Various things

An important notice, a powerful talk, and a recommendation

Important notice about my book Nothing to Grasp:

Late on Friday (May 9), it was discovered that an important part of one sentence in the new paperback edition of Nothing to Grasp had somehow been left out. The omission was only in the paperback, not in the ebook. The error has now been corrected, but if you ordered the new paperback edition before the correction uploaded sometime on Saturday (May 10), the copy you receive might have this error: On p 26, second paragraph, the first line should say, "The wonder of life is intimately connected to its transience and insubstantiality.”

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A Powerful Talk:

This roughly 30 minute video is one of the most beautiful talks I’ve ever heard. When you listen to someone like John Butler or Toni Packer, someone who speaks from a deep listening presence, you have to be really present with it to truly receive it. It’s not just the words that matter, and it’s not about absorbing new ideas to think about. So please don't listen while driving or cleaning the house. Give it your full attention. Actually, this is a video, so you probably won’t be driving or cleaning the house, but I’d urge you not to be doing anything else other than simply, fully listening. If you do that, this talk may be all you ever need to hear:

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A Recommendation:

A dear friend in Scotland recommended a marvelous little Zen book to me called Delving by Daishin Morgan, and I now want to recommend it to all of you. I quoted a bit from it at the beginning of my recent Substack article titled Sufficiency.

This slender, stripped down, exquisitely clear book is an absolute jewel, one of the very best books I've read on Buddhism's essential message, pointing to right here, just this, grasping nothing, delving simply and fully into the present experience of being. It’s really an extraordinary book.

Daishin Morgan is a disciple of Rev. Master Jiyu-Kennett and the first abbot of Throssel Hole Buddhist Abbey in the UK. His teaching is simple and clear, and I love that he shares openly and honestly about his own life in many places throughout the book.

In a chapter called "What Is Real?", Daishin makes a great distinction between scientific exploration and meditative exploration:

"Inner experience does not give you scientific insight, nor does science bear on my inner experience of the world... one is the search for an objective truth; the other is an awakening to the open spaces and their sufficiency. I particularly value the intellect for its power to reveal unfounded beliefs. Yet when it comes to direct experience, the intellect has nothing to say. What I am engaged in is not a scientific inquiry. Whether or not consciousness is explained by a new theory will not, by itself, help me to be in the open spaces."

Given all the recent heady debates in various places over the primacy of consciousness and whether AI is conscious and all such topics, this simple observation—as well as John Butler’s talk—was a great reminder that the heart of spirituality is not intellectual or ideological. It doesn’t need to be figured out. It’s experiential and immediate and requires nothing more or less than our whole-hearted presence.

Throughout the book, Daishin stresses that Zen is about delving into the present experience of being, not looking for something better, not putting any kind of spin on it, but simply being present to and inseparable from the living actuality as it is.

“There is a sufficiency at the heart of life and when we awaken to it, life is fulfilled. It is not a matter of conditions being sufficient, rather that reality is sufficient and complete in itself… At the most fundamental level, reality does not lack anything.”

You can find Daishin's books here and on Amazon. A paperback copy of Delving can be ordered from Lulu. More from and about Daishin Morgan here and here. Very highly recommended.

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Love to all…