Encouraging Words

Practicing Zen is all about attitude. Discovering and cultivating quiet mind encourages us in an attitude of openness and modesty, a willingness to be with what is. With this comes simplicity in how we live and consume. How we receive what is given without complaint...

Finding What is True

After a day engaged in work activities, where we respond to conditions directly and immediately, reading the news can catapult us into a swirl of anxiety, mental confusion and stress. Anxiety arises when we can’t find our ground. The media world of facts, alternative...

Hotei’s Gift

Research shows that when you have a bellylaugh you breathe in six times more oxygen. When was the last time you laughed like that? Just reading this may remind you of the physical experience of laughter, the way the whole body joins in. Thinking mind is given a...

The Vow to Awaken

The Vow to awaken for the sake of all beings unfailingly points us in a reliable direction. And Bodhisattva precepts give us the tools to enact this vow at every choice point in our daily life. Precepts guide what we become aware of and what we value. Instead of being...

Sitting with the Sunrise

The Buddha encouraged us to meditate in the forest in the early morning. Except for us humans’ recent astrophysical technology, we are still Earthbound creatures, subject to the rhythms of the Earth. How often do you experience the sunrise, as a creature of the Earth,...