Pandemic Zen
Paul Gerstein
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About This Podcast
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Recent Episodes
Losing Your Body and Your Life
Paul takes us on a deep dive into the 22nd koan in the Hekigan Roku: "Seppo's Turtle-Nosed Snake". Dealing with living, dying and Reality, this abstruse yet powerful koan can be penetrated by a close…
Where the Rubber Meets the Road
How can Zen practice precisely meet the moment when things go "wrong"? We place the election of Trump in a larger context with the help of a shocking koan from the Mumonkan collection.
The Substance of 'Me'
Lecture (teisho) to a Zen retreat by Paul Gerstein on 10/27/2024 in which he presents the 7th koan from the Hekigan Roku (Blue Cliff Record): "You Are Eh-Cho!" To help elucidate this terse and…
Stuck in a Moment
Zen talk given to a morning Zen retreat (Zazenkai) on August 11, 2024. We start with a poem titled, "My Catastrophe", highlighting the doneness of each present moment and the freedom to shine one's…
At the End of Time
Talk to Zen retreat group on how to approach the "end" of everything. We discuss koan #29 from the Hekigan Roku: "It will be gone with the other."
An Invisible Shield
This is a Zen lecture (teisho) to a virtual retreat group. We start with a TV commercial from the 1950s and progress to the strange "preliminary koan" called, The Duck in the Bottle.
Zen lecture: ”Lotus Leaves”
In this episode, Paul gives a teisho (Zen lecture) on a koan from The Blue Cliff Record (a Tang and Sung dynasty collection of 100 teaching stories). Recorded by: Paul Gerstein, MD Intro music:…
S1E7 Hopeless and Fearless
In this episode, we discuss the rapidly worsening pandemic in the U.S. and the troubling opposition by many to proven mitigation efforts. We examine the famous statement by Milarepa, an 11th century…
S1E6 Observation vs Belief
In this episode, Paul starts with a brief bio of his training in both medicine and Zen followed by a deep dive into facts and fictions regarding COVID-19. The contrast between blind beliefs and…
S1E5 Something's Happening Here
The release of a cellphone video of the killing of an African American jogger, followed by one of a Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd, leads to a world-wide explosion of outrage over racism…
S1E4 Freeze Frame
Paul discusses the ongoing pandemic and its effects on our psyches and everyday lives. Taking an even deeper dive into the “Stopping…” koan, Paul associates insights from quantum physics’ theories of…
S1E3 Jumping on the Horse Thief’s Horse
Podcast channel is given the name, “Pandemic Zen” and the general theme of using mindfulness to deal with real-life adversity. Paul explains the Zen phrase, “Jumping on the back of the horse thief’s…
S1E2 That I Am
Going further into “Stopping” and the reliance on intellectual meaning vs. the “meaning” of the sheer experience of sensory actuality. Paul discusses the insight of “What it means is that it is (and…
S1E1 Pandemic Zen
In this first episode, Paul discusses the implications of the global COVID-19 pandemic and how attending to one’s sensations can be a doorway to a fresh relationship with the challenges of everyday…
Frequently Asked Questions
Pandemic Zen has published 14 episodes since June 2020, covering topics in Buddhism, Health & Fitness.
Pandemic Zen is currently highly active with new episodes semi-annually. Average episode length is 30m.
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