The dead piled up, thick, fragrant, on the fire escape. My mother ordered me again, and again, to sweep it clean. All that blooms must fall. I learned this not from the Dao, but from high school biology. From "Autumn Leaves" by Marilyn Chin All th...

Instead, I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.  Barbara B...

I started reading Barbara Brown Taylor's Learning to Walk In The Dark in women's group early this year. (We read a chapter and share our thoughts about it monthly.) Prior to reading the text, and talking about it together, I had never given much thou...

Pema Chödrön did not become one of my teachers until I had almost finished writing, but she diagnosed the problem so well that I can no longer say it without her help. We are all so busy constructing zones of safety that keep breaking down, she say...