Title: zazenist

Gender: Female

Age: 35

Sun Sign: Cancer

Chinese Sign: Water Ox

As a Buddhist and one who has been suffering from a disabling chronic illness for nearly eight years, one of my main focuses has become the practice of illness.  I'm interested in the groundlessess of illness, and what it teaches us about suffering, nonduality, and how to better live our lives, ultimately transcending our suffering.  I hope someday to make a meaningful contribution to the wisdom in this area and to help people who are having the same experiences to discover their true inner nature.

Apart from that, I'm an aspiring freelance writer, long-time vegetarian (who trends vegan) and pilgrim.  Even though I consider myself a Buddhist and all of my formal instruction has been in Buddhism (in the Tibetan and Zen traditions), I am fairly ecumenical when it comes to other schools of nondual thought.  I don't believe anyone has a monopoly on truth, and I'm inclined to take good teachings when I find them.  Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj have been very influential to me, and I still consider them among my teachers.  I am always drawn to the quiet, simple, expression of practice, to people for whom practice isn't really even an expression - it just is.  People like Sunyata (Alfred Emanuel Sørensen, aka “Mr. Nobody”) impress me in this way. 

My blog, a sort of spiritual journal:

flowing water, uncarved block


“Though I know writing is a bad habit for a Zen priest, I can't help it.  I seem to be writing all the time.  I write poems, of several varieties in several voices, journal entries, dharma talks, essays, books, notes, lists, stories, emails, blogs.  In doing all this, I have no special purpose I can discern or explain.  Though I hope it does somebody some good, I am not at all sure.  It may even do some harm.  More likely, it may just be a waste of time.  What am I doing when I write?  I am not documenting my life for my friends or posterity, nor am I telling anybody something they don't already know or need to hear from me.  Why go on?  I am compelled to, delighted to.  There seems to be something crucial about working with language, something that wakes me up or brings a quality of density or significance to my life, even though I can't say what that significance is more than it is a feeling or a texture.  Besides, writing is a deep pleasure.  And besides that, I have always written, seem to be a writer in temperament and impulse, and what writers do is write; they just can't help themselves.”
                                                          -Norman Fischer

“Bungled it trying to be smart.”
                                                          -Layman P'ang

Member Since: Wednesday, November 01 2006

Last Visit: 520 days ago.

Profile Viewed: 1269 times (last viewed less than a minute ago)