Angel City Zen Center - Beginners Only Podcast

Emily Eslami - Love Potion ((#)9th Precept - No Giving Way to Anger)

"When you get mad at yourself, that means you’re mad at another self. Maybe you turn your face and see yourself. Or you see yourself as other. This is very hard...
If you become angry, you don’t stop being Buddha. Anger appears, that’s all." - Kobun Chino

In the latest installment of her ever timely precept series, Emily takes on that molten hot lava of an emotion, anger. What do we experience when we feel it? How can we feel it and not be consumed by it? How can we use it skillfully when we need to? In this inspiring talk she shows how what exists at the bottom of anger is pain. And how sitting with it is to experience the path of the Boddhisatva – and of Zen meditation itself. 

Dave Cuomo - Fringe Benefit

"If you want to make peace with yourself and not hate zazen, it's going to help to like yourself, or at least just accept yourself the way you are. I promise, you're great and you're worth it. And it'll help.

And fringe benefit, you might find yourself a little happier and nicer, your whole life might improve in every way you ever wanted it to. But that's not why we're here, that's not the point of zazen.” - Dave Cuomo

In a wide ranging talk full of surprises and conundrums, Dave delves into Dogen’s Fukanzazengi (Instructions for Zazen) and the older Chinese text that preceded it to answer the question of whether Zen is something that can be taught, or whether it’s something we can only experience. And bonus! In the latter half Dave treats us to his own "What Am I Doing Here" talk as he shares his experience of how he came to Zen and why he's so stuck on it, along with a sincere inquiry into whether it's a practice we can learn or something that has to come and find us when it's ready.

Emily Eslami - My Missing Piece (8th Precept - No Coveting)

"When you go to the mountain, and see a flower blooming, pick it, break it, and make it yours - this is attachment. If you let it be there for everything and everyone - this is 'no attachment.'

Even your self does not belong to you. You are everything." - Kobun Chino

In the latest installment of Emily’s ever timely precept series, she takes on the eighth precept, "no coveting," ie craving – what it looks like, why we do it, whether we can stop ourselves, and how it turns out that coveting and stinginess are two sides of the same coin after all. What exactly are clinging to when we grasp after those desires, states, and people? And (maybe more concerning) if there is no self, what is there even to cling in the first place?  

Dave Cuomo - A Functional Fantasy Land

"To love the mountains is not to know about mountains, but to climb mountains and to live and die continuously with them.

The best way to realize the true beauty of Mount Fuji is to actually go climb it. If you do that, the beauty of Mount Fuji as you have known it will disappear. But this does not mean that the true beauty of Mount Fuji has disappeared. The beauty of Mount Fuji is eternal and unchanging. 

When we live with Mount Fuji and breathe with Mount Fuji, we can experience the deep taste of being at one with Mount Fuji. We are already beyond the realm of 'trying to understand.'” - Dainin Katagiri

Dave celebrates the return of in person discussions with reading and commentary on a beautiful piece from Dainin Katagiri on Dogen's "Instructions to the Cook," where Katagiri gives us his unvarnished impressions on his adopted American homeland and why our nation of problems and possibility is such fertile ground for practice. 

Dave Cuomo - Karma Happens

"Sometimes I walk by a pile of poo and think "What jerk did that? I hate that guy. This is why we can't have nice things." And then I go around telling everyone about this jerk, and we all get upset and probably sound like a bunch of jerks.

And sometimes I walk by and think, "Huh, look at that poo." Maybe I have to scrape some poo off my shoe, and then I walk on, smelling it for a minute, and then smelling flowers on the next block. I'm guessing things go better for everyone when that happens, but I wouldn't really know because I'm not dwelling on it." - Dave Cuomo

 In a podcast exclusive, Dave takes a deep dive into the steaming pile of confusion that is karma. Is the universe a fair place? Is there such a thing as cosmic justice?? And if not should we even bother trying to be good people??? And if someone does poop in the road and no one is there to smell it, what will those flies even greet on their return??? Find out here!

Emily Eslami - The Fundamental Human Disaster (7th precept - No Praising Self or Berating Others)

"There's a saying, do you want to be right or do you want to be married? I would extend that to, do you want to be right or do you want to be human? Do you want to be right or do you want to be in a relationship with anyone at all?" - Emily Eslami

In her ever timely precept series, Emily takes on number seven, no praise or blame! Aka, our consistent habit of comparing to others. Who are we trying to build up when we put down? What are we comparing against? And is it possible to have confidence without falling into pride? A great talk for anyone with superiority or inferiority complexes and everywhere in between (which is to say, pretty much all of us).

Dave Cuomo - An Unknowable Hope (Inmo)

"If everything you know isn't working, what do you have left? What you don't know. When you stop and allow space for what you don't know to happen, something else can happen." - Dave Cuomo

Dave delves into Dogen's famous "It" (Inmo) to see if it can offer us a way to pick ourselves up when the world knocks us down. But what is "it??" Some say the universe, some say enlightenment, some say God, while Dogen just says (helpfully as always) that "it" is a "what."  Let's find out what that is...

Emily Eslami - Stuck in the Mud With You (6th Precept - No Speaking of Past Mistakes)

“…other people’s mistakes, the mistakes you can’t stop talking about, your mistakes, the mistakes you think are worse than everyone else’s, look around you, we’re all in the mud making those same mistakes. But at least we’re not alone. At least we’re all stuck in the mud together.” - Emily Eslami

Emily takes us on a journey through everyone's least favorite precept (/favorite precept to break) - no speaking of past mistakes! You make mistakes, we all make mistakes, so why does Buddhism not want us to talk about them and is there a danger in not doing so? What's really at stake, and if it's so wrong, why does it feel so good to dish a little gossip now and then?? And wait a minute, what does it even mean to make a "mistake" and who really ends up taking the blame when we point the finger??? Let's find out...

Dave Cuomo - Bursting Buckets of Buddha!

“With this and that I tried to keep the bucket together
Then the bottom fell out.
Where water does not collect,
The moon does not dwell”
- Mugai Nyodai

In an ever timely topic, Dave brings us a Zen look at patience. What is patience and is that what we're actually learning here? Where are do we find ourselves when whatever we're so urgently waiting for never arrives in the moment we're in?

Emily Eslami - Cloudy Days in the Great Brightness (5th Precept - No Intoxicants)

“It’s the emptiness we’re afraid of. Our life is not made up of magic, it’s made up of these empty moments, full moments, thats all we have; the pain we’re experiencing, the boredom, the fleeting happiness, that’s the moment.

But we owe it to this great brightness not to run away, to see these moments as they really are. Because if nothing is special that means everything is special.” - Emily Eslami

In her ever timely precept series, Emily takes a deep dive into refraining from intoxicants, from a nice glass of wine over pasta, to blowing your mind over a pile of mushrooms, who do we harm when we try to escape, how much is too much, how strictly do these rules want to be taken exactly, and what even is this bright mind we're so afraid of clouding?? Find out here...