ABOUT

The zenartisan website does not involve zen as a religion, but rather zen as a philosophy.  This is not the sitting zen, nor the breathing zen, nor the chanting zen.  This site is dedicated to the chopping wood, the carrying water, the sleeping, waking, eating, brushing-your-teeth part of zen.

“I have always found that the people who have quite genuinely died to themselves make no claims of any kind to their own part in the process. They think of themselves as lazy and lucky. If they did anything at all, it was so simple that anyone else could do the same – for all that they have done is to recognize a universal fact of life, something as true of the weak and foolish as of the wise and strong.  They would even say that in this respect there is some advantage in being weak and foolish, for the possession of a strong will and a clever head makes some things very difficult to see.  A successful merchant will be perhaps less ready than a mere tramp to see that the same oblivion engulfs both of them.  To the genuine dead-man-come-alive, sage, mystic, Buddha, jivanmukta, or what you will, the notion that he attained this state by some effort or by some special capacity of his own is always absurd and impossible.”      Alan Watts, Become Who You Are,  (Page 5).

During the warm months, I watch as my neighbors mow their lawns on Fridays, after work, in order to save their weekends for their more important endeavors. Every morning I encounter motorists speeding – weaving in and out of traffic in a rush to get to work.  Later, I watch them speeding and weaving in the evening, in a rush to get away from work.  Rush, rush, rush – always making time for the important stuff!

I hope to make this site a collection of that “stuff” that is too quickly overlooked in the rush to the all important moments of ones life.  The threads of everyday life are constantly being woven strand by strand into the simple fabric of existence.  I intend to direct my focus on the threads.
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