A couple of weeks ago, Akiba Roshi, teacher at Kojin-an temple in Oakland, asked after zazen: “What’s the purpose of our lives?” The person standing next to me said that all of life is an ecological system, like a forest. When a tree dies, a space is created, and

A zen story says, “Not knowing is most intimate.” When we don’t know, our minds are open and curious — we draw closer to our questions, eating and sleeping them, walking them down the street. But as soon as we think we’ve got the answer, we break our engagement

“The idea that some lives matter less is the root of all that is wrong with the world.” — Paul Farmer   What to do when the unconscionable happens? When lies and hatred carry the day, the next four years, and the leadership of a nation ostensibly based on the ideals of

In zen, faith can be difficult to talk about. Since zen isn’t a theistic religion, when we talk about faith, the question immediately arises: faith in what? I love Sheryl Crow’s lyric, “She don’t believe in anything, but if you ask her she’ll say there’s

From the time I read William Wordworth’s description of poetry as “emotion recollected in tranquility,” I believed events were best discussed after they happened, after one had “processed” one’s feelings — made peace with them, transcended or transformed them, broken through to insight or wisdom. If you wrote from

Dead reckoning is the process of determining one’s present position by projecting course and speed from a known past position, and predicting a future position by projecting course and speed from a known present position. The DR position is only approximate because it does not allow for the effect

My new, first-ever smartphone informs me that today is Valentine’s Day, All Day. But I knew that. The heart-shaped boxes of chocolate inching closer to the discount rack and the red-sweatered employees of my local grocery store made the day eminently clear this morning at 6, a time things

After a year’s worth of posts, it’s time to begin again. In last week’s Homeless Kodo study group, the subject of faith arose with its accompanying semantic difficulties, like what is it, anyway? One person testified that because of his religious upbringing, he initially equated faith with

If you’re lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it. — John Irving Yes, I’m trying to sneak in a last post before the year pulls its tail through the doorway and pads off to time’s Florida.

The other day, after a round of stormy weather, I took a walk along the beach at low tide. All kinds of things had been coughed up by the sea: old lobster traps, soda cans, bits of rope and plastic, quantities of seaweed, and a few large mussels, what we