Zen Life

We live in turbulent and uncertain times. Anger and hatred are dividing us instead of bringing us closer together. What's needed is not more of the same, but a deliberate shift to consciousness and love. Join Alex Mill, a former monk who trained in a Zen monastery for 14 years, as he guides you along his personal, true-life journey. He'll recount how he found Zen awareness practice and pursued it to discover freedom, and reveal the principles he learned so that you, too, can access the wisdom and tools necessary to bring the monastery's refuge into your own life, right where you are.

In this series, Om Swami shares the essence of the Zen Living, combing the various branches of Zen and its associated techniques, to help the listener master the Zen way of life. There are 8 core episodes and 4 Bonus ones covering the following: Zazen, Wall-gazing, Osoji and many more to calm and center the mind while living in the world.

For much of his career, Dr. Mark Epstein kept his beliefs as a Buddhist separate from his work as a psychiatrist. But as he became more forthcoming with his patients about his personal spiritual leanings, he was surprised to find how many of them were eager to learn more. The divisions between the psychological, emotional, and the spiritual, he soon realized, were not as distinct as one might think.

The Zen Habits Handbook for Life is a compilation of Leo Babauta's best articles on living from a Zen Habits perspective. What will this book teach you to do? Basically the same things that Zen Habits aims for overall: how to simplify your life, how to live a happier life, how to be more productive with less stress, how to achieve your dreams. The book includes chapters on decluttering, single-tasking, eliminating nonessentials, planning your day, clearing your inbox, getting motivated, cultivating compassion, boosting self-confidence, living consciously, and much more!

Ryokan (1758–1831) is, along with Dogen and Hakuin, one of the three giants of Zen in Japan. But unlike his two renowned colleagues, Ryokan was a societal dropout, living mostly as a hermit and a beggar. He was never head of a monastery or temple. He liked playing with children. He had no dharma heir. Even so, people recognized the depth of his realization, and he was sought out by people of all walks of life for the teaching to be experienced in just being around him.

Does anybody truly and deeply love life? Or is that simply a story, a pipe dream, told by people who want to sell you something? This masterclass began with an ultimate belief that there must be something more, something we are all missing. After all, how could life be such a mess of roles to play, expectations to meet, anxiety, blame, guilt, opinion and conflict; causing endless and involuntary overthinking? We seem to live a cycle of perpetual optimism that we never satisfy; we chase happiness for tomorrow, rarely experiencing it right now, in the present moment.

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.

In this collection of never-before-published teachings by Charlotte Joko Beck, one of the most influential Western-born Zen teachers, she explores our “core beliefs” - the hidden, negative convictions we hold about ourselves that direct our thoughts and behavior and prevent us from experiencing life as it is. Wryly humorous and relatable, Beck uses powerfully clear language to show how our lives present us with daily opportunities to move from thinking to experiencing, from compulsivity to confidence, and from anguish to peace.

Relax and find happiness amid the swirl of the modern world with this internationally best-selling guide to simplifying your life by a Japanese monk who embodies the wisdom of Zen.

Jan Chozen Bays, MD - physician and Zen teacher - has developed a series of simple practices to help us cultivate mindfulness as we go about our ordinary, daily lives. Exercises include: taking three deep breaths before answering the phone, noticing and adjusting your posture throughout the day, eating mindfully, and leaving no trace of yourself after using the kitchen or bathroom. Each exercise is presented with tips on how to remind yourself and a short life lesson connected with it.

Shunryu Suzuki, author of the beloved classic Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, is lovingly remembered as one of the greatest spiritual teachers of the 20th century - whose legacy is felt in every facet of American Zen. This monumental biography of Suzuki, written and read by his student David Chadwick, weaves together a rich tapestry of stories and memories of Suzuki’s students, family, and friends. In this updated and revised audiobook edition, Chadwick also offers rare excerpts from archived recordings of Suzuki’s teachings in the great Zen master's own voice.

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.

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.

Lucidly and beautifully written, Peace Is Every Step contains commentaries, meditations, personal anecdotes, and stories from Nhat Hanh's experiences as a peace activist, teacher, and community leader. It begins where the listener already is - in the kitchen, office, driving a car, walking - and shows how deep meditative presence is available now.

What does it take to have a long writing life? Drawing on her years of writing, teaching, and practicing Zen, Natalie Goldberg shares the experiences that have opened her to new ways of being alive - experiences that point the way forward in our lives and our writing. The "great spring" of this book title refers to the great rush of energy that arrives when you think no life will ever come again - the early yellow flowering forsythia, for example.

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.

Join author Beth Kempton on a life-changing pilgrimage through rural Japan in search of answers to some of life's biggest questions: How do we find calm in the chaos and beauty in the darkness? How do we let go of the past and stop worrying about the future? What can an awareness of impermanence teach us about living well?

Zen Master Tales collects never-before-translated stories of four prominent Zen masters from the Edo period of Japanese history (1603–1868). Drawn from an era that saw the “democratization” of Japanese Zen, these stories paint a picture of robust, funny, and poignant engagement between Zen luminaries and the emergent chonin or “townsperson” culture of early modern Japan. These masters affirmed that the essentials of Zen practice could be conveyed to all members of Japanese society in ordinary speech, including even comic verse and work songs.

By learning how to apply the teachings Zen in your life, you will be able to enjoy a multitude of benefits including reduced stress, stronger relationships, a decluttered mind and home, more savings, a more open and understanding outlook, a more enjoyable work life and stable career, peace of mind, and better health. Hopefully, this audiobook will teach you how to improve your life by incorporating a Zen-oriented mentality into your day-to-day activities and thoughts.

Composer John Cage sought the silence of a mind at peace with itself - and found it in Zen Buddhism, a spiritual path that changed both his music and his view of the universe. "Remarkably researched, exquisitely written", Where the Heart Beats weaves together "a great many threads of cultural history" (Maria Popova, Brain Pickings) to illuminate Cage’s struggle to accept himself and his relationship with choreographer Merce Cunningham. Freed to be his own man, Cage originated exciting experiments that set him at the epicenter of a new avant-garde forming in the 1950s.