09/20/2025, Tenmyo Dojima 堂島典明, dharma talk at City Center.
Tenmyo Dojima 堂島典明 shares how her early struggles with depression led her to rediscover Buddhism in the U.S., begin monastic training in Japan, and continue the joy of walking the Buddha Way—together with others, rooted in connection.

A Journey Toward Boundless Connection

09/27/2025, Chikudo Catherine Spaeth, dharma talk at City Center.
Chikudo Catherine Spaeth teaches that zazen shows us what to care for, and leads the way in our request to study the precepts with a teacher. In this caring we become a good friend to our practice.

A Request for Jukai

10/05/2025, Tatsudo Nicole Baden Roshi, dharma talk at Green Gulch Farm.
Tatsudo Nicole Baden explores how Zen practice literally shifts the architecture of our experience — from a narrow, biographical “here” into a living, embodied field of contact.

A New Here: How Practice Opens Different Worlds

10/11/2025, Shosan Victoria Austin, dharma talk at City Center.
Shosan Victoria Austin teaches that we can deepen our understanding of the causes and cures of dispute, and practice with a unifying value of kindness that has the power to transform our conflicts to occasions for mutual curiosity, intimacy, and growth.

The Power of Non-Retaliation

10/12/2025, Eli Brown-Stevenson, dharma talk at Green Gulch Farm.
So-on Eli Brown-Stevenson uses the image of bubbles and the teaching of the Three Marks of Existence to explore how Zen practice helps us meet impermanence, suffering, and no-self in the body, not through ideas, but through presence.

Perception and Practice

10/18/2025, Zenju Earthlyn Manuel Osho, dharma talk at City Center.
Zenju Earthlyn Manuel Osho teaches that when we remain in the mode of discovery we open to new portals to engage and activate in tending to today’s suffering.

Expanding How We See Things

10/19/2025, Jiryu Rutschman-Byler, dharma talk at Green Gulch Farm.
Abbot Jiryu Rutschman-Byler reflects on the “Finding Yourself” chapter of “Becoming Yourself,” in which Suzuki Roshi teaches that finding real freedom is not about overcoming the limitations of our life, but rather embracing them: “To find true joy under some limitation is the way to realize the whole universe."

Freedom in Limitation

10/25/2025, Dainin Marsha Angus, dharma talk at City Center. Dainin Marsha Angus teaches about cultivating and mental and physical capacity to settle into stillness.

Cultivating Stillness in Turbulent Times

11/01/2025, Zenshin Florence Caplow, dharma talk at City Center. Zenshin Florence Caplow offers stories and teachings from her life as both a Zen practitioner and person with chronic illness, and readings from her new book, “Tend to Your Spirit: Mindful Living With Chronic Illness.”

Tend to Your Spirit: Teachings from Illness

11/02/2025, Gyokuden Stephanie Blank, dharma talk at Green Gulch Farm. Gyokuden Steph Blank honors the effort and awakening of our ancestors and calls on us—the living—to rise up in support of Decency, Dignity and Awakening.

Awakening Together is APT

11/11/2017, Frank Ostaseski, dharma talk at City Center.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/SanFranciscoZenCenterPublicLectures/~4/FUodciCaKJc" height="1" width="1" alt=""/>

The Thin Line Between Life and Death

The purpose of San Francisco Zen Center is to make accessible and embody the wisdom and compassion of the Buddha as expressed in the Soto Zen tradition established by Dogen Zenji in 13th-century Japan and conveyed to us by Suzuki Roshi and other Buddhist teachers. Our practice flows from the insight that all beings are Buddha, and that sitting in meditation is itself the realization of Buddha nature, or enlightenment.

The Thin Line Between Life and Death

San Francisco Zen Center

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