Image by John Harder
A note from Sarah Bender:
Dear Springs Mountain Sangha and friends,
I’m feeling great gratitude for the many offerings of sangha members that are sustaining the vitality of our sangha in this particular time and place. Conversations on Mondays at 5:00 and after evening meditation, after meditation early on Wednesday and Saturday mornings, during Ecodharma meetings, precepts studies and our new study group on The Inner Work of Racial Justice: these all keep our connections real and deep. Even while the temple in which we meet is held up by tables, footstools and pillows, it mysteriously is a real Dharma Hall, in which we continue to deepen our experience of what is real, the great matter of our life and death. Those who don’t join in via Zoom are also reading and contributing thoughts by email, and so continue to connect. This is real and powerful! Thank you.
Individual teacher-student conversations also continue: via Zoom or phone, and on the terrace at Creek Bend. Occasional pauses are provided by training planes from the Air Force Academy, and interpermeation is visible and audible in the form of a pair of wrens nesting under the roof overhead, the hummingbirds visiting the Penstemon and Catmint next to us, the loud Magpies and an occasional hawk way above, stone and moss underfoot.
A suggestion: It can be enormously helpful to sit once or twice a week with a friend, outdoors and at a distance, in companionable silence (in other words, in meditation). Talking together and walking together are wonderful, too— but please do not forget that in the silence of your meditation, you can enter deeply this one life of yours. No particular method is required. Just sit down as host and see what happens. Sitting alone and sitting with a friend, heart opens and we are refreshed. This is not a task to be done, but a time that is just for you; and through you, it touches all that you touch.
Practice helps you remember that at any moment, the river under the river of your life is not far. You can even just dip a toe in and feel it; or you can lie back on the vastness and let it hold you for a bit.
May you know that you are loved, and may you be well.
Sarah
For our ongoing schedule please see our website at smszen.org
We have gone to a single Zoom link for the whole month.
The new August zoom link will be sent by email in the next few days.
Zoom schedule has been designed to leave time for open conversation via Zoom after each of our scheduled meditations
July
Tuesday, July 28: 6:30 PM SMS Action! Summit, Jeff Wagner
August
Saturdays, 4 PM: August 1, 15, 29 Book Study, The Inner Work of Racial Justice, Geri Johnson
Monday, August 3: Sutra Service
Thursdays, 6:30 PM: August 6, 13, 20, 27 Precepts Practice Group,
with Sarah Bender, Roshi
Please note: no Saturday afternoon koans in August
Monday, August 10: Community Night
Monday, August 17: Dharma Talk, Sarah Bender, Roshi
Tuesday, August 18: 6:30 PM Ecodharma group, Debbie Stavish
Monday, August 24: Dharma Talk, Andrew Palmer, Sensei
Friday, August 28: 7 PM Evening Meditation Walk
Saturday, August 29: Online One-Day Retreat
Monday, August 31: Wayfaring Mind Talk
Upcoming Events
SMS Action! Summit
Tuesday, July 28, 6:30-8:30 PM
Contact Jeff Wagner jjusafa23@gmail.com
Reminder of our SMS summit on activism within our Zen community: what would you like to see SMS Action! offer to our community and what would you like to offer in our commitment to not do harm, do good, and do good for others! Welcoming all SMS members and fellow wayfarers to a supportive space to welcome ideas of all kinds in guiding our community towards peace.
Summer Book Study
Saturdays Aug 1, 15, 29 4-6 PM
Contact Geri Johnson gejohnson411@gmail.com
A book study group is forming to read The Inner Work of Racial Justice: Healing Ourselves and Transforming Our Communities Through Mindfulness by Rhonda V. Magee. We will discuss Magee’s concept of ColorInsight which brings in mindfulness and compassion practices while considering our own Race Story and the experiences of others.
Guanyin in the Pavilion under the August Moon
All Five Sundays in August 11:30 AM
with Allison Atwill Roshi, Tess Beasley,
Sarah Bender Roshi & Michelle Riddle Sensei
As two arms of the Pacific Zen School, Pacific Zen Institute and Open Source are joining together to offer a 5-part series featuring four women teachers. We seek to gather and reflect on the nature of compassion as it lives in life and in nature itself—as fire, water, wind, earth, and space.
The schedule of teachers is:
August 2 – All
August 9 – Michelle Riddle Sensei
August 16 – Tess Beasley
August 23 – Sarah Bender Roshi
August 30 – Allison Atwill Roshi
Registration: https://www.flipcause.com/secure/event_step2/ODk1NDc=/82928#!
Next, choose Register FREE or Register Donate, and click ‘Add to Cart’. Once in your Cart, you may add Donation or Dana. Then, check out with your total. When complete, you’ll receive a link for Zoom access in your ‘Thank You’ message and receipt email. Return to register each Sunday as links change every week. For registration questions, please contact corey@pacificzen.org.
Ecodharma Group
Tuesday, Aug 18, 6:30-8:30 PM
Contact Debbie Stavish gardenmail@msn.com
In 2018, at the age of thirteen, Autumn addressed world leaders at the UN General Assembly on the issue of water protection. In April, 2019 she was named the chief water commissioner by the Anishinabek Nation. Peltier is best known as an internationally recognized advocate for clean water and has been called a “water warrior.”
Who is SMS Ecodharma?
- We join together to bear witness and take action in this great turning in time. We are guided by The Three Pure Vows: we vow not to do harm, to do good, and to do good for others. We find that racial & earth justice are interwoven. Liberation, individual & group action, listening, and shared inquiry all help us to skillfully take action for sustainability. We walk our heart-urged path with the question, “How is my work helping my liberation and how is my liberation helping to free all beings?” There is nothing to prove. We trust our companioning. As in the tortoise and the hare fable slow, and fast both win.
At our last meeting Sarah brought in this quote from Master Wolun Qiu, quoted in commentary for Case 81, Book of Serenity (Cleary, p. 348)
If you want to get the bare essence, it is the mountains, rivers, and earth that discover it for you; the thing is eternal and can comprehend the ultimate.
If you enter by way of Manjusri’s (incisive wisdom) door, all conditioned things——earth, wood, tile, stone—help you awaken your potential. If you enter by Avalokitesvara’s (Guanyin’s compassion) door, all sounds and echoes, even clams and spiders, help you discover your potential. If you enter by Samantabhadra’s (shining action) door, you arrive without moving a step.
I use these three doors to provisionally direct you, like using a broken stick to stir the ocean, making the fish and dragons there know that water is their life.
Sarah invited us to spend some time with these questions:
1. How do you understand entering the teachings of Earth by way of the door of incisive wisdom?
2. How do you discover your potential to embody the teachings of Earth by entering through Guanyin’s compassion door?
3. How do you arrive without moving a step through Samantabhadra’s Shining Action door?
4. How do you ACT when you “know that water is your life”?
All are welcome at our Zoom August meeting
Online One-Day Retreat
Save the date!
Evening Meditation Walk, Friday Aug 28, 7 PM
One-Day Retreat, Saturday Aug 29
More details in future emails.
Contact Kelly McFarland S.Kelly.HLS@gmail.com
Work in the Room
Work in the Room by telephone or Zoom can be arranged with Andrew Palmer, Sensei at alpalmer128@gmail.com or with Sarah Bender, Roshi at sembender@gmail.com. Work in the Room is a close encounter of the sacred/ordinary kind—an encounter among you, a teacher, and the great matter that is most deeply real for you right now—and what clearly matters because it shows up in a conversation about the Way, whether, on the face of it, it seems sacred or ordinary. No special undertaking is required.
Recordings of Talks
Did you know that you can listen to previously recorded talks online? Sarah Bender, Roshi’s talks are available here. This link also includes talks she has given through Pacific Zen Institute. Andrew Palmer, Sensei’s talks are available here.
Newsletter Additions?
Do you have artwork, a poem or a volunteer story to share in our newsletter? If so, please send them to Kelly McFarland at s.Kelly.HLS@gmail.com
Many Arms of Guanyin
Wellness Committee
Our sangha’s wellness committee is headed by Linda Hodges, who updates the committee regularly on needs of particular members so that we can reach out to each other when needed!
If you could use a boost of any sort, or if you’d like to be available to respond when the need arises, please contact Linda at hikerhodges@gmail.com.
Mental Health Page on SMS Website
Written by Mary Montoya
Working as a volunteer for five years for NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Colorado Springs chapter, I saw many times, the first hurdles of mental illness are stigma (self or other imposed), lack of awareness of resources and information, knowing you are not alone, and do not have to do this alone.
Community members and those in positions of leadership, community groups, or helping professions, can best help those with mental health issues by educating themselves about where to direct people for help, and by learning more themselves.
I compiled a list of resources for emergency or crisis situations along with some non-emergency resources. I got much of the information off of NAMI Colorado Springs website. It is under the resources tab on our website, or click here: https://www.smszen.org/colorado-springs-mental-health-resources/
More about NAMI:
NAMI is the United States’ largest grassroots organization dedicated to improving the lives of people with mental illness. Local and state chapters have access to nationally developed and vetted programs and educational materials. NAMI is a volunteer based organization whose programs and support groups are peer-led and always free to the community.
NAMI Colorado Springs offers classes and presentations to audiences as diverse as faith leaders, high school students and law enforcement officers. Each is designed to fight stigma and to educate others on the “lived experience” of mental illness.
Prison Support
Liz Cramer continues to send materials to women in the jail, to support them in their meditation practice even though she can’t go in person. Despite not having a volunteer present weekly for meditation, women inmates continue to sign up and get on a waiting list. There are some who dedicate themselves to a meditation practice while waiting sentencing during their time in El Paso County Prison.
Volunteer with SMS
Are you interested in volunteering to help with a specific project within the sangha? Do you have a particular skill or enthusiasm for something that might be helpful? Would you like to help out, but not sure how? SMS truly values and depends on the many efforts given freely by the sangha to the sanga. This is dana and is so much appreciated. If you have questions or want to help, please contact Kelly McFarland S.Kelly.HLS@gmail.com
About Dana
During these times when we cannot meet in person, you can donate to Springs Mountain Sangha through our PayPal account. You can get to the SMS PayPal link on the SMS web site at: https://www.smszen.org/supportsms/
We depend on the generosity of our members to support the work of our sangha.
If you want to make a donation to Sarah Bender specifically, for example, dana for classes, group meetings or work on the phone (suggested donations for these are $10 per class, or $20 for a 20 min. individual meeting) you can do this by sending a check directly to her.
Sarah Bender
7528 Jenkin Place
Colorado Springs, CO 80919
Support for Cloud Dragon
An easy way to support Cloud Dragon, the Joan Sutherland Dharma WorksAmazon shoppers, sign in at smile.amazon.com and choose Cloud Dragon Dharma Works as the charity you would like 0.5% of your purchases to go to. It costs you nothing extra. We’re grateful for your generosity.
See also Joan Sutherland’s Patreon site,
https://www.patreon.com/posts/do-you-trust-yr-31567633
This is another good way to support Joan’s work and receive fresh teachings from her.