I’m currently working on a book describing the spiritual journey. What follows I just cut from that manuscript. But it still felt like it might be useful in another context.    As we enter the way we can feel we’re crossing deserts moving toward an oasis with life-giving waters. Sometimes only to find a shimmering mirage on the horizon that quickly disappears as we approach. Grail. Oasis. Mirage. Deserts. If we’re honest we realize in matters... Read more

      This morning I opened my social media and nearly immediately was gifted with a poem from the Zen priest and hermit Ryōkan Taigu. It was posted by Kuya Minogue. Kuya simply said “Ryokan describes my life.” With that she offered this verse from Ryokan’s Chinese poems. Looking back I see more than seventy years have already passed. I am tired of seeing through right and wrong in the human world Snow in the late night covers all traces of... Read more

      Intimations of Grief A dharma talk by Jan Seymour-Ford Delivered at the Empty Moon Zen Saturday Zazenkai 29 January, 2022   Zen means participating in loss. – we are present and don’t turn away from our loss and pain Zen doesn’t save us from our lives. I’m … anxious … angry, etc. The “I” is extra. So I’d like to talk about loss. I’ll start with a poem by Robert Frost. Nothing Gold Can Stay Nature’s first... Read more

        William Buttler Yeats died in Menton, France, on this day, the 28th of January in 1939. His body was interred in France and lay there for nearly a decade before his remains were removed to Ireland. In his lifetime Yeats was a poet, dramatist, prose writer, generally considered one of the great literary figures of the twentieth century. As a child Yeats was an indifferent student. Although his poetry began to be noticed from an early... Read more

        Charles Lutwidge Dodgson was born at the All Saints’ vicarage in Cheshire, England, today, the 27th of January, in 1832. His family produced military men and clerics. His great grandfather a bishop in the Church of England, his father a country priest, later Archdeacon of Richmond. The family were Anglo-Catholics. Charles’ early education was at home. He, like his siblings, apparently, suffered from a stammer. In 1846 he was shipped off to public school, and in... Read more

        DREAMING THE JESUS PRAYER James Ishmael Ford I find Jesus and the Jesus Prayer on my heart a fair amount of late. And only a little less, Mary, for me as the great Western manifestation of Guanyin. Which in the joining in my heart I guess speaks volumes of me and my life between. I even find myself appreciating the encapsulating story of normative Christianity, the creator God sending his only son down to the broken... Read more

    The other day I attended a zoom based meeting of a clergy group I’ve long belonged to. Its origins are as a Universalist clergy Lenten retreat, but wildly evolved since. Mostly its a small group of people invited into an annual gathering with an implied commitment to that annual gathering for as close to a life time as possible. At that meeting we discussed next steps for a small group having, frankly, a historic purpose with dwindling interest.... Read more

                Mathew Sherling of Infinite Weird interviews Zen teacher James Ishmael Ford, guiding teacher with the Empty Moon Zen collaborative. The illustration of James Ford is by Adrian Worsfold Read more

      I’m touched by a small peculiarity within the announcement of the Vietnamese Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh’s death. He died on the 22nd of January in Vietnam. But the announcement was received here in North America on the other side of the international date line, on the 21st of January. There’s a saying within the intimate way. I am not that. But in truth it is me. Thich Nhat Hanh has died. And death is to be respected.... Read more

      Similar to Zen’s Ten Ox Herding pictures, Vajrayana Buddhism offers an illustration of the spiritual path using elephants. As with the Ox Herding pictures there are several different versions to the Elephant pictures. I stumbled upon a commentary by the Householder Dharma teacher Piya Tan Being Sin. I love the different angles on the interior life presented in these various spiritual maps. And here’s one more… Piya Tan’s comments follow, lightly edited: The Vajrayana model depicts progressive... Read more