Buddhism

No Teacher

Will considers that Zen cannot be taught. All the ideas we accumulate from listening to talks and reading books are not ‘it’. As useful as they are at times, they are the accumulation of just more concepts and ideas. It is only through our great enquiry that we awaken. This teisho, referring to Huang Po and the Brewer’s Lees (Case

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Unwellness

Will explores how we might view our pain differently. Rather than fleeing and avoiding pain, how we might also awaken to the fact that our pain and struggles are also the true dharma. He refers to Case 3 of the Blue Cliff Record: Sun Faced Buddha, Moon Faced Buddha This teisho was given by apprentice teacher Will Moon on day

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Koan Mu

Will discusses Wumen’s comments on how to work with the Koan Mu considering these instructionsin today’s context. This teisho, Case 1 (Chao-chou’s Dog) from the Gateless Barrier (Wu-men Kuan), was given by apprentice teacher Will Moon on Day 1 of Spring sesshin 2024.

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Birth & Death

Beginnings and endings herald in the New Year. It’s already the 4th of January, as I write this, and summer rolls on into heatwaves, punctuated with relief from evening storms. How do we meet beginnings and endings – birth and death, renewal and decline, cycles that are never ending? Transience is stamped and woven into the very cellular fabric of

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Pacify the Mind

Bodhidharma faced the wall. The Second Ancestor stood in the snow, cut off his armand said, ‘Your disciple’s mind has no peace as yet. I beg you, Master, please put it to rest.’ Mumonkan Case 41: Bodhidharma Pacifies the Mind The words, life and control, cancel each other out – life is just this!   Moment by moment, beyond our control and

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Who is that other?

Multitudinous messages coming in from marketers and politicians intensify the sense that thefuture’s uncertain and potentially disastrous, that thoughweare all right, it’s the “other” or “others”who are the problem. Our anxiety grows. Our minds already overflow with habits, preconceptionsand prejudices, with ideas about self and other, ideas that have me here, and you over there, eachof us separate and fearful

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Endless Giving

Waking at daybreak, my sisters and I, dancing with delight, would run to the Christmas tree and tear open our presents. It was the pinnacle of our year – the tinsel and the fake holly – the nativity play at school, the Christmas carols we sang to our neighbours with all those words about joy, goodwill, peace and generosity. The

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Every day is a good day

On my office wall hangs a scroll which inspires me each day, and which was given to me by my teacher Paul. The calligraphy says, ‘Every day is a good day’, a famous phrase of Yun-men. There is an enso below the calligraphy. This could be the fullness of the sun of every day; it could be the completeness of

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