A Mindful Life

I wish my blog were famous and had millions of readers so this video could reach many, many people. If the video doesn’t show/play then click to watch it here. I’ve not read any of David Foster Wallace’s books, but hearing this speech I can’t help but wish he was still alive.

Analysis has its peculiar scientific value, but the Spirit which passes from one person to another as a flame leaps from one coal to another grasps truth in its wholeness as a living thing united within itself. …Spiritual truth cannot be sharply defined like scientific truth. It exists on the dim edge of the unexplored [...]

Oh, to sink into silence. To breathe. To wait. No rituals, no incense, no chants, no words. Just silence and a straight-backed wooden chair. The silence is alive. Traffic zips down the highway. Chairs creak. Birds gossip. Someone coughs or sniffs. But if you really listen, you can hear the sunshine singing. Sometimes the entire [...]

…over the margins of life comes a whisper, a faint call, a premonition of richer living which we know we are passing by. Strained by the very mad pace of our daily outer burdens, we are further strained by an inward uneasiness, because we have hints that there is a way of life vastly richer [...]

THE AFTERLIFE They’re moving off in all imaginable directions, each according to his own private belief, and this is the secret that silent Lazarus would not reveal: that everyone is right, as it turns out. you go to the place you always thought you would go, the place you kept lit in an alcove in [...]

One of my teachers in Zen is Karen Maezen Miller, whom I have known for seven years; I have visited her, and she guided me through my first sesshin. However, her sangha is located in Los Angeles, which is over 300 miles away. So it hasn’t been entirely practical to attempt to join or practice [...]

On the black cushion a stone sinking and floating into the dark light.

About the spiritual training of young, my view is a bit of the same. How you behave in your home is their spiritual upbringing. I think we have to be careful with all forms of ideological indoctrination, and that is what spiritual training is in children: the imposition of a set of abstract beliefs and [...]

No Ordinary Life Drink some coffee light a candle Rain patters light a candle Cat purrs light a candle A child’s party light a candle Eat cake light a candle Buy groceries light a candle Fold laundry light a candle Clean the bathroom light a candle Pay bills light a candle Read books light a [...]

I protect my child as much as possible. Therefore, I have chosen not to tell her about yesterday’s tragedy. At age five, she simply does not need to know. What happened is incomprehensible to me, an adult; she would only personalize the information and worry for her own safety. I cannot make the world safe, [...]