Dharma Talks

Debra Seido Martin is Zen West's Guiding Teacher. She was transmitted in 2009 by Kyogen Carlson, late Abbott of Dharma Rain Zen Center. Seido is an organic farmer and psychotherapist devoted to the wild and giving space of practice and grace of the land. She carries forward her teacher’s directive to “ordain into your life.”

Dogen's Genjo Koan: Firewood Becomes Ash

In conventional understanding, firewood becomes ash, and the two have a continuous relationship. We have a concept that time moves forward on a journey and thus has spatiality. But Dogen says that each thing—firewood or ash, you or me—is its own full expression in the moment. There is no separation between the time we abstract and imagine, that we control and move through, and our very being. Time is all being, and all being is time. The pine is time and the bamboo is time. W

Oct 15

Koan Summer: Quiyuan Gives Birth

In this tender koan (from the Hidden Lamp) Quiyuan describes her awakening in terms of gestation and giving birth. It whispers quiet questions for everyone: what is meditation like for you? How do we take care of the embryo inside ourselves, and in each other? What is that moment when we feel completely stripped bare? What is that presence, pulsing and alive, that we hold and are held by?

Jul 9