Bright Way Zen

Rev. Domyo Burk

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BUDDHISM

Bright Way Zen is a Zen community based in Portland Oregon, USA, and accessible worldwide via our "Cloud Zendo" (Zoom). This podcast includes talks and classes by our teacher, Rev. Domyo Burk, of the Zen Studies Podcast, as well as by Sangha members and visiting teachers. If you like the podcast, considering joining Bright Way Zen yourself! brightwayzen.org

4D AGO

Reimagining Zen Towards an Ethics of Interbeing - Week 3/10

Buddhist practice is wonderfully liberating because it empowers you to let go of your suffering regardless of your circumstances. However, we can also get stuck in the fallacy that conditions don't matter, thereby making it seem like helping beings (including ourselves) experience things like safety, health, freedom, justice, prosperity, and love are outside of the realm of Buddhist concern. Are we only interested in "spiritual" well-being, as if that can be separated entirely from conditions? Or do we work for the happiness of beings without worrying about distinctions like "material" or "spiritual?" You might also see this is a tension between "internal" and "external" practice. How do we balance internal work with working to make conditions more supportive and life-affirming for ourselves and others?

58 min
6D AGO

Returning to the Practice - Sangha member talk with Mick Stukes (1/18/2026)

Mick shares his challenges to keeping a committed and confident practice at home, and reads from the Shobogenzo Zuimonki. Are we "vessels of the Dharma" even in our perceived inadequacies or difficulties? Is the big "E" attainable even if we feel too small for it? Dōgen's radical idea is that practice and enlightenment are not separate. It's when we return to this place, here and now, and simply do our practice that we can find that thing that we're looking for.

54 min
JAN 14

Reimagining Zen Towards an Ethics of Interbeing - Week 2/10

The Buddha famously said, "Hatred does not cease by hatred at any time: hatred ceases by love, this is an old rule." How do we really manifest this, even when standing in opposition to what we think is wrong? Can we see through our own sense of self-righteousness? Jonathan Haidt writes in The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion: "This book explained why people are divided by politics and religion. The answer is not, as Manichaeans would have it, because some people are good and others are evil. Instead, the explanation is that our minds were designed for groupish righteousness. We are deeply intuitive creatures whose gut feelings drive our strategic reasoning. This makes it difficult—but not impossible—to connect with those who live in other matrices, which are often built on different configurations of the available moral foundations."

59 min
JAN 12

Zazen as the Ultimate Self-Care - Domyo (1/11/2026)

Self-care can be defined as regenerative activity, free from a sense of entitlement, that supports healthy functioning. In this context, does Zazen qualify as "self-care"? What can Zazen do for us, and what is its true purpose?

52 min
JAN 11

How Buddhist is Zen? - Domyo (1/4/2026)

David Hinton makes the following argument in his book "China Root: On Taoism, Ch'an, and Original Zen" - that when Buddhism arrived in China from India, it was fundamentally reinterpreted and reshaped by Taoist thought, and then the resulting amalgam of Ch'an, or Zen, is so transformed by Taoism that it is scarcely recognizable as Buddhism at all. Our guiding teacher explores this idea in the context of how original Buddhist teachings combined with Mahayana features such as inherent Buddha nature, interdependence, thusness, "sudden" realization, and radical nondualism to manifest as the Ch'an or Zen that we recognize. A lively discussion follows.

54 min
JAN 7

Reimagining Zen Towards an Ethics of Interbeing - Week 1/10

Join us for a ten-week journey as we ask ourselves how to manifest our Zen ethics and precepts beyond the personal realm. Traditionally, Buddhism and Zen have focused on individual practice aimed at relief of individual suffering. However, there are many teachings that point us beyond our small selves toward our relationships: We should care for all beings without distinction, practice generosity without limit, actively work for the welfare of others, and accord with the truth of Interbeing – that we aren't fundamentally separate from anything. In the first week of this 10 week discussion series, Rev. Domyo Burk leads the Sangha through a discussion of excerpts from David Loy's A New Buddhist Path: Enlightenment, Evolution, and Ethics in the Modern World.

55 min
12/15/2025

Domyo's Ten Fields of Zen - Field 5 - The Precepts

In this episode Rev. Domyo Burk discusses with the sangha the fifth field in the teaching of her Ten Fields of Zen, The Precepts. Domyo speaks about the The Precepts as our moral guidlines in Zen and how they play a large role in our practice.

44 min
12/14/2025

The Importance of Sesshin in Zen Practice

As Rohatsu Sesshin begins for many Zen Buddhists all over the world, Rev. Domyo Burk discusses Sesshin (a silent multi-day residential retreat), addressing the challenges, and describing why it is important and central to Zen practice

58 min

Bright Way Zen is a Zen community based in Portland Oregon, USA, and accessible worldwide via our "Cloud Zendo" (Zoom). This podcast includes talks and classes by our teacher, Rev. Domyo Burk, of the Zen Studies Podcast, as well as by Sangha members and visiting teachers. If you like the podcast, considering joining Bright Way Zen yourself! brightwayzen.org

Creator

Rev. Domyo Burk
Years Active

2025 - 2026
Episodes

14
Rating

Clean
Copyright

© 2025
Show Website

Bright Way Zen