Nhat Hanh-isms
The following come from Thich Nhat Hanh’s books, The Miracle of Mindfulness, The Heart of Understanding, Peace Is Every Step, Being Peace, and Interbeing. Breathing in, I calm body and mind. Breathing out, I smile….
Author: Mark J. Chmiel
Share the Wealth: With Gratitude for Thich Nhat Hanh
I invite you to join us on Sunday 23 January for an hour of communal sharing of our gratitude for Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, who died earlier this week. Feel free to share a…
Breakdown Precedes Breakthrough
You’ve made the right choice. Believe me, today is a good day for you. These are tough decisions, I know. But we intellectuals, and I say we because I consider you such, must remain lucid…
Forever on the Alert
I’ve known Pat Geier almost 40 years. Not two months into the pandemic, we began Zooming on Fridays, then added Mondays, and before too long were immersed in reading and discussing the works of French…
Reflections on the Intellectual Life by Irina S.
In one of my classes, we are reading a variety of books on the love of learning. I asked Irina (a nom de plume) if she’d be willing to share a few reflections on Zena…
January 12, 1996
The first week of January was bright and bitterly cold. Pat Geier and Cristobhal, our friend from Guatemala, had spent Christmas and New Year’s with us and had already left for Louisville, but she was…
These Are a Few of Our Favorite Things—A Winter Class to Take Us into Spring
Somehow [Bonnie] forced you to see yourself at your most amazing. Most precious. And believe in what you saw. She saw. A ll obstacles fell into shadow, disappeared, backlit by the blaze of what could…
Birds of a Feather
From Matt Taibbi’s article today at Substack–Which brings us back to Cheney. All those things Trump is rumored to be, Dick Cheney actually is. That’s why it’s so significant that he appeared on the floor…
Letter, 19 August 2014
Dear Candice, Yesterday, even as I was contemplating taking a break from Facebook, I noticed that there was an event calling for people to come downtown for a protest re: Ferguson. The goal was…
Two Books I Finished Reading Today
A Flash of Lightning in the Dark of Night: A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life [A commentary on Shantideva’s great manual], by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. We Were in Auschwitz / 6643…