Cosmopolitan Zen

How to Work with Emotional Koans - Part 2 - Ekai Joel Kreisberg Roshi - WSP26 - May 30th, 2026

Ekai Joel Kreisberg explains that Junpo Roshi’s emotional koans (11–13) were designed to bring Zen practice into everyday life by helping practitioners work skillfully with emotional reactivity. Rather than suppressing or bypassing feelings, he encourages slowing down and fully experiencing emotions through a process of recognition, acceptance, self-compassion, and ownership. By understanding that emotions are neither positive nor negative but valuable sources of information, practitioners can uncover what truly matters to them, take responsibility for their reactions, and respond from awakened awareness rather than habit. The practice transforms emotional triggers into opportunities for insight, compassion, and growth in relationships and daily life.

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

The Background Hum: Why More Insight Doesn't Produce More Freedom - Kenshin Cian Whalley - May 2nd, 2006

Kenshin talks about the “background hum” that is the constant mental effort of maintaining the self, such as planning, judging and creating stories to avoid uncertainty. Most self-work adds more layers to this narrator instead of freeing us. Zen points toward subtraction, not feeding the story, but resting in “I don’t know,” allowing uncertainty without needing control. The practice is not abandoning effort in life but starving the effort that keeps reinforcing the self.

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

Zen Master Bankei and the Unborn - Nanda Nina Lynch - April 18th, 2026

Nanda Nina Lynch gives a talk on Bankei Yōtaku and his realization of the “Unborn” shows that awareness is already complete and effortless. Suffering comes from clinging to thoughts and emotions, practice is simply to trust and abide in this natural, ever-present mind in all moments.

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

Suffer Well: Insights from Buddha's Teachings - Ming Po Larry Matthews - April 4th, 2026

Ming Po gives a talk inspired by Thich Nhat Hanh teachings that true peace comes from accepting yourself, staying present through mindful breathing, and meeting suffering with awareness and kindness, allowing it to transform rather than control you.

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

Seven Bodhisattva Archetypes - Manjushri - Jozen Jonathon Fielder - April 12th, 2025 - SPP25

Faces of Compassion - Week 2 - Our next exploration is of Manjushri as a Bodhisattva archetype.  Manjushri is a bodhisattva embodying supreme wisdom and clear seeing. He is often depicted with a sword (symbolizing the cutting away of ignorance) and a scripture (representing the transmission of wisdom) - Seven Bodhisattvas with a dharma talk by Jozen Jonathon Fielder.

Jozen Jonathon Fielder offers his teachings and his wisdom tireless through several sanghas. Having been ordained as a Hollow Bones Zen priest, he continues to lead a regular practice as part of the Virtual Zendo. As a martial arts teacher and dharma teacher, he is an associate clergy member of Shining Bright Lotus. Recently he has begun to develop his own dharma center Iron Mountain Zendo in the UK. 

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/iron-mountain-zendo

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

This talk introduces Rohatsu—the traditional period honoring the Buddha’s awakening—and places it in the context of winter’s darkness and the symbolic “birth of the light.” Roshi Ekai reflects on the masculine framing often found in Zen history and highlights overlooked feminine perspectives through stories such as the family koan of Layman Pang, his wife, and their daughter Ling Zhao. Their responses illustrate effort, ease, and the middle way, pointing toward a more natural, inclusive wisdom rooted in everyday life and nature. He emphasizes relaxing into practice, recognizing the ever-present Dharma, and acknowledging the cyclical nature of birth and death, weaving in personal reflections on loss during this season.

 

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

FPP25 - The Dignity and Disaster of My Ego - Emyo Darlene Tataryn

Fall Practice Period - October 25th, 2025

Emyo gives a Dharma talk entitled, The Dignity and Disaster of My Ego. Based on Keith Martin-Smith's book, When the Buddha Needs Therapy, for our Fall Practice Period.

Emyo talks about how the ego is a conditioned process, not a permanent self. It organizes experience and helps us function, but suffering arises when we mistake its stories for reality. Zen does not destroy the ego—it trains it. Through awareness, we learn to let the ego serve practical life while resting in the open, boundless nature of awakening.  

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/fallpractice25

 

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/ 

Letting It Out: Extending the Love that We Receive - Nanda Nina Lynch - January 31st, 2026 - WPP26

This talk by Nanda Nina Lynch explores the Buddhist teaching that true happiness comes not from self-centered striving, but from love and compassion for others. Drawing on Shantideva, Makransky, and bodhisattva teachings, it explains that our true nature (Buddha nature) is inherently loving, open, and connected to all beings. When we act with kindness, we awaken well-being in ourselves and others; when we act from anger or self-interest, we perpetuate suffering (karma and samsara). Difficult interactions don’t “put” emotions into us but trigger what’s already inside, offering opportunities for awareness and growth. In dark times, even small acts of care matter. The session concludes with a guided meditation cultivating gratitude, self-inclusion, and boundless compassion, letting love radiate outward like sunlight to all beings.

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action. https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

Compassion as a Liberating Power: Bring Difficulties into Compassion - Jozen Jonathon Fielder - February 7th, 2026 - WPP26

This talk marks the final week of a winter practice series based on Awakening Through Love and focuses on compassion as a liberating power. After briefly recapping earlier weeks—love as our true nature, letting be, and extending love to others, Jozen explores Mahayana and Zen teachings that emphasize non-dual compassion, compassion that makes no distinction between good and bad, self and other. Drawing on Dzogchen teachings, Zen koans, and the Dalai Lama, the talk explains that **wisdom (emptiness) and compassion must arise together, as both reveal the shared causes of suffering and the shared potential for freedom. The session culminates in a guided loving-kindness (metta) meditation, progressively extending compassion from oneself to loved ones, neutral people, difficult people, and ultimately all beings, affirming the insight that self and reality are not separate.

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/

In this talk, originally made for Hollow Bones Zen, Ekai explains that Mondo Zen is not just a facilitation process but an ongoing path that blends genuine insight with emotional maturity, rooted in zazen, koan practice, and community support. The first set of koans deepens direct realization of clear, compassionate awareness, while the emotional koans help practitioners work skillfully with triggers by feeling what lies beneath reactions and choosing compassionate responses. Practicing with teachers and sangha keeps this inquiry alive in daily life, allowing insight and emotional wisdom to grow together and be expressed in the world.

Our mission is to foster a diverse, inclusive community, dedicated to awakening through Buddhist teachings promoting personal and interpersonal healing with ethical compassionate action.

https://www.shiningbrightlotus.org/