NOTHING EXTRA: NOTES ON THE ZEN LIFE

We live with so much pain and sadness, so much uncertainty and fear – but, if we understand the truth about reality, it doesn't have to be a problem. Zen practice isn't about improving yourself or otherwise changing yourself – or, least of all, finding yourself. It's about no longer identifying with the self, the personality, your story of who you think you are. It's about stripping such delusions away, meeting life as it is without adding anything extra, and awakening to your enlightened nature. And that's what this short book – with some chapters only a couple sentences long – does.

In these notes, personal stories, and answers to Zen students' questions, Zen master Dogo Barry Graham shatters myths about mindfulness and self-discovery and gets to the essence of the enlightened life. He discusses love and sex, attachment and freedom, with references ranging through Moby-Dick, Stephen King's horror novel Pet Sematary, Albert Camus, Descartes, Anais Nin and the TV series The Wire. He shows that your place of meditation is wherever you find yourself, whether cloistered in a temple or commuting to work on a city bus. Your enlightenment, your Buddha-nature, is a practical matter, to be addressed and resolved here and now.

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