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IN THE BARDO
To Tell the Truth
How do you tell the truth? How do I tell the truth? I’ve been working on this question a long time. Francine Prose quotes Hemingway’s...
Birthdays
It bothers me that I still can’t remember my mom’s birthdate. I don’t have any childhood memories of her birthdays. What I remember from...
Going Gray
Two years ago, filling out my passport renewal application, likely for the last time, I stumbled on my height. I’ve been getting shorter...
Oh, Dirk.
In Zen funerals, we talk directly to the departed. I am at a loss for words. I am hoping that words will come. I am picturing you....
Bringing to the Societal Table Those Who Have Been Excluded
This has been the expression of my vow since I found the words in Bernie’s Instructions to the Cook. “Bringing to the societal table...
Visionary Leadership
This has to be the Zen practice. I love the story of the Golden City which the Buddha tells in the Lotus Sutra. It has inspired me. It is...
Magic
Catching the magic is sometimes not so easy. Stumbling into the magic of success is not something to be taken for granted. It has always...
What is Social Action?
The selflessness of social action is not self-neglect just as self-care is not self-neglect. There are four phrases that come to mind,...
No.
What is my “No!” When do I shout it? Do I really shout? “No!” Jesse and Theresa Peterford first met at ICS. Theresa, star teacher, chief...
Infinite Onion
Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to transform them. When I was doing koan practice with Jishu, very briefly in the last year of her...
Infinite Circle
We were serving special needs students at double the district rate. As we have built our schools, I have been guided by, anchored in an...
Mother's Day 2020
Zen’s relationship to mothers has always seemed a bit strange. Mother’s Day, 2020 is also the twenty-fifth anniversary of Maezumi Roshi’s...
Zen Budgeting Through the COVID-19 Pandemic
No one likes budget cuts. They are always painful. This was shaping up to be our most painful budget. Business people say when they are...
The Zen of Budgeting
Coming Soon, a case study in Zen Budgeting: Budgeting through the Covid-19 Pandemic. I am too grandmotherly. The Gateless Gate is the...
Oh, Richard
At a Zen funeral, we talk directly to the person who has left us. Oh, Richard, thinking of you, I smile. We had so much more to do. So...
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Ken Byalin
Jul 5, 20237 min read
Cowardice and Courage
I have been slowly reading my friend Nancy Mujo Baker’s new book, Opening to Oneness.[1] I say slowly because it takes me two or three...
15 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Jul 5, 20235 min read
To Profit or Not To Profit
I was rereading Bernie Glassman’s Instructions to the Cook, in anticipation of leading a seminar on it for the Zen Peacemakers. (You can...
86 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Jun 29, 20233 min read
Oh, Billy.
In Zen funerals, we talk directly to the departed. Happily, my friend Bill Wingate was able to read this blog over breakfast a month...
104 views1 comment
Ken Byalin
Jun 23, 20235 min read
My Multifaith Journey Continues
The multifaith journey is not without bumps. When Bernie left Yonkers, energy for the multifaith House of One People dissipated, although...
19 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Jun 23, 20237 min read
Older Brother Bob
Roshi Robert Kennedy. S.J., always introduced me as his Dharma brother, Dharma brothers because Roshi Bernie Glassman was both of our...
56 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Jun 14, 20236 min read
You Can Call Me “Roshi”
“You can call me ‘Roshi.’” It surprised me when I heard myself say those words. I had never taken readily to the status symbols of Zen. I...
38 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
May 24, 20234 min read
Tetsuji Prelude: Blown Away
I took Jukai with Bernie, although the pathway to that place was convoluted. I had been blown away when Bernie had accepted me as a...
28 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
May 24, 20236 min read
Jukai – Prelude and Fugue
The Prelude – Taking Refuge I first heard of Jukai sometime after arriving at the Zen Center of New York. I understood that it was the...
33 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
May 15, 20236 min read
Who are you?
Prelude: Bodhidharma The first case in the Blue Cliff Record tells a longish story of Bodhidharma’s arrival in China and his meeting with...
76 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
May 10, 20234 min read
Boobilah
If you asked me why I do koan study with my students, I would have a different answer now than I would have had a year ago. For years,...
51 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
May 1, 20234 min read
Please Take Care of Bernie
I have been slowly reading my friend Nancy Mujo Baker’s new book, Opening to Oneness. I say slowly because it takes me two or three days...
40 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Apr 26, 20234 min read
Layman Pang’s Daughter: Fugue: "Luckily no one was looking."
I had been blown away by Roshi Eve Marko’s presentation of this koan. My first thought in sharing it had been to omit the last line. The...
52 views1 comment
Ken Byalin
Apr 19, 20235 min read
Layman Pang's Daughter: Prelude, "Im Helping"
Roshi Eve Marko spoke to our Tuesday evening Zen group recently. Eve has been a close friend for a long time. She was married to my...
96 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Apr 15, 20235 min read
Pascal's Karmic Gamble
Blaise Pascal, the 17th century French mathematician and philosopher, is best known for his famous “gamble”. Considering the question of...
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Ken Byalin
Apr 7, 20236 min read
“You’re Fired”: There’s Blood on My Hands
Although Jishu asked me “to do something about Bernie’s jagged karma,” she never suggested that I do anything about my own. What did I...
76 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Mar 30, 20237 min read
The Shadow
I have been slowly reading my friend Nancy Mujo Baker’s new book on the Zen Precepts.[1] I say slowly because it takes me two or three...
22 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Mar 27, 20234 min read
Spring
I am celebrating the arrival of Spring. This year, my first year of retirement, walking has been a new occupation and a preoccupation....
24 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Mar 16, 20235 min read
The After Firing
Roshi Jishu Holmes was my teacher. It is hard to grasp that she has been gone for 25 years. And yet I hear her words as clearly as ever....
43 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Mar 9, 20235 min read
The Bargain
It is hard to believe that 20 years have passed. My father died as I turned 30. Mom lived thirty years longer, although she was only a...
19 views0 comments
Ken Byalin
Mar 2, 20236 min read
Relative Privilege
In some ways, it seemed that I had always felt poor, always knew that there was stuff that others had that I didn’t. It took me longer to...
15 views0 comments
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