Upaya Zen Center's Dharma Podcast

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk and Day 4 of Upaya’s Fall Practice Period Sesshin, Sensei Kathie Fischer brings our attention to resonance—the way one vibration awakens or encourages another. Drawing from physics, poetry, and the words of the ancestors, she invites us to hear the dharma not as explanation but the vibration of practice itself. She reminds us, “Do not be concerned with the…

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In this morning talk on the first full day of the Fall Practice Period Sesshin, Sensei Shinzan draws from Dōgen’s Bendōwa (“The Wholehearted Way”) to remind us that zazen itself is the true gate of the Buddha Dharma. With warmth and humor, he encourages practitioners to release striving and self-judgment, saying, “Sesshin is not for making decisions or planning your life. It’s for trusting the…

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In this opening session of Upaya’s 2025 Fall Pratice Period Sesshin, four teachers—Sensei Kathie Fischer, Sensei Shinzan (joining remotely from San Diego), Sensei Monshin, and Hoshi Senko—welcome participants into the stillness and rhythm of this week-long meditation retreat. They offer encouragement and practical guidance for entering sesshin as a space of deep care and transformation.

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In this Zazenkai Day Talk during Fall Practice Period, Chris Senko Perez reflects on Dōgen’s Genjō Kōan through his image of sailing far out to sea, where the ocean appears perfectly round. Dōgen comments on this imagery, “When Dharma fills your whole body and mind. You understand that something is missing.” Senko explores this paradox—how true fullness awakens an awareness of vastness still…

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In this Fall Practice Period session, Senseis Kathie, Monshin, and Shinzan, with reflections from Hoshi Senko, open the study of Dogen’s Bendowa and Genjokoan. They invite participants to encounter Dogen not as a distant master to be analyzed but as a living companion in practice. “The zazen of even one person at one moment,” reads Sensei Monshin, “imperceptibly accords with all things and…

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In this Zazenkai Day talk during Upaya’s Fall Practice Period, Sensei Kathie Fischer offers her reflections on the simplicity and depth of Zen practice. She begins by exploring the role of language in understanding Zen, noting that “the purpose of a word is to create a boundary.” Kathie reflects on our intellectual and creative tendency to collect, compare, and update expressions of practice or…

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Senseis Monshin, Kathie Fischer, and Shinzan, together with Hoshi Senko, open Upaya’s Fall Practice Period by welcoming participants from around the world into a month of deep study of Dogen’s Genjokoan. “To study the way is to study the self,” Monshin reminds us, as the teachers reflect on beginning again, letting go of comparison, and trusting the unfolding of practice. With warmth, humor…

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In this talk from Upaya’s Awareness and Action series, Dr. Guo Gu, founder of the Tallahassee Chan Center, explores Embodiment and Engaged Practice—how awakening through the body becomes the ground for compassionate action in the world. “This body is what we have to work with,” he says. “It is the tool, it is this moment.” Through guided meditation and passionate teaching…

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In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk during Fall Practice Period at Upaya, Sensei Monshin explores the meaning of dharma position. Building from Dogen’s Genjokoan, she explains dharma position as an expression of the inseparability of self and reality—“this intersection of the individual and universal.” Each being, she reminds us, is perfectly situated where it is; practice does not move us toward…

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In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk during the Fall Practice Period, Sensei Shinzan turns to Dōgen’s Genjō Kōan, drawing on the image of a monkey grasping at the moon’s reflection to reveal how our search for enlightenment often obscures what is really there. “You want to see who is awake or who is enlightened? Just watch how they live their lives,” he says, reminding us that realization is…

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In this Way-Seeking Mind Dharma Talk, resident Tuck Butsumon Stibich offers a moving reflection on his path from intellectual inquiry to embodied Zen practice. Raised in Dayton, Ohio, in a family grounded in […]

In this session of Upaya’s Awareness in Action series, Bhikkhu Bodhi offers a penetrating teaching on discernment as the heart of engaged Buddhism in times of crisis. He reflects on his journey from 1960s […]

In Part 4 of Upaya’s Love and Death program, Frank Ostaseski and Roshi Joan invite participants to “bring death into the room” through a mindfulness practice with photographs of people who stepped through the threshold of […]

This is the 2nd half of … part 3 of Upaya’s Love and Death program, Frank Ostaseski and Roshi Joan Halifax explore the tension between belonging and accommodation. Through personal stories of illness, recovery, and […]

In Part 3 of Upaya’s Love and Death program, Frank Ostaseski and Roshi Joan Halifax explore the tension between belonging and accommodation. Through personal stories of illness, recovery, and care, they show how dignity in receiving […]

This is the 2nd half of … part two of Upaya’s Love and Death weekend program, Roshi Joan Halifax and Frank Ostaseski deepened the exploration of how personal love can open into universal compassion. Framed […]

In part two of Upaya’s Love and Death weekend program, Roshi Joan Halifax and Frank Ostaseski deepened the exploration of how personal love can open into universal compassion. Framed by the bodhisattva path, Roshi Joan recounted […]

In the opening session (part 1) of Love and Death, Roshi Joan Halifax and Frank Ostaseski welcomed more than 1,300 participants into a shared inquiry of love and mortality. Framed by Rainer Maria Rilke’s insight that […]

In this intriguing Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Kodo inspires us with the lion’s roar of Queen Srimala. Beginning with reflections on how motivations and intentions consciously and unconsciously impact behavior, Kodo guides […]

In this timely session of Awareness in Action, Father John Dear confronts the urgency of our times with an echo from Martin Luther King Jr.: “The choice is no longer violence or non-violence… It’s […]

In this unique Wednesday Night Dharma Talk before the upcoming Love and Death program, Roshi Joan Halifax and Frank Ostaseski engage in an open dialogue on Life, Death, and Freedom. Departing from scripted teachings, the evening unfolds […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Dainin interweaves personal story, Buddhist teaching, and contemporary challenges to show how the Bodhisattva vow can be lived — and is urgently needed — in our […]

In this session of Upaya’s Awareness in Action series, writer and activist Rebecca Solnit joins Roshi Joan Halifax to explore how stories shape reality, the nature of human behavior in crisis, and the discipline of hope […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei James Fushin explores vulnerability as a profound gateway to awakening. Drawing from the Vimalakirti Sutra and physicist Brian Cox’s question—”How do we live a finite, fragile life in […]

In the second part of this two-part Wednesday Night Dharma Talk mini-series, Zen teacher Guo Gu guides us into the embodiment of silent illumination. He begins not with theory but with experience: posture, presence, and body. […]

In this session of Awareness in Action, Roshi Joan Halifax and Terry Tempest Williams guide participants to witness the world with care, presence, and courage. Roshi Joan opens with the Zen koan—“A monk asked Joshu, […]

In this closing session of Upaya’s Dogen Seminar, faculty and participants reflect on how ancient teachings become living transmission through courage, friendship, and practice. Roshi Joan reminds us that discovery emerges not through […]

In the seventh session of Upaya’s Dogen Seminar, Sensei Genzan explores Dogen’s Eight Awakenings of Great Beings (Hachi Dainin Gaku), weaving scholarship with lived experience to reveal how Zen practice addresses the paradoxes of daily […]

In the sixth session of Upaya’s Dogen Seminar, the faculty engage in a rich exploration of Dogen’s use of language, paradox, and poetry as spiritual communication. Heine highlights how paradox functions as […]

In this fifth session of Upaya’s Dogen Seminar, Norman and Kathie Fischer explore Dogen’s Four Methods of Guidance (Bodaisatta Shishobo), one of the most accessible and transformative fascicles of the Shobogenzo. Building on reflections about paradox in Zen, […]

In this fourth session of Upaya’s Dogen Seminar, Sensei Jiryu explores the profound paradox at the heart of Zen practice: the essential teaching of non-separation. He highlights the famous line, “The great way […]

In this third session of Upaya’s Dogen Seminar, renowned poet, translator, and peace activist Sensei Kazuaki Tanahashi presents his analysis of paradox in Dogen’s writings, drawing from his monumental 33-year translation project of […]

In this second session of the Dogen Seminar, distinguished scholar Dr. Steven Heine explores the profound role of paradox in Zen Buddhism, examining how these seemingly contradictory teachings serve as liberating devices rather […]

In this opening session of Upaya’s Dogen Seminar, program faculty introduce themselves and reflect on themes and paradoxes within Dogen’s teachings they will be sharing over the weekend. Roshi Joan Halifax presented Dogen’s […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, resident priest Senko Perez reflects on the common trap of imagining that true practice lies elsewhere—in quieter places, calmer minds, or better circumstances. During a recent solo […]

In this session of Awareness in Action and speaking from her farm in Alexandria, Louisiana—unexpectedly located at the center of America’s deportation operations—dharma teacher and social justice activist Konda Mason explores the powerful connection […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Monshin explores the ancient Buddhist teaching of Kanno Doko — “responsive communion” or “mystical communion.” Drawing from a Wallace Stevens poem and the writings of Suzuki Roshi, she […]

In the first part of this two-part Wednesday Night Dharma Talk mini-series, Zen teacher Guo Gu explores the deep relationship between silent illumination (or just sitting), and embodiment practice. He traces the historical roots of silent […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Jiryu affirms the central practice of Zen is to become truly ourselves. Reading from Suzuki Roshi’s teachings, and sharing quotes from Shohaku Okamura, Katagiri Roshi, and […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Genzan offers a unique exploration of true dharma expression – weaving together the teachings of 13th century Zen master Dogen with the poetry and life of […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, longtime resident and novice priest Jimon Lorene Flaming tenderly offers her long and winding path to practice in her way-seeking mind talk. Inspired by overseas medical service […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Dainin shares deeply personal stories of accompanying her father and Roshi Joan through life-threatening medical crises, revealing how the Buddhist Five Remembrances transformed from abstract teachings […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Monshin explores what it means to be a peacemaker in our complicated world. Recalling a creative renaming of the 4th of July as “Interdependence Day,” Monshin […]

In this session of Upaya’s Awareness in Action series, Father Gregory Boyle—Jesuit priest and founder of Homeboy Industries—offers a profound reflection on kinship, healing, and radical compassion. Father Boyle brings humor, depth, and […]

In this informative Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Zenshin Florence Caplow explores the meaning of “Buddha meets Buddha” in the context of how we might skillfully navigate our relationships with spiritual teachers. Zenshin […]

This is the 2nd half of the session on Planting Life, where participants explore indigenous food ways and decolonization through cultivated ancient wisdoms. Artist and cultural preservationist Roxanne Swentzell shares her […]

This is the 1st half of the session on Planting Life, where participants explore indigenous food ways and decolonization through cultivated ancient wisdoms. Artist and cultural preservationist Roxanne Swentzell shares her […]

In this session of Planting Life, we participate in the sacred planting ceremony that honors indigenous wisdom through the cultivation of ancestral crops—corn, beans, and squash—known as the Three Sisters. Led by […]

In this session of Planting Life, Mayan archaeoastronomer Alonso Méndez reveals the profound astronomical knowledge embedded in ancient Mesoamerican civilization. Drawing from his decades of research at Palenque, Méndez traces how corn […]

In this session, Roshi Joan Halifax, Troy Keido Fernandez, Sensei Wendy Johnson, and Alonso Mendez open the annual Planting Life program at Upaya Zen Center. Roshi welcomes in-person and online participants to this sacred gathering that […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Cynthia Ryotan explores the ancient Zen poem “The Mind of Absolute Trust” or “Xinxin Ming.” She unpacks how our preferences “chop up our lives and […]