “but you can’t make a mirror by polishing a tile!” The teacher responds with “can a Buddha be created by doing Zazen?”

This talk, is a commentary on the chant, “On Opening the Dharma”. This is traditionally chanted prior to the teacher giving a dharma talk.

This talk is a commentary of the four practice principles developed by Charlotte Joko Beck and her students when she formed the Ordinary Mind Zen School. These were later revised by my teacher Barry Magid, who changed the second principle. The principles are a contemporary reworking of the four noble truths and capture the essence of Joko and Barry’s teaching in four lines. We chant the four principles at the end of a formal period of zen practice or at the end of the day when on retreat.

This was my first talk given in Coffs Harbour, Australia to a small fledgling sangha. This talk focuses on the centrality and uniqueness of the student-teacher relationship in the Zen Buddhist tradition.