the southern hemisphere, the night of June 20 is the longest night of the year, marking the arrival of winter. Welcoming the cold as a gift is part of being one with nature and its cycles… Recently we experienced the longest night of the year. The fact might have gone unnoticed–after all, the difference was a matter of seconds. But we all felt the coming of the cold, on time, like a boyfriend arriving for an unbreakable date. Few celebrated, because its arrival officially ends the sweetness of summer and heralds times of hardship and rigor. Cold is an absence, an absence of heat, and yet it feels like a presence…Photo: Jörg Peter/Pixabay... posted on Nov 16 2017 (14,812 reads)

know. So, in description of what you're looking at in that friendship circle, these sounded like all folks who certainly had kind of a human understanding, but it just didn't click. They didn't, the friend didn't get what they needed, which is again I think that very tender, gentle being-with that's so important—and being with past the days of the death, being with weeks and months later. In some way it's sort of like we're talking about with the organic nature of grief, the organic nature of being the helper is to take the pressure off yourself by not figuring out what to say and being present. Now, in that, we write about the discouragement of thing... posted on Jan 17 2018 (62,830 reads)

To even be able to think how an action could impact so far into the future suggests a considerable awareness of their world, an understanding of relationships and interdependency. A natural garden is a mini-world of interactions and balances. With my herb garden plans, it would have been thoughtful to imagine more than one level of the garden. I was attending to what grows above ground, what is visible. Bill Devall, Professor of Sociology at Humboldt University, writes: “But nature is not just a collection of scenery ... Nature is a process of interacting events.” It is an interaction of the visible and invisible. Too often, only the visible is included. The snakes ... posted on Oct 15 2017 (15,212 reads)

They would get the message that they were off the hook for finding solutions. In the end, he was likely to have a room full of people who were deeply disappointed, raging against the injustice of having to bear the outcome of inadequate leadership. On the other hand, he could tell them the truth and acknowledge their betrayal. He could communicate the expectation that they work as adults who could, and should, contribute to the success of the organization. This speaks to the adult nature of everyone’s existence and the fact that we alone choose what we make of our future. At least in the moment of Joe’s speech, employees at this newspaper heard the message that t... posted on Oct 22 2017 (12,292 reads)

than there is in suiseki? How does bonsai differ from suiseki around that? Janet:  They’re similar in that they both share some of the Japanese ideas about composition: the asymmetrical triangle, the use of empty space. But they’re very different, obviously. It’s a completely different medium. One is living, and always changing, and eventually dying. The other isn’t, at least not on a human time scale. But they both share the idea of bringing an abstraction of nature, and in a somewhat idealized vision of that nature, into your house or garden. If you have a beautifully maintained white pine, Goyomatsu—if it’s really well done—it evokes th... posted on Dec 4 2017 (27,955 reads)

existence. To deny the reality of that is to cause ourselves a lot of pain.  Instead what would happen if we turned toward this experience? I think that we rely on impermanence, that really boring dinner party that you are going to go to tonight, it's going to end. Great dictatorships will fall and be replaced by thriving democracies. George Harrison, the great singer, reminded us that all things must pass. I think that to live in harmony with this basic truth and to realize that our nature and the nature of the world is not fundamentally different becomes a liberating opportunity rather than a threat. Without impermanence, your children wouldn't grow up. Pain would not go awa... posted on Jan 26 2018 (32,116 reads)

things I realized is that different spiritual teachers meet a lot of different things when they use this term, "spiritual awakening." Let's start right there. What does spiritual awakening mean to you? Albert DeSilver:Yes, it's sort of like defining God, isn't it? How do you do that? I think for me, spiritual awakening has to do with transcending this sense of separation and difference. It means waking up to the vitality and brilliance of the universe that is our true nature. For so much of my life, I went through kind of trapped in the mind—trapped in the thinking mind, in the perceiving and believing mind. Then for me the awakening experience was this bl... posted on Sep 20 2018 (11,076 reads)

Life of One’s Own: A Penetrating 1930s Field Guide to Self-Possession, Mindful Perception, and the Art of Knowing What You Really Want “I did not know that I could only get the most out of life by giving myself up to it.” “One must know what one wants to be,” the eighteenth-century French mathematician Émilie du Châtelet wrote in weighing the nature of genius. “In the latter endeavors irresolution produces false steps, and in the life of the mind confused ideas.” And yet that inner knowing is the work of a lifetime, for our confusions are ample and our missteps constant amid a world that is constantly telling us who we are an... posted on Jan 1 2018 (14,059 reads)

Maathai “represents an example and a source of inspiration for everyone in Africa fighting for sustainable development, democracy, and peace.” Similarly, Satish Kumar walked from India to the United States for peace, starting at the grave of Mahatma Gandhi and ending at the grave of John F. Kennedy. He walked without money, trusting in the kindness of strangers to support him. "Peace comes from trust. Wars come from fear." He advocates making peace with soil (nature), soul (yourself) and society (others) because the future well being of humanity and the earth is dependent on a new world view in which the care of the planet, nourishment of the soul and the ... posted on Oct 18 2017 (10,323 reads)

me and what kind of life I want to live, and processing the day, and kind of going through what was important. You don't have to do it the whole hour—just five minutes—but actually not being up in the head the last hour of the day, come back down below the shoulders at the end of the day, as well. Like parenthesis. Some of these, and some very basic ones: just don't use while you're eating, taste the food. Just do one thing at a time; if you're taking a walk in nature, turn off the phone, turn off the phone all together and put it away. If you are sitting at a meal with a friend, or having a drink with a friend, don't put the phone in-between the two of ... posted on Feb 8 2018 (18,616 reads)

Low Hero? FP: I used to go to a camp and then co-directed a camp called IncluCity Camp. The campers taught me. The young people again. They would do that in their cabins–Hi Low Hero. I thought, ‘That is great. Why not use it at home?’ KSC: Can we teach people about gratitude? FP: That is a great question. I am not sure how I learned about it. I think it happened when I was very, very young with my parents and my grandparents. It got ingrained. It comes as second nature to me now. I think kindness and gratitude can both be definitely taught. By taught, I don’t mean you open up somebody’s head and put in in there, and you close up their head and the... posted on May 6 2018 (9,257 reads)

severed, replaced with the diffuse, generic relationships of the market economy. Bereft of a full complement of personal relationships, the self that is lodged in such a world feels out of place, lost and never quite at home. When I am in relationship to the faces I see throughout my day, when I know them and they know me, I know myself as well. I belong. All the more when I am in living relationship to the animals, plants, and earth around me, feeding me, clothing me, housing me. When nature becomes instead a spectacle or an inconvenience, when my daily interactions are with strangers or acquaintances whose important stories are unknown to me ; when my human, bodily needs are met t... posted on Apr 7 2018 (24,007 reads)

exploration of themes, colors, techniques, materials, or styles. Others are recording observations of places, people, animals, and events. Perhaps we simply want to decorate space or capture beauty. Maybe we're expressing dreams, exorcising inner demons, evoking emotions, moving toward healing. We might be attempting to make visible what's spiritually invisible and to understand our place in the world. If we're deeply disturbed by issues of a social, political, and/or economic nature, the challenge of our art could be to exhort public action. Detail of "Red Disaster" (1963), by Andy Warhol. Silkscreen ink on synthetic polymer paint on canvas. Museum of Fine... posted on Mar 16 2018 (8,003 reads)

Though my prayer and meditation keep my heart open to seeing the passage of time and seasons with appreciative eyes, mostly I just want the cold days to be over. As the earth begins to thaw, we often want the process to hurry up.  I long for bright flowers blowing in a spring breeze and warm summer evenings on the porch. While impatience with winter is only human, I pause and remember the need to move slowly through this time of year.  If we rush through the change in seasons in nature and in our lives, we will find ourselves missing that edge between winter and spring with its important lessons to teach. What is the natural purpose and symbolism in this time of thawing?&n... posted on Mar 25 2021 (13,301 reads)

economics is based upon the Buddhist concept of interdependence among all people and between people and the Earth. Because we’re all interdependent, our well-being is interconnected. Happiness comes from living a meaningful life and from minimizing suffering—not just our own, but the suffering of others, as well. The wonderful thing is that neuroscientists have verified that when people help others, theyfeel better. They feel happier. They’re also healthier. Being in nature, interacting with nature, has the same positive effects. In Buddhist economics, we say to people who are very rich, use your wealth to help others, to reduce the suffering of people and of t... posted on Jun 22 2018 (9,266 reads)

but with a prayer. He was a human whose doing and rationalization of non-violence was far exceeded by his being of it. Gandhi was deeply influenced by the Jaina philosophy and the Bhagvad Gita, as he was brought up in a part of the world that was steeped in these traditions. His own understanding on non-violence was quite sophisticated. He felt that non-violence in action was superficial, and that the real problem was violence in the mind that arises by not understanding one’s own nature. Known for being provocative at times, Gandhi would exhort those with a superficial understanding of this doctrine to adopt violence instead and go shed their blood in a war. After they had ... posted on Jun 18 2018 (13,957 reads)

in the slackwaters, cleansing flows. Floods dissipate in the ponds; wildfires hiss out in wet meadows. Wetlands capture and store spring rain and snowmelt, releasing water in delayed pulses that sustain crops through the dry summer. A report released by a consulting firm in 2011 estimated that restoring beavers to a single river basin, Utah’s Escalante, would provide tens of millions of dollars in benefits each year.2 Although you can argue with the wisdom of slapping a dollar value on nature, there’s no denying that these are some seriously important critters. To society, though, beavers still appear more menacing than munificent. In 2013 I lived with my partner, Elise, in... posted on Aug 15 2018 (8,235 reads)

and science must come together. Einstein said that science without religion is blind, and that religion without science is lame. And that’s Einstein! Matter without spirit is dead matter. And without matter, spirit is useless. So how can we change education, to incorporate these ideas? Children go to school day, after day, after day. They are almost brainwashed. Conditioned. The answer is to de-condition our minds: the process of unlearning through experience, through seeing nature and people with fresh spontaneous eyes. Fall in love every day. Fall in love with your husband, your wife, your mother, your trees, your land, your soil, whatever, every day! The freshness is m... posted on Sep 11 2018 (10,035 reads)

story. In one recent study, white participants watched brief video clips that elicited either moral elevation, humor, or neither. Elevation videos included a man giving “free hugs” to people on the street or musicians from all over the world simultaneously playing the same song, while humor videos involved comedy troupes either walking an “invisible dog” down the street or reenacting Ghostbusters in a public library. (The “neither” video just featured a nature scene.) Afterwards, participants filled out questionnaires about their emotions and sense of common humanity, and participated in a test of implicit bias toward different groups of people. W... posted on Aug 28 2018 (10,398 reads)

see my life clearly, I felt that I'd been treating it very superficially, and that after this experience, I really needed to inquire more deeply into what it is to be a human being, what the potential of a human being might be. And so I resigned my job, and I stumbled across yoga, and I found I was naturally very adept at yoga. I pursued it, enjoyed it, and it helped me gain trust in myself and the world again. At the same time, I began to look more closely at a long-held interest in the nature of mind, particularly as described in Buddhist practice. And this is the reclining Buddha of my grandfather, which I saw as a child in our home, and which always I wanted to have near me, and t... posted on Sep 7 2018 (6,904 reads)