Hakone Zendo

Shared by Kaz How do you motivate yourself to overcome challenges? Any special tactics? Personally, I train for triathlons every year, and the January training can be a real struggle. It’s cold, often rainy, and still dark in the mornings. Whenever I get ready for training, my mind starts coming up with excuses – maybe…

Shared by Aaron on 1/28/24 From Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki “Zen is not some kind of excitement, but concentration on our usual everyday routine. If you become too busy and too excited, your mind becomes rough and ragged. This is not good. If possible, try to be always calm and joyful and keep…

Shared by Taylor on 1/21/24 Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki: “If you continue this special practice every day, you will obtain some wonderful power. Before you attain it, it is something wonderful, but after you attain it, it is nothing special.” Dogen: “Before one studies Zen, mountains are mountains and waters are waters; after…

Shared by Peter on 1/14/24 Through meditation, we practice mindfulness. So what is mindfulness? Mindfulness is a skill that involves focusing attention on the present moment, rather than dwelling on the past or thinking about the future.  When I learnt practicing meditation for the first time, I was told to be mindful of my breathing–breathe in and breathe…

Shared by Deepak Deepak generated this image using AI To lighten the mood, I shared a humorous story about meditation A bunch of monks were meditating together when a Buddhist deity suddenly appeared before them. The deity pointed to one of the monks, named Larry, and said, “Your meditation is so pure that it has…

Shared by Chris on 12/17 What is the relationship between comfort and growth? Often, discomfort is the gateway or catalyst to growth, which means we should be wary of being overly focused on comfort. A reading from “The Prophet” illustrated this: And tell me, people of Orphalese, what have you in these houses? And what is it…