Podcasts | Upaya Zen Center

In this session of The Measure of Our Humanity, Roshi Joan Halifax opens by reflecting on six years of monthly gatherings exploring socially engaged Buddhism — and on the urgency of the question […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Roshi Joan Halifax opens by naming her deep concern for the ongoing wars, displacement, and political upheaval seen throughout the world. Rather than offering direct reassurance, she turns to two stories held in deliberate tension: Kyōgen’s koan “Man Up a Tree,” in which a man hanging by his teeth from a branch is asked a question he cannot answer without falling, and the more familiar parable of a man clinging to a twig on a cliff face, stalked by tigers above and below. Together they frame a teaching on aimlessness and indeterminacy at the heart of Zen. Roshi points to aimlessness not as passivity but as a requirement of appropriate action: “When you are aimless, you’re not grasping towards something. You actually have the capacity to respond to things as they are.” Sensei Dainin follows, reflecting on the uncertainty of our times through her own not-knowing during Roshi’s recent open-heart surgeries. Drawing on Zen teacher Zenju Earthlyn Manuel, she names this era as belonging to “awakening times” — a call not to despair, but to vow, and to practice together.

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Butsumon Tuck Stibich — a resident priest at Upaya — opens with a teaching from Thich Nhat Hanh. No stranger to war, Thich Nhat Hanh explains that […]

In this Wednesday Night Dharma Talk, Sensei Fushin addresses what so many of us are carrying right now — the weight of a world in upheaval, the accumulation of personal grief, and the […]

In the final session of The Poetry of Cold Mountain, participants share their overnight translations of Hanshan’s poems — working from character-to-word guides across five poems. The range and depth of […]

In Part 6 of The Poetry of Cold Mountain, the evening session gathers around two offerings. Kaz Tanahashi gives a live calligraphy demonstration, rendering Hanshan’s poem “You Ask the Way to Cold Mountain” […]

In Part 5 of The Poetry of Cold Mountain, the session opens with a participant unexpectedly sharing two pieces of calligraphy prepared before the retreat — Hanshan poems rendered by hand […]

In Part 4 of The Poetry of Cold Mountain, the session opens into a shared creative space. Kaz Tanahashi and Peter Levitt shape the afternoon around two fundamental poetry practices — writing from the present […]

In Part 3 of The Poetry of Cold Mountain, Peter Levitt offers a deep dive into the craft and consciousness of Hanshan’s poetry. Drawing on three defining qualities of Hanshan’s work — plain […]

Roshi Joan Halifax opens this first full session (Part 2) of The Poetry of Cold Mountain by acknowledging the violence unfolding in Iran, holding the gravity of the world alongside the refuge of […]