covid

Nothing like a return from eight days in the hospital—an episode of great pain to make spring even more welcome. John tells his story of being hospitalized, and the legend of the painter of a yellow crane who disappears on the back of his creation. There is nothing to do or dread in pain. The heart opens: there are no barriers in evolving consciousness. Complete Sunday Zen session from April 12, 2023.

PZI Zen Online: Excerpt from The Journey Into Awakening. A story especially for this Covid lockdown Thanksgiving. A woman gets a task that seems impossible and which she must practice without fail for a year. As recorded Nov. 22, 2020. 17 minutes.

Solstice and the big wheels turn. Juneteenth celebrations & demonstrations are encouraging. Navigating and feeling the covid bardos of long confinement. Has nothing happened? Maybe all sorts of things are happening? “We can’t stay here long.” What is a border? Old injustices are looming. Readings from Slave Narratives, poetry of Li Bai, Alberto Rios, Czeslaw Milosz. Sunday Zen session recorded June 21, 2020.

PZI Zen Online: We are in the midst of great civil unrest around racism and the institutions that support it. Li Bai, Du Fu, Dalung & Primo Levi speak about what remains, what lives, what holds us in the universe—even as we feel most perishable, sad, defeated. The light is still there in all things even without a foundation to stand on. As recorded June 14 2020.

PZI Zen Online: The moment you are doing nothing the universe is doing you! What is your response? Responses, readings from Atlanta Mayor Bottoms, Yunmen, William Stafford, Joan Sutherland. Koans for troubled times. Each moment is new. Where is the source of your response? No guarantees, anything can happen. As recorded June 5, 2020.

PZI Zen Online- Dongshan’s 4th Rank-‘Two crossed swords..’a timely image for unrest, protests, the dance of the vast and undifferentiated natural order of the universe is always calling us even in distress. Everything is expressing itself, demonstrators are streams moving in flow to a river. Not a thing out of place. As recorded June 8, 2020.

PZI Zen Online – It’s all a dream – how memory morphs and we are inherently unreliable narrators of our own lives. Conviction dissolves. Nothing to rely on. Partial recording of session June 3 2020.

PZI Zen Online: Zen has no insiders, no outsiders. The true person has no rank, no color, no designations. John reads from Garrett Cadogan’s essay, “Walking While Black.” Koans and vows as expressions of reality. The bodhisattva path. The space and light of the universe is already in everything and everyone, beyond categories. As recorded June 7th, 2020.

Audio: PZI Zen Online – Jon begins with Dongshan’s 3rd Rank and ends with Zhouzhou’s ‘Welcome!’ Beauty in the odd experience of lockdown, economic hardship and all of it. Koans reinforce our innate knowledge before our parent were born. Celebrations of the awakened mind. As recorded – music Jordan McConnell. june 1 2020.

PZI Zen Online -‘From the very beginning, nothing has been withheld.’ See Audio: Stinginess & the Storehouse of Treasures. The covid prompted hoarding, the contagion of ‘not enough’, but there are subtle ways our responses change and generosity appears. Without withholding, we allow even ‘disaster’ to unfold in a project as the universe in flow & at play. As recorded. (Tess begins with reading from Marie L. Von Franz -see text file)May 26, 2020.

PZI Zen Online: A woman’s story of awakening, and meeting with the mysterious prediction of teacher Heavenly Dragon. The absurdity of life’s journey. A meeting with a strange woman and her interrupting request, “Say a word of Zen!” How do you allow something different to arise? This—one finger! As recorded May 24, 2020.

We are in a time ‘before moonlight’ with Covid and the resulting massive unemployment, with great unknowns ahead. Dreams in Zen are not so different from waking life. We make up stories about what will happen. But we are passing through a gate of meeting and not recognizing. How do you make your way? Step by step. As recorded May 25, 2020.

Audio PZI Zen Online – David Parks with the 3rd of his zoom sessions on The Bird Path. Returns to the question: Where are you coming from? What we come out of in this time. Where we change our focus. As recorded May 14 2020.