Meditations

It was just a few seconds on BBC news, in what already seems like another time in the spiraling chaos the world has become. But the image seared my heart…

One of my sitting places is under a great sycamore on the banks of a small stream in the middle of expansive fields, with a view of the canyon and…

Descartes was wrong. He should have said: I think, and therefore I am divided. Then perhaps the world would not be so divided between East and West, North and South,…

Sometimes what people call meditation is as far from my understanding of it as a jihadist’s idea of heaven. It sounds more like the continuity of hell to me. Central…

So-called mystical experiences are impossible to be certain of, yet without experiencing something beyond the human mind life becomes a barren desert. Communion with the numinous is the wellspring of…

Since the beginning of civilization, and probably before, sages have said, “know yourself.” There is no truism more common, yet also more commonly ignored. Just what is self-knowing, and why…

The African leaders at the first-ever US-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington last week presented an upbeat image of an African continent ready to do business. But can business lead, or…

People that were unfortunate (or fortunate) enough to be near the epicenter of the atomic blast in Hiroshima 69 years ago today were instantly vaporized. They left only their outlines…