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Instructions for the Tenzo
ZEN MONASTERIES have traditionally had six officers who are all Buddha's disciples and all share buddha activities. Among them, the tenzo is responsible for preparing meals for the monks. Regulations for Zen Monasteries states, "In order to make reverential offerings to monks, there is a position called tenzo." Since ancient times this position has been held by accomplished monks who have way-seeking mind, or by senior disciples with an aspiration for enlightenment. This is so because the position requires wholehearted practice. Those without way-seeking mind will not have good results, in spite of their efforts... More » -
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Leaving the Lotus Position
I sit in a chair. Yes, of course, but I mean I sit zazen in a chair. This is a recent development, arising no doubt from a karmic web of causes and conditions, but the primary one is osteoarthritis in my knees.Everybody knows that a Zen student truly dedicated to the Way sits cross-legged on the floor. Buddha was sitting cross-legged when he was enlightened under the pipal tree 2,600 years ago, and there are millions of Buddha statues to prove it— sitting cross-legged on altars and bookshelves all over the world. Several of them are in my house. More » -
The Aim of Attention
Self-awareness . . . is a neutral mode that maintains self-reflectiveness even in the midst of turbulent emotions. —Daniel Goleman, Emotional Intelligence More » -
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How Amazing!
Joseph Goldstein grew up in his family’s resort in the Catskill Mountains of New York and graduated from Columbia University, where he majored in philosophy. Courses in Spinoza and Eastern Religion sparked an interest in both metaphysics and spiritual inquiry. “I read the Bhagavad Gita, and the whole notion of non-attachment - of acting without attachment to the fruits of the action - just made sense to me.” He went to Thailand with the Peace Corps in 1965, met teachers of vipassana meditation in the Theravada tradition, and spent most of the next eight years in Asia. In l975, he, along with Sharon Salzberg and Jack Kornfield, cofounded the Insight Meditation Society (IMS), in Barre, Massachusetts, one of the first vipassana residential retreat centers in the country. More » -
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Mind is Shapely, Art is Shapely
GARY SNYDER asked his teacher Oda Sesso Roshi, "Sometimes I write poetry, is that all right?" Oda laughed and said, "It's all right as long as it comes out of your true self." He also said, "You know, poets have to play a lot, asobi." The word asobi has the implication of wandering the bars and pleasure quarters. For a few years while doing Zen practice around Kyoto, Snyder quit writing poetry. It didn't bother him. His thought was, Zen is serious, poetry is not serious. In 1966, just before Oda Roshi died, he spoke with him in the hospital. He said, "Roshi! So it's Zen is serious, poetry is not serious." Oda replied "No, no, poetry is serious! Zen is not serious." More » -
Touching Enlightenment
DURING MY OWN PRACTICE and teaching of meditation over the past thirty-five years, many things have surprised me, but none more than the growing and somewhat anguished realization that simply practicing meditation doesn’t necessarily yield results. Many of us, when we first encountered Buddhism, found its invitation to freedom and realization through meditation extraordinarily compelling. We jumped in with a lot of enthusiasm, rearranged life priorities around our meditation, and put much time and energy into the practice. More »
