Affirmation of Welcome:

Walking the path of liberation, we express our intimate connection with all beings.

The Austin Zen Center community offers a haven of peace and harmony in which to engage in the arduous task of self-discovery through Zen practice. Welcoming diversity, the practice of zazen is available to people of every race, religion, nationality, class, gender, sexual orientation, age, and physical ability.

May all beings realize their true nature.

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Weekly Schedule:

Weekday Mornings (Mon-Fri)

• 6:00am – Zazen (seated meditation)
  
• 6:35am – Kinhin (walking meditation)
• 6:45am – Zazen
• 7:20am – Service
• 7:35am – Soji (temple cleaning)
• 7:50am – Morning program ends

Weekday Evenings (Mon-Thu)

(Many come to zazen after work; it's OK to enter the zendo whenever you can get here.)

• 5:40pm – Zazen
  
• 6:20pm – Service
• 6:30pm – Evening program ends

(Note: You may depart before service begins.)

Saturday Beginner's Instruction

• 9:15am – Beginners' Program (across street at 702 W. 31st St.)
• 10:20am – Join regular schedule (see below)

Saturday Morning Program

• 8:15am – Zazen
• 8:50am – Kinhin
• 9:00am – Zazen
• 9:40am – Service
• 9:55am – Soji (temple cleaning)
• 10:30am – Dharma Talk
• 11:15am – Announcements, tea and snacks

*Childcare offered on the first Saturday of each month from 9am – 11:30am. Sign up here for 8/7/10.

Affiliated groups meeting at Austin Zen Center

• Dharma Punx: Sundays, 11am–12:30pm
• Meditation and Recovery: Sundays, 6–7:00pm
• Natural Wisdom & Compassion Meditation, with Betty Holmes: Mondays, 6:45–7:45pm
• Yoga, with Sebastian Bentkowski: Thursdays, 4:45–5:30pm (at 702 W. 31st)

Just This

The editorial staff of Just This, the journal of the Austin Zen Center, is pleased to announce its latest issue: Play.

If you become too serious, you will lose your way. (Shunryu Suzuki, Nov. 22, 1969)

A teacher on the West Coast is teased by his friends because in the midst of kensho he laughed so hard he fell off his eating bench onto the floor. And there’s the Buddhist teacher who set a giant pumpkin on his mat for dokusan and hid with his assistant behind a screen, to giggle at the reaction of the students who entered at the bell. Sometimes tears fall in sesshin, true, but sometimes we laugh. It’s easy to become serious about our practice. After all, what could be more important? But laughter punctures self importance and tightly held beliefs. Laughter and playfulness remind us to hold lightly. The writers and artists in our current issue of Just This play with the idea of Play. They tell us play can be humor, laughter, games and imagination, the outlook of the child, delight. In the process, they delight us.

Please visit the blog at http://azcjustthis.blogspot.com and leave comments for others as you see fit.

Just This is partway through a series of issues on the theme of Zen and Creativity, with several articles in each issue. Previous issues (Mountains and Water, Shared Intention, Making Our World: Construction and Craft, Words and Letters, and Movement) can be accessed at the blog site.


We are excited about this new development in our community life and look forward to your contributions in future issues. The next issue of Just This has the theme of Zen Poetics. Please send submissions to AZCJustThis@googlegroups.com

Thanks, Just This staff (Trevor Maloney, Kim Mosley, Sarah Webb, and Pat Yingst)