Each Breath Gives Life
Combine this with our koan for the 2025 spring practice period, and you’ve set yourself up with some lovely contemplation in the coming months.
Zen and the Big Questions
One of the things I love most about our tradition is that it’s the only religion whose central and uncompromising dogma is to accept nothing as dogma.
L.A. Fires: A Letter from Angelino Sangha Members
We share this not just to ask people to give, but for any expanded conversations about ongoing histories of race and place that complicate narratives on mainstream media.
Come Close, Do Nothing
This teaching is asking us to come close to all experiences – pleasant, unpleasant, neutral – and see what happens next when we don’t turn away.
Becoming a Zen Practitioner
I realized that Zen was not just something I wanted to do once in a while, but that it was something I wanted to be. It was not about my activities alone, but about my life.
All About Our BIPOC Sangha
Sangha members have repeatedly expressed value for this group as a uniquely safe spiritual and personal space in their lives.
Celebrating our Black Dharma Brothers and Sisters
Learn more about some of our BIPOC members and the work our community is doing to celebrate Black Zen.
Hello From Your New ED!
Welcoming Renkyo Heather Fehst as the new Executive Director of Clouds in Water.
Friday Night Zen: All About Boundaries
How do we lean into our “yes” without abandoning our “no”?
Friday Night Zen: Healing Through Mindfulness
There is nowhere to get to that is more important than the present moment.
Meditation is not Pacifism: The Role of Mindfulness in Social Activism
How can we use mindfulness, as either members of an oppressed community or allies, to actively stand up against systems of oppression?
Coming Home to the Heart: Reflections on Retreat at Hokyoji
This place has been kept alive by the selfless service of steady practitioners. I hope to keep coming home to the heart of Hokyoji again and again so that I may feel the slight awakening of my own heart.
Here, Queer, and Zen
I’ve come to know Zen as intimacy. Going deep to really see, understand, feel, listen – and to do that in relationship with myself and sangha.