“What a joy it is to be on an incompleteable path.” - Henry Shukman, Sanbo Zen Master

I actually want to write about my zen practice. But I feel like setting the stage with meditation more generally is a better place to begin.

The world is afire, literally and metaphorically. It’s been almost 20 years since suddenly everyone had smart phones. We started opening and refreshing feeds—no, waterfalls—of problems, tasks, and agendas. Priorities set by companies, organizations, influencers, bots. This technology added hundreds of new voices to our daily experience. Embedded in dopamine, streaming constantly. Directly to you, 24/7.

So, you’re telling me we already got this damn monkey mind that won’t shut up, that fills us with suffering well enough…and now we’re injecting doomscrolling into the mix?

Of course people need meditation. We need it more than ever.

[Continue reading…]