Zen Buddhism

Zen is the practice of studying your subconscious and seeing your true nature. The purpose of this work is to show you how to apply and utilize the teachings and essence of zen in everyday life in the Western society. This is where your zen journey begins....

In these delightful and playful talks, Osho introduces the mystery, the wonder and the emptiness that is Zen, not comparable to anything else and a completely different approach to life. The chapters alternate between elaborating original excerpts by the 14th Zen master, Ikkyu, taking us into the world of Zen – and responding to personal questions, which brings the world of Zen into our lives, connects with our issues and questions.

Feeling overwhelmed? Step away from life's mounting demands and free yourself up for what matters with this succinct and sensible guide by the Zen Buddhist author of the international bestsellers The Art of Simple Living and Don't Worry. With these and ninety-two other practical tips, we can abandon the futile pursuit of controlling everything in our lives and unlock the key to a fulfilling social life, individual well-being, and a calmer, more focused mind.

Zen Buddhism is often said to be a practice of mind-to-mind transmission without reliance on text—in fact, some great teachers forbid their students to read or write. But Buddhism has also inspired some of the greatest philosophical writings of any religion, and two such works lie at the center of Zen: The Heart Sutra, which monks recite all over the world, and The Diamond Sutra, said to contain answers to all questions of delusion and dualism. This is the Buddhist teaching on the perfection of wisdom and cuts through all obstacles on the path of practice.

In a distant city, an old cat considers himself as wise as can be, until he hears of an ancient pine far away, under the boughs of which infinite wisdom can be found. Thus, the Cat embarks on a journey deep into the forest to search for the tree. Along the way, he meets new friends—the Hare, the Magpie, the Wolf Cub, the Monkey, the Tortoise, and the Tiger—and comes across the energetic young Kitten. What wisdom does the Cat have to impart to his friends, and, perhaps more importantly, what does he still have to learn?

Zen master Julian Daizan Skinner guides the listener through a sequence of meditation techniques that can safely lead even a complete novice through to advanced levels. Based on his own long experience of the Rinzai Zen tradition, as taught by the great 17th-century masters Hakuin and Bankei, Daizan highlights the key points for success and addresses the pitfalls. Structured around a traditional teaching framework called 'the two wings of a bird', Daizan clearly lays-out how these methods build and combine to create a transformative and sustaining practice.

Approximately four million Americans claim to be Buddhist. Moreover, hundreds of thousands of Americans of various faiths read about Buddhism, are interested in its philosophical tenets, or fashionably view themselves as Buddhists. They’re part of what’s been described as the fastest growing religious movement in America: a large group of people dissatisfied with traditional religious offerings and thirsty for an approach to spirituality grounded in logic and consistent with scientific knowledge.

Western thought and culture have coalesced around a series of constructed ideas—that human beings stand separate from a nature that must be controlled; that the mind is somehow superior to the body; that all sexuality entails a seduction—that in some way underlie our exploitation of the earth, our distrust of emotion, and our loneliness and reluctance to love.

These three sutras are the most important texts for the Chan (Chinese) and Zen (Japanese) Buddhist traditions, though they are very different in character and provenance. The Diamond Sutra (Vajracheddikā Prajña Pārāmitā Sutra in Sanskrit) has the distinction of being 'the earliest complete survival of a dated (11 May 868) printed book’. It was found in the Dunhuang Caves in China in 1900. The title, Diamond Cutter, outlines its purpose, which is to cut through ignorance to attain to perfect wisdom or ultimate reality.

Leave the pressures and demands of your daily life behind as you focus on the Zen within your soul. Zen and the Love of Nature takes you on a captivating journey from a single lotus flower to a rippling brook to the grandeur of Mount Fuji, giving a Zen perspective on the joy and beauty of our natural world.

Exploring Buddha’s core teachings, the author shares his own secular and accessible interpretations of the Four Noble Truths, the Three Treasures, and the Eightfold Path within the context of his lineage and the teachings of his teacher and the teachers before him. He looks at Buddha’s teachings on our singular reality that appears as a multiplicity of things and on the “self” that perceives reality, translating powerful spiritual experience into the vernacular of modern life.

Exploring the relationship between Christianity and Zen, especially through his dialogue with the great Zen teacher D.T. Suzuki, the book makes an excellent introduction to a comparative study of these two traditions, as well as giving the listener a strong taste of the mature Merton. Never does one feel him losing his own faith; rather, one feels that faith getting deeply clarified and affirmed. Just as the body of "Zen" cannot be found by the scavengers, so too, Merton suggests, with the eternal truth of Christ.

Bring Me the Rhinoceros is an unusual guide to happiness and a can opener for your thinking. For fifteen hundred years, Zen koans have been passed down through generations of masters, usually in private encounters between teacher and student. This book deftly retells more than a dozen traditional koans, which are partly paradoxical questions dangerous to your beliefs and partly treasure boxes of ancient wisdom. John Tarrant brings the heart of the koan tradition out into the open, reminding us that the old wisdom remains as vital as ever.

Reiki master and best-selling author Diane Stein has been a dedicated hands-on healer since 1988. Stein believes strongly that this powerful healing art, once a closely guarded secret tradition, should be accessible and available to all. Since she began teaching in 1990, Stein has initiated thousands of students in all three levels of Reiki healing. Through these efforts she developed a comprehensive teaching method that encompasses the fundamentals of this ancient system.

Over a decade ago, when Writing Down the Bones first appeared, Natalie Goldberg started a revolution in the way we practice writing. Now, for the first time, Goldberg reads her classic work, while offering new commentary about the creative, spiritual, and practical dimensions of writing. This collector's edition also includes an exclusive interview with the author.

Confidence, as every golfer knows, is the key to peak performance on the greens. Zen Putting: Mastering the Mental Game builds your confidence through a thinking-outside-the-box approach that helps golfers of all levels get out of their own way and roll the ball better than ever.

In this long-overdue book from one of the most influential spiritual teachers of the last century, Shunryū Suzuki Roshi shares simple, warmhearted teachings on a practice that is fundamentally about becoming yourself. In his inimitable style, filled with humor and insight, Becoming Yourself speaks directly to the newest beginners while also serving as a touchstone and a continual source of inspiration for even the most experienced practitioners and Zen teachers.

A great primer on the history of Japanese art as it evolved under the Buddhist (and later Zen) movements embedding in Japan's culture. Written by the first great populariser of Chinese and Japanese cultural artefacts, including translating a great number of Chinese poems and literary works.

The question-and-answer format makes this introduction to Zen especially easy to understand - and also to use as a reference, as you can easily look up just the question you had in mind. The esteemed Zen teacher Norman Fischer and his old friend and teaching colleague Susan Moon (both of them in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki, author of Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind) give this collaborative effort a playful tone: Susan asks a question on our behalf, Norman answers it, and then Sue challenges him.

Wrestling with fear doesn't have to be a negative experience. This book offers an approach to life that unlocks a new way of thinking and being in the world, one that leads directly through the center of the anxieties we seek to avoid. Written in the style of an owner's manual, a guide to being human, Burkett focuses on areas of pain and anxiety as they tend to manifest for modern people: feelings of unworthiness, and issues surrounding sex, money, failure, and even death.