Angel City Zen Center - Beginners Only Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Sara Campbell - World‘s Created, World‘s Destroyed Nov 19, 2021

Show notes

"I love the idea of worlds creating and worlds destroying. Each moment being new makes the good times sweeter. And being aware of how much you love something when it's happening makes harder times bearable. It's that awareness that everything is being made up and torn down constantly." - Sara Campbell

Live from Mt Baldy, Sara brings us a personal exploration of this year's retreat theme, "World's Created, World's Destroyed," including everyone's favorite koan on the end of the world and what to do about it, plus a lovely reading from Charlotte Joko Beck on the great coal furnace of zazen.

Dave Cuomo - Space Nov 13, 2021

Show notes

"When I stopped being scared of other people, a funny thing happened. I realized I like people.

You were like these static things that knew right from wrong and could judge me, and then one day you stopped being that. I realized that you don't know who you are or what you’re supposed to be doing either, and that meant I don't have to know what I am or what I’m supposed to be doing. And now we can all just hang out. It's a way different relationship, a funny relationship, and I like it a whole lot better."

Recorded live from Mt Baldy, Dave Cuomo reads Dogen’s “Space!” and talks emptiness, anxiety, and boundless love, while the sangha debates the best and worst poems to bum out a wedding.

Gyokei Yokoyama - The Simplest Thing Oct 29, 2021

Show notes

“The freedom we talk about is that wherever we are, we are in some kind of structure. Some are more restrictive, some are more free...

What I picked up through this monastic life was the freedom from your own preconceptions and notions - the end of enslavement by our own mind, to be free wherever you are.” - Gyokei Yokoyama

Join us as special guest Gyokei Yokoyama of Sozenji temple brings us a highly personal and insightful window into growing up in traditional Japanese Zen Buddhism and monastic training in the rough and tumble world of Eheiji Temple (yes, that Eiheiji!). What do Japanese Zennies really think of us hair brained Westerners taking up the practice? And what is gained and lost in the sometimes harsh realities of institutional Zen? And do we need such harsh lessons to get the fundamental point? (And what is the fundamental point???) Find out here!

Dave Cuomo - Grump & Gruff (Bodhidharma‘s Outline of Practice) Oct 23, 2021

Show notes

"If I say my boss over there is underpaying me because they're a jerk and that's not my fault, then I'm not really being with that situation. If I see myself as much a part of this situation as they are, then that's where actual joy happens. That's what I would call love.

I love my crappy bosses for the fact that we shared the same circumstances that conditioned me to resent them and them to find it pleasing to underpay me, and that it's not either of our fault that eons ago the earth came together in a big shattering of star bursts, and now here we are fighting over resources because we're both made of DNA. How can I blame us for being born on a planet like that?

So all we're really saying here is, yup, I live here too, and I love you, because we're in this together." - Dave Cuomo

Dave takes a good hard look at a classic tough love treatise by our great grumpy founder of Zen himself, Bodhidharma. Does "suffering injustice" really mean we're supposed to take crap and like it? Can "seeking nothing" actually help us find joy?? Find out here!

Leslie Mundy - Near Happenstance (What Am I Doing Here??) Oct 08, 2021

Show notes

“It's not about the chanting. It's not about what we're saying. It's about the community. It's about listening to each other.” - Leslie Mundy

In a very sweet and insightful story hour, our own Leslie Mundy takes the hot seat to regale us with the tale of what she’s doing and why she’s here. From mind altering days in the ‘60s, to the wild world of koan interviews, to our own ACZC Zoomdo, Leslie spins us stories within stories of learning how to sit still in a world that never seems able to for all that long.

Dave Cuomo - Dave Cuomo - Leggo My Ego (Yogacara - Manas (Self Consciousness)) Oct 01, 2021

Show notes

“We didn’t evolve to see reality, we evolved to survive. If we had evolved to see reality we would probably just appear as timeless bits of quantum foam. But that wouldn’t be very helpful for trying to feed yourself or make babies…" - Dave Cuomo

In the latest installment of his Yogacara series, Dave takes on the double headed monster, the double edged sword, of Manas - the self consciousness. According to DT Suzuki, It’s the thing that keeps us captive, and the only thing that can set us free. Buddhism says we have no self. Our senses tell us otherwise. Why? What is that self, how did it get there, and do we need it? What’s the difference between healthy self conception and the hindrance of self conceit? And can we ever get to know the sweet taste of fresh air if we’re stuck driving around seeing the world through the gauges of a submarine? Find out here!

Sara Campbell - A Different Way of Being Hopeless (Genjo Koan) Sep 21, 2021

Show notes

“It’s been hard to accept that my life didn't go exactly how I thought it should. That is a humbling thing to experience. And to know that your time is finite…

I still grieve some of the things that I don't have, but I'm way more able to see beyond them as a result of this practice. And I can be grateful for it. And I can see that my weirdo life has value. But I'm not really the judge of that. That's not up to me. That's bigger than me.” - Sara Campbell

Sara takes us on an intimate personal journey through Genjo Koan, Dogen’s classic poetic piece about a small nonexistent self trying to make its way in a wide world that turns out to be bigger than it could hope to understand. Who are we if we don’t make the conventional life milestones we’d sought to define ourselves by? And how do we let go enough to dive fully into a life that might not be going the way we’d planned? Find out here!

Emily Eslami - Holy S**t Sep 14, 2021

Show notes

“People of scant knowledge do not think that buddhas have dignified behavior in the toilet... This is not learning of the Buddha’s truth. Remember, purity and impurity is exemplified by blood dripping from a human being. At one time it is warm, at another time it is disgusting. The buddhas have toilets, and this we should remember.” - Dogen

In an ever topical and timely discussion, Emily reads us Dogen’s (in)famous chapters on the perfect practice of washing and going to the bathroom in a talk on purity and impurity, the clean and the unclean, and the bright bathroom mirror that reflects what we truly are as we wash, brush our teeth, and yes, poop the great poop of enlightenment. Do enlightened beings fart like the rest of us? (You betcha!) How exactly does one bathe in enlightenment? (With ease!) And did Yunmen really say that Buddha was a dried s**t stick? (Again, you betcha). Find out here!

Dave Cuomo - Trust Fall (The Singing of Dragons) Sep 07, 2021

Show notes

“Not knowing what the crap we’re doing is the delight of being human.” - Dave Cuomo

Dave brings us a Zen pep talk for hard times with a reading of Dogen’s Ryugen or, The Moaning of Dragons Through Withered Trees, one of Zen’s most poetic and enthusiastic exhortations for giving up and giving in to a universe that just wants to sing it’s song through you. What is there to rely on in a world of emptiness (everything!) And can we still have faith in ourselves in a practice of non self (what’s stopping you)? Find out here!

Dave Cuomo - DIY(T) (Teachers in Zen) Aug 24, 2021

Show notes

"If anyone says that I was ever enlightened, they're lying. If anyone says that I teach anyone, they're lying." - Gautama Buddha

Dave does his best to shed a little clarity on the classically confusing situation of working with teachers in Zen. What is there to teach when Buddha himself swore there is no dharma and no beings to teach? And given that, how should we Zen students work with our teachers?? And why does Zen suspiciously seem to maintain a rigid hierarchy and organization while telling us constantly that no such thing is necessary and no one should trust it?? Dave brings us answers straight from the mouths of the old masters themselves. But who did they think they were talking to and if we believe them, why would we listen to them?? Find out here.