MN Zen Meditation Center: Sunday Talks

Talk given by Ted O'Toole. Sunday Talks from the Zen Meditation Center on Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis, MN. Donations appreciated at MnZenCenter.org.

Talk given by Tim Burkett. Someon lives in a mountain gorge cloud robe and sunset tassels holding sweet plants he wants to share the path up is long and hard the climber burdened by regrets and doubts finally meets an old man called by others "out of it" yet joyfully serene in his stupidity -- Han Shan Look at the birds Even flying is born out of nothing The first sky is inside you open at either end of day The work of wings is always freedom fastening one heart to every falling thing -- Anonymous

Talk given by Mark Turbak. 1) Quiet The Mind 2) Start Right Here 3) Do Less 4) Don't Take Things Too Seriously

Talk given by Bussho Lahn. Sunday Talks from the Zen Meditation Center on Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis, MN. Donations appreciated at MnZenCenter.org.

Talk given by Wanda Isle. It's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that mindfullness is a continuous state of calm. But life is not like that. In Buddha's discourse on mindfulness, he said, "When the mind is in a wholesome state, know that the mind is in a wholesome state. When the mind is in an unwholesome state, know that the mind is in a unwholesome state." This is mindfulness.

Talk given by Tim Burkett. When the lofty hear of Tao they devote themselves. When the common hear of Tao they wonder if it's real or not. When the lowly hear of Tao they laugh out loud. Without that laughter, it wouldn't be the Tao. - Chuang Tzu I burned incense, swept the earth, and waited for a poem to come. Then I laughed, and climbed the mountain, Leaning on my staff I laughed again I'd love to be a master of the blue sky's art: see how many sprigs of snow-white cloud he's brushed in so far today. -Yuan Mei

Talk given by Bussho Lahn. "...in many traditions you have this notion that throughout our lives we train for a right dying; and that means to train for flowing with life,for giving ourselves... ...we can make the inner gesture of dying; giving thanks instead of taking for granted; giving up rather than taking possession; for-giving as, opposed to taking offense. What we take for granted does not make us happy; what we hold on to deteriorates in our grasp; what we take offense at we make into a hurdle we can't get past. But in giving thanks, giving up, forgiving, we die here and now and become more fully alive." - Brother David Steindl Rast There is a special circle in Dante's hell that is populated by souls whose only fault was that their aspirations were too low. - Huston Smith

Talk given by Ben Connelly. The beneficial factors are faith, conscience, humility, lack of desire, aversion, and delusion, energy, tranquility, carefulness, equanimity, and non-violence. - Vasubandu's 30 Verses on Consciousness Only

Talk given by Susan Nelson. Sunday Talks from the Zen Meditation Center on Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis, MN. Donations appreciated at MnZenCenter.org.

Talk given by Tim Burkett. I praise the ancient Chinamen who left me a few words, usually a pointless joke or a silly question, a line of poetry drunkenly scrawled on the margin of a quick splashed picture - bug, leaf, caricature of teacher, on a paper held together now by little more than ink & their own strength brushed momentarily over it. Their world and several others since gone to hell in a hand basket, They knew it, cheered as it whizzed by & conked out among the busted spring cherry-blossom wine jars, Happy to have saved us all. - Phillip Whalen

Talk given by Ted O'Toole. For When, with irreversible intent, The mind embraces bodhichitta, Willing to set free the endless multitudes of beings, At that instant, from that moment on, A great and unremitting stream, A strength of wholesome merit, Even during sleep and inattention, Rises equal to the vastness of the sky. -- Shantideva, Bodhicharyavatara

Talk given by Tim Burkett. Thought's the Slave of Life And Life's Time's Fool And Time which Takes Survey Of all the World Must have a Stop - Shakespeare, Henry IV Love's not the Slave of Life -Shakespeare, Sonnet 116

Talk given by Susan Nelson. Life prepare me to be a sanctuary- Clear and wholly, tried and true, With thanksgiving I'll be a living sanctuary... for you.

Talk given by Tim Burkett. Walnuts have a shell, and they have a kernel. Religions are the same. They have an essence, but then they have a protective coating. - Huston Smith

Talk given by Ben Connelly. I would like to be remembered as a person who wanted to be free... so other people would also be free. -- Rosa Parks