Dharma Roads

Send us Fan Mail In this episode I share some thoughts about what I have learnt from zazen practice and how it has come to be so central to my life. In my experience, zazen (Zen meditation) is a very creative, expansive and revitalising activity. The mind seems to open naturally to fresh understandings and shifts of perspective - as if windows and doors open, allowing the cool breeze of thoughts, feelings and sensations to flow unhindered.

Send us Fan Mail In this episode I explore ideas about nirvana, awakening and what we mean by ‘the self,’ as described in the Buddhist traditions founded by Gotama Buddha - whom scholars reckon may have lived around 400 BCE. I suggest that awakening and ourselves are processes, rather than fixed states or things, and that we can cultivate them through mindful awareness or Zen meditation. Rather than being accessible only to a few people endowed with special powers, awakening is an art we can ...

Send us Fan Mail The brevity of life and the nature of time are topics that humans have puzzled over for at least two thousand years – and probably for as long as our species has walked the earth. In this episode I want to offer a few thoughts on these matters and on the mysterious phenomenon we refer to as ‘the present moment.’ What I have to say is rooted in my experience of zazen, Zen meditation, and in my study of Buddhist thought and other philosophical traditions. The practice of zazen ...

Send us Fan Mail In this extended episode, I talk about the ideas and insights of two thinkers, David Hume who lived in the eighteenth century, and Isaiah Berlin, who died in 1997. They both offer us interesting thoughts about human nature, what we mean by ‘the self’ and how to enshrine multiple personal freedoms and rights within a vibrant society. Both writers argue for tolerance and benign scepticism. I also suggest some connections between their ideas and those of Gotama Buddha.

Send us Fan Mail In this episode I talk about the American poet, essayist and translator, Kenneth Rexroth. Like Gary Snyder, who I will speak about in a future episode, Rexroth explores the natural world – both literally, as a hiker through the American landscape, and in his poetry and other writings. Rexroth belongs to the generation immediately prior to Snyder though they did know each other well in the 1950s. I will touch on various strands of his work and point out a few parallels with Bu...

Send us Fan Mail In this special episode I interview, Mike Slott, about his new book titled, Mindful Solidarity: A Secular Buddhist Democratic Socialist Dialogue. Mike is the founder of the Secular Buddhist Network – an organisation that has done a lot of work advocating for a secular approach to Buddhist ideas and practices, and in helping to link together secular Buddhist individuals and groups from around the world. In his book Mike argues for a dialogue between secular Buddhists an...

Send us Fan Mail In this extended episode I share some thoughts on a strand of philosophy known as ‘pragmatism’ as realized in the work of one of its key exponents, John Dewey – who was born in 1859 and died in 1952 at the ripe old age of ninety-three. Here and there I will point out parallels between Dewey’s ideas and the ideas and practices of other Buddhist and non-Buddhist thinkers I have mentioned in earlier talks. Over Dewey’s long life he had a profound influence on American philosophy...

Send us Fan Mail In Episode 21 I talked about existentialism and mentioned that while Jean Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and other existentialist thinkers were agnostics or atheists, there were a number of influential Christian philosophers who developed forms of existential thinking. The earliest of these was the Danish theologian, Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), who lived in Copenhagen for most of his life. In this episode I share a few thoughts about Kierkegaard's ideas and life. Please k...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, I return to the question discussed in Episode 22, that is, what kind of ethical values may be necessary to the development of a just and peaceful society – describing in more detail what I have called ‘mindful ethics.’ In a sense what I say here is repeating what I had to say in Episode 7, though with some significant changes. In particular, I provide a slightly different way of articulating, and thinking about, the ‘Eightfold Path’ – one of the key features ...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode I talk about my many years of Zen meditation practice and relate my experience to the development of a sceptical, secular Zen that is rooted in contemporary western culture – with an emphasis on empirical investigation, naturalism rather than supernaturalism, and minimal ritual. I relate this development to the twin functions of teaching and learning - that is, transmission and transformation – as first suggested by the Brazilian philosopher of education, Paol...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode I suggest that the current neo-liberal forms of capitalism are unsustainable insofar as they are damaging to our planet and its life-supporting atmosphere, and as they generate, in the human realm, divisive and deeply inequitable social structures. I argue that we need to develop more beneficial modes of living, working and doing business, grounded in what I think of as mindful ethics – an ethics of compassion, clear-sightedness and sustainability.

Send us Fan Mail In this episode I share some thoughts about impermanence, clinging and the value of non-attachment. I also reflect on what it means to be here – the miraculous nature of being alive and conscious. I go on to say something about interdependence and the ways in which mindful meditation can help us to appreciate our daily lives and to learn how to let go rather than to hang on.

Send us Fan Mail In this episode I explore the relationship between poetry and paying attention – the ways in which poets are mindful - noticing things that often get missed in the merry-go-round of life. In the act of making poems, poets practice a kind of mindful attention – taking notice of what is happening in, and around, themselves in a clear-sighted yet caring and compassionate way. One of the primary purposes of poetry is to celebrate and share these acts of acute attentiveness as con...