The Zen Mountain Monastery Podcast

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The Mountains and Rivers Order (MRO) is a Western Zen Buddhist lineage established by the late John Daido Loori Roshi and dedicated to sharing the dharma as it has been passed down, generation to generation, since the time of Shakyamuni Buddha. Zen Mountain Monastery, the main house of the Mountains and Rivers Order, is one of the West’s most respected Zen Buddhist monasteries and training centers. Nestled in New York’s beautiful Catskill Mountains, the Monastery draws its strength from the anc...

Episode List

Do You Know the Self—or Not?

Apr 5th, 2026 2:55 PM

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi – ZMM – 4/5/26 – From the Book of Serenity, Case 37 – Guishan’s “Active Consciousness” –

Acupuncture Needle of Zazen

Mar 28th, 2026 5:00 PM

Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi – ZMM – 3/28/26 – The subtle healing energy of zazen is likened to an acupuncture needle by Hongzhi, and Shugen Roshi explores how this teaching functions in our own practice life. Within zazen, are we truly engaging what is right in front of us? The simple and direct nature of zazen brings us back again and again, and so we return and settle into the ease of being within our own minds. Hongzhi invites us to “know without touching…and rest there.” Things become closer, softer, bright and clear.

Finding the Monastery in Samsara

Mar 27th, 2026 5:01 PM

Danica Shoan Ankele, Sensei – ZMM – 3/27/26 – In this Renewal of Vows (Fusatsu) talk, Shoan Sensei offers the perspective that we are practicing within samsara, exactly where we are. Here we can come very close to the narrow habits and patterns that create suffering—something we cannot do in some imagined fantasy of a Buddha Land. Taking up the place where we find ourselves as the place of our own vows, we can discover ways to bring forward our infinite capacity to leave possessiveness and self-delusion behind, and, with the support of the precepts, learn to be truly free. It is here that transformation can happen.

Entering the Wilderness

Mar 26th, 2026 5:51 PM

Bear Gokan Bonebakker, Osho – ZMM – 3/26/26 – A very human practice is to go into unfamiliar places, maybe on a pilgrimage or a journey of some sort into the unknown. What might be the benefit of this type of practice, why did it come to exist? Gokan Osho explores the Buddha’s teachings on facing one’s own mind, free of attachments. When we relax, and get very close to our direct experience, there is the possibility of transformations which can’t be prepared for.

Just Resting, While Freely Going Forth

Mar 25th, 2026 3:35 PM

Ron Hogen Green, Sensei – 3/25/26 – ZMM – Hogen Sensei asks the question: what is it to just rest? To let our busy preoccupation with our thoughts come to rest. Accepting all streams, everything becomes “one taste,” non-dual and not in opposition to anything. To truly settle down and allow the busyness to rest is to let the continuous flow be present just as it is, revealing the edges of what we call our “self” in the moment-to-moment flow of reality.

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