Event Details
Cost: $155
Dates: Join us over 3 Sundays on: November 1, 8 and 15
Time: 10am–12pm MST
Where: Online
Online Event
Rice in the Bowl - Awakening in ordinary life
A three-week live, online Deep Dive with Henry Shukman
Register
November 1, 8 and 15, 2026
10:00am - 12:00pm MSTOnline event
My miracles are chopping firewood and drawing water from the well.
A live online Deep Dive with Henry
A Deep Dive is an immersive, multi-week experience of live practice and teaching with Henry, built around a specific text or poem. For Rice in the Bowl, we’ll explore the teaching of Layman Pang, an early Zen practitioner who saw that the very fabric of everyday life is the miracle.
Over three weeks, you’ll gather with Henry and a community of fellow practitioners for extended guided meditations, dharma talks, and Q&A. This poem becomes a lens through which to explore your practice, giving you something concrete to return to again and again. It’s your opportunity to move from solo practice to shared practice, and to experience Henry’s guidance in real time.
A note from Henry
The early Zen practitioner Layman Pang once saw a miracle-worker perform the supernatural feat of walking on water. But Layman Pang was unimpressed, saying: “My miracles are chopping firewood and drawing water from the well.” In other words: the very fabric of everyday life is the miracle. Existing is the real miracle.
Often we think of awakening as some far-off distant and sacred place we need to seek. But awakening to our true nature is available right here, right now— in the very stuff of our most ordinary, daily experience.
What to expect
Over three weeks, you'll join Henry for three live two-hour Sunday sessions featuring:
- Extended guided meditations (25-30 minutes) that let you fully settle into present moment experience
- In-depth dharma talks bringing together ancient traditions, modern wisdom, and poetry
- Q&A where your practice questions get answered directly
- WhatsApp community for the Deep Dive group
The beauty of the ordinary
Meditation can help us to see the beauty of our ordinary lives in two ways. Firstly, it can help to uncover the inherent beauty of experience itself. The sunset may be beautiful, but the very fact we are able to see one is more beautiful still.
Secondly, the most ordinary objects in our lives can themselves be triggers for awakening. A cup, a calendar, a sensation of pain – these can all be gateways to a dramatic shift in our perspective of the world.
This course invites you to discover awakening not as a distant goal but as something found in the heart of daily life, where even the most ordinary moments reveal profound beauty. Drawing on Zen stories and wisdom, Henry will show how meditation can help us see both the miracle of simply experiencing life and the extraordinary potential hidden in everyday objects and encounters.
What you’ll learn from Henry
- How to uncover the beauty inherent in the world around you
- Seeing both the miracle of simply experiencing life and the extraordinary potential hidden in everyday objects and encounters
- How ordinary moments can become gateways to dramatic shifts in perspective
- Discovering awakening not as a distant goal but as something found in the heart of daily life
- The practice of finding the sacred in the mundane
Join Rice in the bowl
$155
- 3 live two-hour Sunday sessions with Henry
- All session recordings
- WhatsApp community for the Deep Dive
- Access to practice resources and prompts
Here’s what students have said about Henry’s teaching
From Henry's teachings, I feel like I’ve really learned how to slow down, pause and just allow a relaxation for my mind and my body. And from that, there’s been an experience of opening and just opening to what is.
– Kate Since learning from and practicing with Henry, I found that “allowing life as it is” is the single most effective and beneficial way to meet my fears and challenges. I am and will forever be grateful to Henry and his amazing network of support.
– Valerie Henry has deep knowledge of Buddhist practices and traditions, along with a lot of knowingness about literature, history, life. And his gifts as a teacher, as a poet, as a storyteller, allow him to distill all that knowledge.
– Therese
Henry Shukman
Henry teaches mindfulness and awakening practices to a wide range of students from all traditions and walks of life. Henry is an authenticated Zen master in the Sanbo Zen lineage, and is the Spiritual Director Emeritus of Mountain Cloud Zen Center. Previous to this, Henry had a career as an award-winning author and poet. His struggles and traumatic experiences as a youth, combined with a spontaneous awakening experience at 19, paved the way for Henry to develop a well-rounded approach to spirituality and meditation – one that includes love for self and the world as its foundation.
Questions?
If you have any questions about this event, please contact our team at info@thewayapp.com. We’re happy to assist and look forward to having you join us!
Recordings
Each session will be recorded. If you can’t attend live, or simply want to reference it again, we’ll share the recording the day after the session.
Scholarships
We warmly welcome you to contact us if a scholarship would allow you to attend this retreat.
Please contact our team at info@thewayapp.com for details about how to apply.