Earning a Living
“Earning a living and doing productive work are originally nothing other than free giving,” Dogen Zenji says in an essay called Four Elements of a Bodhisattva’s Social Relations. This essay can be found on-line in book three of the Nishijima/Cross translation of Shobogenzo, or in volume one of the Kazuaki Tanahashi et al translation. Hubert Nearman’s […]
Of Walls and Squirrels
I got this email today: In the light of recent events with the economy, political strong-arming with the President wanting to build a wall & a risk of recession on the rise & no way away from it: How do we really stay centered? How can we just shut down that reaction, & not run and […]
Just Don’t Do It
A guy wrote to me recently saying that he couldn’t understand what to do in Shikantaza. Shikantaza, for those who don’t know the term, is the type of zazen I teach. The word literally means “just sitting.” But the just in “just sitting” is an emphatic just. It’s not like the just in “just sitting […]
Buddhists on the Funny Farm
A bunch of people have sent me an article that appeared recently in Esquire magazine called The Other Side Of Paradise: How I Left A Buddhist Retreat In Handcuffs by Michael Holden. The opening paragraph says, “The police stayed calm and the Buddhists were calmer, but by then there wasn’t much anyone could do. In […]
American Buddhism Round-up 2018
Happy New Year. Here’s my annual Year in American Buddhism Round Up! Actually, I’ve never done one before. But it seemed like a good idea. The biggest story in American Buddhism for me in 2018 was the scandal around Noah Levine and the subsequent downfall of Against the Stream and Refuge Recovery. Between 1982, when […]
