Adam Frank is an oddsmaker on the grandest scale. Thirty years ago, he says, science did not even know that planets existed outside the Solar System. But a revolution in data and observations has changed that. In a big way. We now know, he says, that not only are there other planets but that a few of them, like Earth,…
A knot sat in my throat for days. As I rode down the winding and rugged road to Tassajara Zen Mountain Center in the Los Padres Forest, I was aware that a Queen called Aretha Franklin was dying. I felt this deep sense that I was dying with her. The next morning along with the wake up bell at the…
When I was first diagnosed with breast cancer at age 34, I was fortunate to be surrounded by many loving friends and family who were ready to support me in whatever ways I needed. Apparently, I didn’t think I needed much. I was already a student of Buddhism and a yogi with a very healthy self-care routine. I was also…
The Wheel of Awareness is a useful tool I’ve developed over many years to help expand the container of consciousness. I’ve offered the Wheel to thousands of individuals around the world, and it’s proven to be a practice that can help people develop more well-being in both their inner and interpersonal lives. The Wheel of Awareness practice is based on…
As part of our “Garrison Talks at the JCC” event series at the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan, meditation teacher and author Sharon Salzberg recently spoke with author and teacher Frank Ostaseski, a leader in the field of end-of-life care, about courage. Frank Ostaseski: My dear friend Roshi Joan Halifax recently published her new book, Standing at the Edge: Finding Fear…
Frank Ostaseski and Roshi Joan Halifax, pioneers in the field of contemplative end-of-life care, who have trained thousands of healthcare clinicians and caregivers, recently led a retreat at the Institute on the compassionate care of the dying. Being with those who are dying can be an intense, intimate, and deeply alive experience. It often challenges old patterns, reveals our deepest…
I still remember the event that made me into an environmentalist. I was seven or eight years old, standing outside with my father watching a large flock of starlings fly past. “That’s a big flock of birds,” I said. My father told me then about the passenger pigeon, whose flocks once filled the skies, so vast that they stretched from…
We know only too well the story that defines our world today. It is a tale of consumerism and greed, sustained by the empty but enticing promise of an endless stream of “stuff” as the source of our happiness and well-being. Some of us are finally coming to recognize the self-destructive madness of this myth, how we are ravaging our…