in the world of zazen, when we sit, we are sitting with all beings even though we may think we are just sitting on our own. the just...

Back home now reflecting on our 5-day silent retreat a few days ago at Great Ocean Road in Victoria. During the talks, we delved into...

What a truly magical experience. This retreat was a holiday for my brain and my soul. I had no idea that there was so much healing in...

jatiluwih, bali, november 2024 master dogen: expounding a dream within a dream ________________________________________ nightfall storms rage the termites' road stops in front of the mountain a dream ferries me to the other shore the one you leave the one you reach apart in thought alone is what drifts in the river's voice rain swollen

The first dhamma talk Hamid gives invites us ‘to become intimate with our own mind’. This invitation shapes this retreat for me. The word...

Coming out of the world of doing, it felt quite intense to go into being. It's strange to see how something I really want - going to the...

As pointed out in the retreat there is an immense source of distractions as never before in the history of humankind. I’m sitting in an...

All reflections have a beginning, yet I am unsure where to start. How far back in time should I go for you to understand my current...

We are at Karuna Center, in Monchique, Portugal, starting our Autumn 8-day silent retreat. When we sit together in silence, what...

ei-tai ji temple, la rochette, 13 august 2000 here is a poem i presented to my teacher, ryotan tokuda roshi, on my monk ordination day...

silent retreat september 2024 / payangan, bali ______________________________________ in and out of silence words freely move where there is no in there is no out * fatal crossing juvenile serpent you are now one with the road * nighttime finding refuge in my room a fly falls asleep what tomorrow will offer you i don't know * the master's words i pray god to rid me of god invite us to silence * bouts of sleep in sleepless nights in the land of dreams awakening is never far *

ultimately the journey makes us understand that there is no going from here to there and no becoming for us. the journey begins and ends...

" so you should view this fleeting world..." the lotus sutra so between two tides our lives this presence mirage on a shore appears shadow play of surfaces on sinking sands mirror to skies immeasurable to twinklings washed away pantai kedungu, bali september 2024

dôgo and zengen went to a house to express condolences. zengen rapped on the coffin and asked, "alive or dead?" dôgo said, "I won't say...

" anché peye āni āni / what you seek is seeking you. " - jallaledin rūmi " the fire boy comes seeking fire." - zen koan ______________________________ this poem a vastness unnamable the twilight sky call it dharma is a calling that all things passing echoes endlessly mirror mirroring recite in a silent way a calling to you the calling is you

fades away the muzzin's call as we leave port lember behind old boat rust eaten traval companion true vessel of emptiness you plough a path in the sea ferry us from island to island in search of in search of what you know there're no shores to be reached you know our thirst of crossings is an invention of waves just as our shape that brush stroke of her iridiscence suspended in mid-air and yet

pantai ann, lombok, august 2024 on reading okumura roshi in the shallows of speech water words ripple over murmuring algae where light begins to descend shimmering gains in intensity silence spreads out her stars night sky day sky they illumine the old boat's dreams can go on blazing for now

After two days and many hours of sitting in zazen, the incessant thoughts of my every day life, the distractions and desires finally began to ebb and slow, and what started to rise were the thoughts that reflected the deeper, more troubling realities I was contending with. I sat and observed as these thoughts kept rising and releasing. And as Zazen isn't really about achieving a goal or objective; its about sitting with what surfaces, I continued to return to my breath and le

m’illumino d’immenso - giuseppe ungaretti at the end of your long journey, you may well take note that the journey never had a beginning...

unusual for the season, it rained all night long. you know this because of the drizzle you heard falling in your sleep. you have lived long enough on this planet to know the sound the rain makes as it falls on tinned-roofs and leafage. not one sound, myriad of sounds. how shallow your sleep has been, misty now, gains a little depth thanks to the rising waters.. dreams heavy with the fragrance of soaked rice fields. unclear whose deams they could be, provisionally you can clai