I Want a Milkshake
Yesterday’s talk at the Universalist Unitarian Church in Cleveland Heights went really well. The questions from the audience were great. One person asked about how Zen helps a person overcome desire. As you may know, the standard version of Buddha’s Four Noble Truths goes, 1. All life is suffering, 2. The cause of suffering is […]
Zen Dojos Are Not Churches
Looking over some of the responses to my previous blog post, I think I am starting to get a handle on why I find myself so often at odds with the way a lot of people think about the matter of welcoming-ness and inclusivity in Zen. In that previous blog post, I compared Buddhist centers […]
Is American Buddhism Really “Too White”?
According to the Pew Research Center, Buddhism is the fourth most racially diverse religion in America. In fact, American Buddhists leave everyone except the Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Muslims in the dust. The numbers are staggering. Less than half of American Buddhists are white as compared to other religions like the Episcopal Church […]
Peace of Mind
Kodo Sawaki said, “You lack peace of mind because you’re running after an idea of total peace of mind. That’s backwards. Be attentive to your mind in each moment, no matter how unpeaceful it might seem to be. Great peace of mind is realized only in the practice within this unpeaceful mind. Real peace of […]
Objective Reality and Stubbed Toes
In an essay called “The Mountains and Waters Sutra” (Sansuigyo), Dogen says, “ways of seeing … water differ according to the type of being: There are (heavenly) beings which see what we call water as a string of pearls… Demons see water as raging flames, and see it as pus and blood. Dragons and fish see water […]
