Zen Moments

“Suddenly I was face to face with a swinging club…”

For some years I taught Art to teenagers who had been excluded from school. You have to be so careful with kids like these. Especially when they first arrive. They’re often hostile – brittle, ready to fly off the handle at the least imagined slight. The [...]

“As heartbroken as I felt, my world had become richer for loving.”

I was in Southern India at an Ashram at the foot of a sacred mountain. During my time there I would go from the mountain to the place I was staying. There were many people living on the streets and many animals, as anyone [...]

“I was tossing the coin to decide whether to buy an apple or an orange with our last dollar…”

In August 1987, I left my job in Sydney, and hitch-hiked to Ayers Rock to see the Harmonic Convergence – a special alignment of planets which was supposed to usher in the New Age.
My friends at work [...]

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life”

Commencement address by Steve Jobs
CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios
Given to graduates of Stanford University, June 12, 2005 (Duration: 15 mins)
“I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help [...]

“So – stand back and look at what it’s costing emotionally.
Forget the money for the moment…”

Having been a Buddhist monk, and now running an IT support business, I find that these two worlds sometimes overlap in surprising ways.
In running my business, I never sign contracts with people. Everything is done on trust, people come [...]

“Just me and the water and the deepest blue sky above…”

It was the first time I had gone swimming. I wasn’t scared of the water but there was apprehension about going under and not getting my breath. So when my friend who was helping me learn to float told me to dunk my head in [...]

“They tried to ask in a dozen ways what was wrong…”

A Zen Moments reader sent us this gentle story about the care that one devoted family took to find out what was troubling their loving, elderly father.
In his later years he suffered from advanced dementia and lived in a nursing home where his family often [...]

“There comes a time in your life when you finally get it… “

There comes a time in your life when you finally get it… When in the midst of all your fears and insanity you stop dead in your tracks and somewhere the voice inside your head cries out- ENOUGH! Enough fighting and crying or [...]

“The darker it gets, the more brightly the light shines”

Just as a smile is infectious and causes delight in others, so, much more powerfully, our wisdom and compassion shines like a warm and tender light on those around us, and our very being becomes a gift to others…
The darker it gets, the more brightly the [...]

“In making our minds up, we set them up to be broken down.
We create the conditions for doubt by trying to create certainty.”

Once upon a time I knew what I wanted out of life. I knew where I was going. I was going to be a Great Inventor.
And I revelled in that sense of confidence [...]