Reading Archives (2016)
Five Prayers
In gratitude, I bow to all generations of ancestors in my blood family. I see my mother and father, whose blood, flesh, and vitality are...
Inner World of Moods
“Give me a place to stand on," said the Greek mathematician Archimedes, “and I can move the world.” He was...
How to Live If You're Going to Die
I got a call that a dear friend of mine, who received precepts from me years ago when I lived at Green Gulch, was dying. I arranged with...
For the Traveler
Every time you leave home, Another road takes you Into a world you were never in. New strangers on other paths await. New...
Every Piece is Meant For You
Ever since I was young I enjoyed solving puzzles and having the pleasure to see the bigger picture afterwards. But even after all that, I...
Love Needs to be Constantly Cleansed
In the stories that I cherished in my youth, happy endings almost always involved some kind of love, and I began to observe that in...
Restoring Balance and Meaning in Ourselves
During a time of great drought, a Taoist master was asked by members of a village if he could help bring rain to their dry fields. They...
Why I Make Movies
All movies are an illusion. We think we are seeing motion but in fact we are seeing twenty-four still pictures every second. Half the...
The Glass is Already Broken
Once someone asked a well-known Thai meditation master, "In this world where everything changes, where nothing remains the same,...
Three Millimeters of the Universe
Dear Sam, One night in the hospital, a friend came to visit me. I told her I didn't think I could go on anymore. What I was...
Destiny is Within Us
I remember walking to the bus stop one day. Sweat was dripping down my chin, while I gazed upon the faded metal bus-stop sign a block...
Reengineeing Our Patterns
When I recommend to someone that they slow down, they often raise a legitimate question: “There is so much that I have to do; how...