Sunday Morning

8:00 am zazen

8:40 am kinhin  

8:50 am zazen

9:30 am service

10:00 am soji

10:30 am potluck

Monday through Friday Mornings

6:00 am zazen
6:40 am service       

6:50 am soji (mindful temple cleaning)

7:05 am end / Friday: Dharma Brew

Wednesday Evening

6:20-7:00 pm zazen instruction for newcomers: Please REGISTER here

7:10 pm zazen

7:40 pm service

7:50 pm dharma talk followed by tea and treat

Notes:

• Zazen is seated meditation
• Kinhin is walking meditation
• Soji is temple cleaning
• Sunday potluck is vegetarian - bring your dish ready to serve and take it to the kitchen when you arrive
• Dharma Brew is coffee and tea, a light breakfast and informal discussion of practice

Zoom Protocol

NOTE: We will be phasing Zoom out for our sangha soon. Zoom is offered for those who are immunocompromized. Come practice with the sangha in person.

Your sitting place should be set aside from other activities and free from distractions.

You will need enough space to either do standing bows or full prostrations during service.

If you have an altar, light it before sitting.

Scroll down to download the chants used in service. Print them out and have them available for service.

Zoom opens 10 minutes before the scheduled zendo activity. Showing up on time supports everyone's practice.

You will hear the han and have the opportunity to get settled before the zazen bell rings.

Keep your mic on mute for zazen and service.

Sit facing the wall or in profile from your device.

You do not need to watch your screen or the clock during zazen. Listen for the sounds of the zendo.

When the bell rings after zazen in the morning, keep your mic muted and chant the Robe Chant with those in the zendo.

After the robe chant turn on your camera (if it was off during zazen) and follow along with service, bowing with the bells and chanting.

Zoom Courtesy

These courtesies are for all of us. They create community. The Ino (zendo leader) is available to answer questions. Email the Ino.

If you have never attended Ashland Zen Center in person please introduce yourself before joining Zoom for the first time (below)

Turn on your video for service and dharma talk

Identify yourself by name in your Zoom square

Mute yourself during zazen and service; unmute to contribute to discussion such as after a dharma talk

Notes on Zoom Practice

We will be phasing Zoom out for our sangha soon. Zoom is offered for those who are immunocompromized. Come practice with the sangha in person.

Here are some ways that even from home, connected through Zoom, we can find encouragement and we can encourage others in the zendo.

Dress for zazen, even on zoom. Whether it is sweatpants or formal sitting robes. Whatever is comfortable and intentional. If you have long hair, wear it up off your neck. Wake up early enough to dress, pull back your hair, and find your seat without hurrying. This is a gift to yourself, not a rule about being on time.

Before sitting zazen and after sitting zazen, bow to your seat and away from your seat. The spirit of bowing is gratitude and greeting. We bow (to seat) in gratitude for the tradition, for the gift of practice, for our teachers. We bow (away from seat) in gratitude to the opportunity of this complete life, honoring the relationships, the responsibilities, the beautiful, the unfinished.

When you first sit down and adjust your posture, and at the end of zazen before you get up, rock your body right and left. The Fukanzazengi teaches: “When you arise from sitting, move slowly and quietly, calmly and deliberately. Do not rise suddenly or abruptly.” These teachings offer us an assist to discovering seamlessness. To discover and flow in more and more seamless practice. Attention to each ingredient is this discovery. Prepare for zazen, practice zazen, conclude zazen. Each ingredient is needed for the flow of zazen to function. This is true of everything. A meal – growing or buying food, washing and prepping food, using the stove or oven, setting the table, saying thank you, grace, the meal chant, eating the food, clearing the table, washing the dishes, putting away ingredients and leftovers, turning off the light. Did the meal begin when we turned on the oven? When we felt a pang of hunger? When we planted the tomato seed? Seamlessness is attention, attention, attention.

For service, stand for bowing and chanting. Turn on your camera. There is no ‘right’ background for your presence. Don’t zoom-stress. There have been cats, dogs, children, bright sunlight, wobbly devices, ceiling-fan shots, electrical outlet closeups… None of it has disturbed the zoom zendo. Do your best, be present and show your presence.

Chant with your ears. Not just listening, but hearing. Chanting is word and breath. It expresses harmony between difference and togetherness. Breath practice in chanting is concentration practice. Taking a full breath and giving it away, all the way to the bottom of the breath. Giving our self away, without holding any back. The only way to take a full new breath is to push the breath all the way out. Chanting shows us what happens when we Give. Breath. Away. In zazen we are taught “think not-thinking. How do we think not-thinking? Non-thinking.” Non-chanting is “chant with your ears.” Harmonizing, generosity. The note we find together is not on a pitch-pipe. Harmonizing is not sharing one note. Harmonizing is authentically discovering and expressing this note, in community. There may be someone with perfect pitch and someone tone deaf standing next to each other in the zendo. Or, on zoom, the sound from the zendo may slow down and speed up, or have a dissonance to it. Authentic, heartfelt chanting sometimes is divine and sometimes is dissonant! Harmonize by joining. A sangha’s chanting sound is completely unique to each sangha. Harmonizing is letting go of ‘right’ sound, ‘right’ note, and just joining the heart-sound. The heart of the sound is transparently us, together. Our authentic sound is full and resonant. Authentic sound is universally possible. Just as anyone can sit, anyone can chant. Uniquely individual, valuable and perfect.

Suzuki Roshi famously said “You’re perfect, just the way you are. And you could use a little work.” It is with that sense of humor that periodically we bring to mind the way we traditionally do things together. In that light spirit we remind the assembly to make an effort to harmonize, and we remind the kokyo to make an effort to start the chant on a note that the assembly can array themselves around without trouble.  

None of this is about right and wrong, better or worse, self-improvement. The encouragement is to find your fearless heart, express it.

The transparent revelation of your heart is the character of Zen.

ZOOM Meeting ID: 541 552 1175

Zoom Passcode 740750

Our Way is to accept everything as it actually is, moment after moment. This dynamic spirit is how we free all beings from suffering and how we find an appropriate response in this world. May your health remain strong and may you feel the complete support of this practice and our sangha.

If you are new to Ashland Zen Center Zoom offer a greeting here:

A good guideline is to be seated at least 5 minutes before the first period is scheduled to begin in the morning. Arriving 10 minutes early allows you to settle without hurry.

At the beginning and end of kinhin, the door will be opened briefly. Some leave at this time to go to work, family, school or other obligations. Kinhin is also a time to use the bathroom.

If you come to Ashland Zen Center and like what you experience, help pay it forward to the next person who comes through the door. There is a wooden donation box on the wall in the entry room, if you feel moved to give.

Welcome.