by Abby Mushin Terris | Feb 17, 2024
How do we know when we’ve made a mistake? Is a mistake something we did in the past, or a consequence we expect to meet us in the future? What if there is nothing within us – nothing at all – endowed with the ability to prevent our making mistakes in the...
by SJZC Administrator | Feb 10, 2024
Every weekday morning after our morning zazen the small group of us have tea around the kitchen table at the Zen center. The guiding teacher (usually Soten) offers a prompt for discussion. This past Monday I offered the prompt, “If you were to substitute another...
by Abby Mushin Terris | Feb 3, 2024
In zazen on the cushion (bench or chair) we look deeply, carefully, minutely into each breath, each sensation, each thought, or impulse…and come to appreciate how ephemeral this “each” is. Beyond zazen on the cushion, the instants unfold in a stream of nowness...
by Abby Mushin Terris | Jan 27, 2024
It used to get so dark you couldn’t see your own hand in front of your face. It still does. Do you ever go out into the forest at night, where the canopy is so thick it filters out even the starlight? Or have you been out in the ocean when silence stretched your ears...
by SJZC Administrator | Jan 20, 2024
From Shinei… How do you meet your life? This life right now? Are you meeting it as a task to be accomplished? A problem to fix? As an opponent to brace yourself against? Right now, you have a choice. Take a deep breath, relax the body and drop all notions of...
by Abby Mushin Terris | Jan 13, 2024
Zen practice is a way of life. Does this life have some destination? If we answer this question using the mind of opposites, then the destination is death. Life and death. But surely this life is way more complex than this, as is death. So let’s set that approach...
