I know something of the training of physicians and I know something of the training of chaplains. They are very different forms of training. A physician relies on knowledge and experience in their work. A chaplain relies on presence and a therapeutic self. It is rare to find a chaplain or a physician who can […]
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Zen Training outside the Dojo
8 February 2020 I finally self-published the book I’ve been working on: once called Wrestling with Angels, now called Facing Suffering. When originally describing it, I would say that it is an account of my three months of training as a hospital chaplain. Now I’m realizing that is not what the book is about. Out […]
Blog #5
Aug 9, 2018 One reason I like mowing the meadow is the fresh smell every few seconds as different plants are sliced while the tractor chugs along. There is a news stream to the nostrils that I can’t decipher but I love to receive it anyway. What the plants are expressing is important, and maybe […]
Blog #4
June 13, 2018 Here’s a strange bit of suffering, something of my own. It feels vague, ill-formed, self-indulgent, but also real. Something I often tell medical students when talking about suffering is that I try not to judge degrees of suffering – “this suffering is much more significant than that suffering.” We first have to […]
The Weight of Suffering
24 April 2018 I’ve just finished participating in a day-long symposium on Suffering and Caring: Perspectives from Medicine, Philosophy, and Zen, held at the University of San Francisco. I was the Zen representative, working with two philosophers and a physician and an audience primarily of USF students. Over the course of preparing for the symposium, […]
Given a choice between Heaven and Hell…
I got a phone call from a long-time Zen student, one who knows how to cut to the chase in most conversations. He asked, “Does suffering end?” Without thought, I answered, “No.” We then got into the story of his suffering and I explained more of my “no.” But later I was reflecting on why […]
When Breath Becomes Air
I saw a man in the intensive care unit last night, close to brain death. Tubes and monitors all around. The hospitalist on duty is carefully explaining to the family of this forty-three-year-old man the sequence of events likely to take place over the next several hours as his skull continues to fill with blood […]