What Two Women Think

A roshi is a person who has actualized that perfect freedom which is the potentiality for all human beings. He exists freely in the fullness of his whole being. The flow of his consciousness is…

From a Recent Notebook

Of course, Diane di Prima is in My Canon… Because  she honored Suzuki Roshi’s unprecedented presenceBecause she made  the case for old-school being literally in touchBecause she gave primacy to cosmologyBecause I gifted C. with…

The Teachings Are Infinite…

I vow to learn them all.–from Bodhisattva Vows “You Are That Person” A student asked Soen NakagawaDuring a meditation retreat: “I am very discouraged. What should I do?”Soen replied, “Encourage others.” At the beginning of…

That Glow, That Yes!

Natalie Goldberg, Thunder and Lightning: Cracking Open the Writer’s Craft 30 September 2000 It’s clear to me today, anyway, that my Holy Contour of Life book will be a structure like Natalie’s: short, compressed, easy…

Three Questions

Gregg Krech, Naikan: Gratitude, Grace,  and the Japanese Art of Self-Reflection (Stone Bridge Press, 2001) I learned of Naikan through consulting the bibliography of Patricia Ryan Madson’s book, Improv Wisdom.  Therein, she cited books on…

Presence

Shunryu Suzuki  Roshi was the first person I ever met for whom I felt immediate and total trust. It was something which I had never expected to experience. Every sense, every brain cell and nerve…