Hello and welcome to another episode of the Secular Buddhism Podcast. This is episode

number 106. I am your host Noah Rasheda. Today I'm going to share three more Zen

Coans and talk a little bit about what they mean for me.

Keep in mind you don't need to use what you've learned from Buddhism to be a

Buddhist. You can use this to learn to be a better whatever you already are. I

thought I would be fun to discuss a couple more Zen Coans and specifically what

they mean for me and I want to emphasize that second part what they mean for me.

If you'll recall the whole point of a Zen Coan and the Zen tradition is to be

presented with a story or a question or an idea that essentially knocks you

out of the conceptual thinking. It's meant to pull the rug out from under your

feet and it kind of defeats the whole point if somebody tells you the

coon and then just tells you what what it means because the truth is there is

no meaning to it. There's only the meaning that you give to it and that's your

job to figure out what this means for you. So I want to be cautious about how I

approach these Zen Coans because I am not pretending in any way that I have the

answers to these or that I know what they mean or that I have anything wise to

impart when it comes to these Zen Coans. I just want to share what they have

meant to me and I hope that you keep that in mind with not just the Coans but I

guess everything that I've ever shared on the podcast kind of falls into that

category. It's like this is what this stuff means to me and the invitation is for

you to explore and figure out what this stuff means for you. So keep that in

mind as you listen to these. So the first Zen Coan I want to share is called

...