The Incomplete Zen Master's Guide

MESSAGE

I wholeheartedly endorse the powerful appeal for peace made by the Holy Father, Pope Leo, during his Palm Sunday Mass. His call for the laying down of arms and the renunciation of violence resonated profoundly with me, as it speaks to the very essence of what all major religions teach.

Indeed, whether we look to Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism or any of the world's great spiritual traditions, the message is fundamentally the same: love, compassion, tolerance, and self-discipline. Violence finds no true home in any of these teachings. History has shown us time and again that violence only begets more violence and is never a lasting foundation for peace.

An enduring resolution to conflict, including the ones we see in the Middle East or between Russia and Ukraine, must be rooted in dialogue, diplomacy and mutual respect — approached with the understanding that, at the deepest level, we are all brothers and sisters.

I urge for and pray that the violence and conflicts may soon come to an end.

DALAI LAMA

31 March 2026

Are you sitting now…

Has sitting under a tree helped. No.
Sit some more!

You may have thought I died: alas, not, but having nothing to say…

“The reason why the Buddha declared his teaching as a sort of Good News to the planet was not because he had discovered the First Noble Truth, that everything is suffering.

In fact he did not even mean that everything is suffering—he meant that every unenlightened and selfishness-dominated thing is suffering.

His real truth, the one that Buddhists actually take refuge in, was the Third Noble Truth, the truth of freedom from all suffering; of freedom as the reality of life, that beings are free; and that they therefore have the right to happiness, naturally. This is why the Buddha was so cheerful.”

— Robert A.F. Thurman in MINDSCIENCE

Robert A.F. Thurman Menla Mind & Life Institute

Attachment is as fleeting as the dew drops on a branch…

Grasp the
timelessness impermanence
of life

Buddha wouldn’t care as attachment only causes suffering including image…

Can’t sit under a tree, think about just sitting under a tree…