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IN THE BARDO
Lifelong Learning
When I invited the teachers who’d told me that they’d already found their dream job to put down on paper what it was that made our...
Zazen
Listening to Bernie and Genpo talking about what, if any, were the absolutely essential ingredients of Zen, it disturbed me when they...
Don't Forget Me
I am listening to a decade-old conversation between Bernie and Genpo , their reflection on forty years of friendship and Zen practice. I...
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
Oct 16, 20228 min read
Buffalo Blue Humid Subways
Anne Wingate told me about Ada Calhoun’s memoir/biography of poet Frank O’Hara and her father, Peter Schjeldahl, Also a Poet. Peter was...
420
Ken Byalin
Oct 5, 20226 min read
Yom Kippur, 2022
The story is told of Rabbi Zusya that once on the Eve of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement he heard the Cantor in the House of Prayer...
620
Ken Byalin
Oct 1, 20225 min read
There is No Pole
“How do you step from the top of a 100-foot pole?” For me, this has always been a koan which resonated. It is as if it always pointed me...
540
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