Tricycle Talks
- Episodes
- 219
- Released
- every two weeks
- Latest episode
- Nov 11, 2026
About the podcast
Tricycle Talks: Listen to Buddhist teachers, writers, and thinkers on life's big questions. Hosted by James Shaheen, editor in chief of Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, the leading Buddhist magazine in the West. Life As It Is: Join James Shaheen with co-host Sharon Salzberg and learn how to bring Buddhist practice into your everyday life. Tricycle: The Buddhist Review creates award-winning editorial, podcasts, events, and video courses. Unlock access to all this Buddhist knowledge by subscribing to the magazine at tricycle.org/join
Episodes 219
Bridging the Sacred and the Mundane with Tsherin Sherpa
Tsherin Sherpa is a classically trained Tibetan thangka painter who splits his time between California and Nepal. His paintings combine traditional techniques and contemporary subject matter, reimagining …
Show notes
Tsherin Sherpa is a classically trained Tibetan thangka painter who splits his time between California and Nepal. His paintings combine traditional techniques and contemporary subject matter, reimagining Tibetan Buddhist iconography in the context of the diaspora. He currently has an exhibition at the Honolulu Museum of Art called “Divine Disruption.”
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Sherpa to talk about what led him to train as a thangka painter at the age of 12, a fateful encounter with Jamba Juice that opened up a new direction in his work, how he incorporates pop art and comic book culture into his paintings, and how he aims to blur the boundaries between the sacred and the secular.
Untying the Knots That Bind with Anne C. Klein
Anne C. Klein is a professor of religious studies at Rice University, a lama in the Nyingma tradition, and a founding teacher at Dawn Mountain Center for Tibetan Buddhism in Houston. Her new book, Lamplight on …
Show notes
Anne C. Klein is a professor of religious studies at Rice University, a lama in the Nyingma tradition, and a founding teacher at Dawn Mountain Center for Tibetan Buddhism in Houston. Her new book, Lamplight on Your Path: Adzom Drukpa's Guide to Dzogchen's Foundational Practices, provides the first English translation of a classic Tibetan practice manual. Considered a companion text to Patrul Rinpoche’s beloved Words of My Perfect Teacher, Lamplight on Your Path offers a commentary on Jigme Lingpa’s foundational practices, or ngondro, that prepare the mind for the state of wholeness and freedom at the heart of the dzogchen tradition.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Klein to talk about what the foundational practices are and why they’re considered so essential, how chanting helps us to internalize and embody the teachings, the relationship between effort and effortlessness in dzogchen practice, and how the foundational practices can untie the knots that bind us to samsara.
Embodying the Dharma Through Ethical Living with Marisela B. Gomez
Marisela B. Gomez is a dharma teacher, physician-scientist, and public health scholar. She recently cowrote a book with Valerie Brown called Love Is Liberation: Five Contemplations for Daily Ethical Living …
Show notes
Marisela B. Gomez is a dharma teacher, physician-scientist, and public health scholar. She recently cowrote a book with Valerie Brown called Love Is Liberation: Five Contemplations for Daily Ethical Living. Drawing from Thich Nhat Hanh’s five mindfulness trainings, the book presents ethical guidelines aimed to help us transform suffering in ourselves, our communities, and our world, particularly in the context of injustice and oppression.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Gomez to discuss how she was first introduced to the five mindfulness trainings, why the mindfulness trainings are like spiritual friends, and how contemplating the trainings can offer us a path back to our values. Plus, Gomez leads a guided meditation.
A Vision of Buddhist Democracy with William Edelglass
On October 14, 1956, B. R. Ambedkar, the Dalit activist and chief architect of the Indian constitution, led nearly half a million followers in a mass conversion to Buddhism. The conversion set in motion the …
Show notes
On October 14, 1956, B. R. Ambedkar, the Dalit activist and chief architect of the Indian constitution, led nearly half a million followers in a mass conversion to Buddhism. The conversion set in motion the development of a religious movement known as Navayana, or New Buddhism, which positioned Buddhism as a fierce rejection of Hindu nationalism and caste politics. In Ambedkar’s reading, Buddhism was uniquely suited to support a revolutionary reconstruction of Indian society grounded in religious transformation. In the years since his death, many Dalits have followed his example and converted to Buddhism as a form of protest and resistance.
In honor of the seventieth anniversary of Ambedkar’s conversion, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sat down with scholar William Edelglass, who has written extensively about Ambedkar’s life and legacy. In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Edelglass discusses why Ambedkar believed reform was inadequate and true change required complete annihilation of caste, how Ambedkar viewed social conflict as the primary cause of suffering, Ambedkar’s reimagining of the Buddha’s life story, and how Ambedkar understood Buddhism as a path of collective freedom from violence and social inequality.
Nirosta Steel on Buddhist Pop and the Making of ‘MY SKYSCRAPER’
Steven Hall, aka Nirosta Steel, has been making ambitious experimental music for more than forty years, though most of it has gone unreleased. This summer, the Indiana label ULYSSA dug through decades of Hall’s …
Show notes
Steven Hall, aka Nirosta Steel, has been making ambitious experimental music for more than forty years, though most of it has gone unreleased. This summer, the Indiana label ULYSSA dug through decades of Hall’s archives to put together his first album in years, MY SKYSCRAPER, which quickly rose to critical acclaim. Drawing from his longtime collaboration with Arthur Russell and building on their notion of “Buddhist pop,” the album presents four decades of Hall’s work, spanning folk, disco, and experimental synth-pop.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Hall to talk about his winding path to music, what he learned from his time with Allen Ginsberg and Larry Fagin, his friendship with Arthur Russell and Russell’s notion of “Buddhist bubblegum,” and how Buddhism literally saved his life.
A Buddhist Guide to How to Truly Love with Maria Heim
Maria Heim is a professor of religion at Amherst College. Her new book, How to Truly Love: An Ancient Guide to a Life of Kindness, presents a fresh and accessible translation of a chapter from the Path of …
Show notes
Maria Heim is a professor of religion at Amherst College. Her new book, How to Truly Love: An Ancient Guide to a Life of Kindness, presents a fresh and accessible translation of a chapter from the Path of Purification, a meditation manual by the great 5th-century sage Buddhaghosa. Through a careful exploration of the brahmaviharas, or sublime attitudes, Buddhaghosa offers practical strategies for releasing anger and hatred and finding freedom.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Heim to discuss why Buddhaghosa considers love a kind of attention, how love can help us see more clearly, why meditation requires a foundation in morality, and how attention to the particular can help us cultivate a universal sense of love for all beings.
Bridging Contemplation and Action with Jonathan F. P. Rose
Jonathan F. P. Rose is an urban planner and philanthropist whose work focuses on creating more environmentally, socially, and economically resilient cities. In 2003, he and his wife, Diana Rose, cofounded the …
Show notes
Jonathan F. P. Rose is an urban planner and philanthropist whose work focuses on creating more environmentally, socially, and economically resilient cities. In 2003, he and his wife, Diana Rose, cofounded the Garrison Institute, a retreat center in the Hudson Valley dedicated to the intersection of contemplation and engaged action.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Rose to discuss how he first came to Buddhism, how the Garrison Institute supports activists to address social challenges through a contemplative lens, and what it means to harness contemplative practices to build resilience, both for individuals and for the planet as a whole.
Illustrating Impermanence with Miya Ando
A sixteenth-generation descendant of Bizen swordsmiths, Miya Ando is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores the ephemerality of natural phenomena. Her new book, Water of the Sky: A Dictionary of 2,000 …
Show notes
A sixteenth-generation descendant of Bizen swordsmiths, Miya Ando is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores the ephemerality of natural phenomena. Her new book, Water of the Sky: A Dictionary of 2,000 Japanese Rain Words, presents a visual compendium of terms for rain, featuring expressions from Buddhist rain sutras, Heian-era poetic anthologies, and regionally specific terms from throughout Japan.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Ando to discuss the concept of mono no aware and how she aims to capture impermanence and transience in visual form, what she’s learned from the radical 15th-century monk Ikkyu Sojun, and how attention to everyday phenomena like rain can invite wonder and awe.
The Practice of Freedom with Oneika Mays
Oneika Mays is a yoga and meditation teacher and former mindfulness coach at Rikers Island Correctional Facility, where she taught for more than a decade. In her new book, Sit with Me: A No-BS Journey to …
Show notes
Oneika Mays is a yoga and meditation teacher and former mindfulness coach at Rikers Island Correctional Facility, where she taught for more than a decade. In her new book, Sit with Me: A No-BS Journey to Mindfulness and Meditation, she draws from her experience at Rikers to lay out a clear and accessible guide to metta, or loving-kindness practice.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Mays to discuss how she came to be Rikers Island’s first mindfulness coach, how metta can be a practice of internal freedom even when external freedom is not a possibility, what she’s learned from bell hooks about love, and how we can remain whole in a world that breaks us apart. Plus, Mays leads a guided meditation.
Writing as Radical Refusal with Viet Thanh Nguyen
When Viet Thanh Nguyen was growing up as a refugee in the United States, it was hard for him to find stories that represented his experience. Now, as a Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist, he is determined to …
Show notes
When Viet Thanh Nguyen was growing up as a refugee in the United States, it was hard for him to find stories that represented his experience. Now, as a Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist, he is determined to center the narratives of Vietnamese writers and artists in the diaspora. His most recent book, The Cleaving: Vietnamese Writers in the Diaspora, which he coedited with Isabelle Thuy Pelaud and Lan Duong, is the first anthology to gather the voices and perspectives of Vietnamese diasporic authors from around the globe. Featuring dialogues among thirty-seven writers and artists, the book explores themes of history and memory, the ongoing legacies of colonialism and war, and the role of art in reckoning with the realities of diaspora and displacement.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Nguyen to talk about how writing can be a tool for fighting back against erasure and exploitation, why he rejects the trope of being a voice for the voiceless and believes instead that we should abolish the conditions of voicelessness, how contributors to the collection complicate notions of authenticity and authority, and how political imagination can be a resource for building a better future.
A Practitioner’s Guide to the Diamond Sutra with Ken McLeod
For the past forty years, Ken McLeod has worked as a teacher and translator of Tibetan texts, practices, and rituals. With his new book, This Unexpected Jewel: Reading the Diamond Sutra, he presents a fresh and …
Show notes
For the past forty years, Ken McLeod has worked as a teacher and translator of Tibetan texts, practices, and rituals. With his new book, This Unexpected Jewel: Reading the Diamond Sutra, he presents a fresh and accessible translation of the Diamond Sutra, one of the most revered texts in the Buddhist tradition.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with McLeod to discuss how his first encounter with the Diamond Sutra caused his mind to stop, why he frames his translation as a practitioner’s translation rather than an academic’s, how the Diamond Sutra cuts through our tendency to rely on conceptual understanding and points to a different way of experiencing life, and the transformative power of reading the sutra aloud. Plus, McLeod reads a few passages from his translation of the Diamond Sutra.
The Zen Art of Caregiving with Sister Tue Nghiem
Sister Tue Nghiem is a dharma teacher in the Plum Village tradition. She is currently based in Australia. In her new book, Caregiving and the Art of Presence: A Zen Nun's Journey of Love and Letting Go, she …
Show notes
Sister Tue Nghiem is a dharma teacher in the Plum Village tradition. She is currently based in Australia. In her new book, Caregiving and the Art of Presence: A Zen Nun's Journey of Love and Letting Go, she reflects on the challenges and unexpected gifts of caring for her mother in the final seven years of her life.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Nghiem to discuss how she came to be her mother’s caregiver, what caring for her mother taught her about the importance of letting go, how suffering can be a catalyst for compassion, and what it means to cultivate the gift of non-fear. Plus, she leads a guided meditation.
The Shamanic Voice of Kim Hyesoon with Jack Saebyok Jung
In March 2014, the legendary avant-garde poet Kim Hyesoon embarked on her first foray into digital performance art. For a duration of eight months, she posted anonymously on the online blog of a major South …
Show notes
In March 2014, the legendary avant-garde poet Kim Hyesoon embarked on her first foray into digital performance art. For a duration of eight months, she posted anonymously on the online blog of a major South Korean publisher under the moniker “Lady No.” Set in a fictional land called Aerok, or Korea spelled backward, the posts explore the anxieties and obsessions of modern Korean society, often using aspects of the occult to point at what is unspeakable or unsaid. In Lady No, poet Jack Saebyok Jung presents translations of these hybrid works into English for the first time.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Jung to talk about how Kim Hyesoon’s poetry resists and outmaneuvers censorship, Hyesoon’s aspiration to achieve transparent poetry, how poetry can respond to the pressures of everyday life, and the shamanic dimensions of Hyesoon’s work. Plus, Jung reads a few poems from Lady No.
The Courage to Choose Love with Tara Brach
Tara Brach is the founder of the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, and she has been practicing and teaching meditation since 1975. She recently released a new book, The Courageous Heart Workbook …
Show notes
Tara Brach is the founder of the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, and she has been practicing and teaching meditation since 1975. She recently released a new book, The Courageous Heart Workbook: Choosing to Love in Perilous Times, which is a practical guide for awakening courage and cultivating compassion for ourselves and our world.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Brach to talk about what courage looks like in our current moment, how choosing love can help counter the dangers of what she calls the trance of separation, how we can learn to recognize our own basic goodness, and the power of reconnecting with our aspiration and sense of what matters most. Plus, Brach leads a guided meditation.
Engaged Compassion with Lobsang Tenzin Negi
Lobsang Tenzin Negi is the cofounder and executive director of the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics at Emory University. He is also a professor in Emory’s Department of Religion. In …
Show notes
Lobsang Tenzin Negi is the cofounder and executive director of the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics at Emory University. He is also a professor in Emory’s Department of Religion. In his new book, Engaged Compassion: Seven Practices to Cultivate Resilience, Connection, and a Joyous Life, he builds on more than twenty years of research in laying out concrete practices for developing compassion for ourselves and others.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Negi to discuss how he came to develop a model known as Cognitively Based Compassion Training, why he views compassion as a trainable skill, how Buddhist stories can help us understand and experience a sense of belonging and connection, and what he’s learned from his work with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Plus, Negi leads a guided meditation.
Reincarnating the Buddhas of Bamiyan with Tuan Andrew Nguyen
Tuan Andrew Nguyen is a multidisciplinary artist whose work focuses on history, memory, and the ongoing impact of violence and war, particularly in his native Vietnam. He recently unveiled a new project on New …
Show notes
Tuan Andrew Nguyen is a multidisciplinary artist whose work focuses on history, memory, and the ongoing impact of violence and war, particularly in his native Vietnam. He recently unveiled a new project on New York City’s High Line, which is a twenty-seven-foot-tall Buddha sculpture inspired by the Buddhas of Bamiyan titled The Light That Shines Through the Universe.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Nguyen to discuss the backstory for his new installation, his process of transforming remnants of war into works of art, how storytelling can be an instrument of healing and resistance, and how teachings on reincarnation influence his artistic practice.
Writing into the Void with Ruth Ozeki
Ruth Ozeki is a novelist, filmmaker, and Zen priest. She recently published her first short story collection, The Typing Lady and Other Fictions. With characteristic wit and grace, Ozeki astutely explores …
Show notes
Ruth Ozeki is a novelist, filmmaker, and Zen priest. She recently published her first short story collection, The Typing Lady and Other Fictions. With characteristic wit and grace, Ozeki astutely explores themes of identity, longing, loss, and the clarity that comes with old age. In one story, a couple watches their ambitions roam the woods as ghosts; in another, an aging writer enlists her granddaughter to fake her death as a way of getting out of an upcoming book tour.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Ozeki to discuss what drew her to the form of the short story, how the Buddhist teaching of not-self informs her writing, how writing short stories can be an act of surrender, and the lessons she learned from caring for her mother in the final years of her life. Plus, Ozeki reads a short excerpt from one of the stories in the collection.
Finding Balance to Engage More Fully with Margaret Cullen
Equanimity can often be mistaken for passivity or indifference. But meditation teacher Margaret Cullen insists that it is actually about feeling the entire range of human experience—and, in the process …
Show notes
Equanimity can often be mistaken for passivity or indifference. But meditation teacher Margaret Cullen insists that it is actually about feeling the entire range of human experience—and, in the process, responding from a place of love and discernment.
Cullen is a licensed psychotherapist and mindfulness-based stress reduction instructor, and she has taught mindfulness and contemplative practices around the world. In her new book, Quiet Strength: Find Peace, Feel Alive, and Love Boundlessly Through the Power of Equanimity, she explores how equanimity can help us respond to the challenges of our times with greater curiosity and compassion.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Cullen to discuss the difference between equanimity and indifference, why equanimity is an expression of love, and how equanimity can help us engage more fully with the world rather than withdraw from it. Plus, Cullen leads a guided meditation.
A Beginner’s Guide to Dark Retreat with Andrew Holecek
Andrew Holecek is an author and spiritual teacher in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, and he leads seminars and retreats on meditation, dream yoga, and death and dying. For the past thirty years, he has been …
Show notes
Andrew Holecek is an author and spiritual teacher in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, and he leads seminars and retreats on meditation, dream yoga, and death and dying. For the past thirty years, he has been engaging in a form of esoteric practice known as dark retreat. In his new book, Total Eclipse of the Mind: Unleashing the Power of Darkness for Creativity, Healing, and Transformation, he lays out a comprehensive introduction to the practice of dark retreat and how it can utterly transform our relationship to ourselves and our world.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Holecek to discuss what exactly a dark retreat is, why he views dark retreat as the most transformative practice he’s done, how spending time in darkness can help us recover a lost way of seeing, and what the darkness can teach us about our unconscious mind. Plus, Holecek offers practical guidelines for starting a dark retreat practice at home.
Did the Buddha Really Teach That There Is No Self?
Thanissaro Bhikkhu is an American Theravada Buddhist monk trained in the Thai forest tradition. He currently serves as abbot of the Metta Forest Monastery in San Diego County and is a frequent contributor to …
Show notes
Thanissaro Bhikkhu is an American Theravada Buddhist monk trained in the Thai forest tradition. He currently serves as abbot of the Metta Forest Monastery in San Diego County and is a frequent contributor to Tricycle. Over the years, he has written extensively on the Buddhist concept of not-self, including the many misperceptions that have arisen about this teaching over the centuries.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Thanissaro Bhikkhu to discuss why the Buddha refused to answer when he was asked whether there was a self, what it means to consider not-self as a strategy rather than an ontological truth, why perceptions of self and not-self are types of karma or activity, and why all views and perceptions are eventually discarded on the path to awakening.
Opening to Wonder with Ada Limón
Ada Limón is the author of seven books of poetry, and she recently completed her term as the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States. During her tenure as Poet Laureate, Limón undertook a series of projects …
Show notes
Ada Limón is the author of seven books of poetry, and she recently completed her term as the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States. During her tenure as Poet Laureate, Limón undertook a series of projects harnessing poetry to transform our relationship to the natural world, from installing poems on picnic benches in national parks across the country to engraving a poem on a spacecraft that is on its way to the second moon of Jupiter. In her new book, Against Breaking: On the Power of Poetry, she draws from her experience as Poet Laureate to argue that poetry can be a powerful force for healing, connection, and courage.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Limón to discuss why she views poetry as a sacred language, how poetry can help us move through the world with courage and equanimity, what it means for poetry to exist in the questions, and how reading and writing poetry can help us imagine a different type of future.
Bridging Worlds with US Poet Laureate Arthur Sze
Arthur Sze is a poet and translator based in Sante Fe, New Mexico, and he is currently serving as the 25th Poet Laureate of the United States. His new book, Transient Worlds: On Translating Poetry, takes …
Show notes
Arthur Sze is a poet and translator based in Sante Fe, New Mexico, and he is currently serving as the 25th Poet Laureate of the United States. His new book, Transient Worlds: On Translating Poetry, takes readers through nearly two millennia of poetry from across the world and explores how translation can deepen our understanding and appreciation of poetry.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Sze to discuss why he views translation as the deepest form of reading, how poetry can prompt us toward moral and spiritual transformation, what it means for translation to be an impossible task, and how poetry can build bridges and connections across languages and cultures. Plus, Sze reads a few poems from the new collection.
A Buddhist Guide to Understanding Emotion with Maria Heim
Buddhism can often be mischaracterized as encouraging the elimination of emotion. Yet, as scholar Maria Heim points out, feeling is central to Buddhist teachings and practices—in fact, the Buddha presented the …
Show notes
Buddhism can often be mischaracterized as encouraging the elimination of emotion. Yet, as scholar Maria Heim points out, feeling is central to Buddhist teachings and practices—in fact, the Buddha presented the four noble truths as being “for one who feels.”
Heim is the George Lyman Crosby 1896 & Stanley Warfield Crosby Professor in Religion at Amherst College, and her new book, How to Feel: An Ancient Guide to Minding Our Emotions, presents new translations of essential early Buddhist teachings on emotion. Drawing from the Pali canon, she argues that the Buddhist psychology of emotions can offer us a different way of observing and relating to our feelings—and, in the process, bring about a sense of freedom.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Heim to discuss the misconception that Buddhism encourages the complete elimination of feeling, the paradoxical relationship between pleasure and pain in early Buddhist texts, how language can describe and shape experience, and how noticing our feelings can fundamentally restructure our behavior.
Reimagining the Story of Citizenship with Daisy Hernández
Daisy Hernández is an associate professor at Northwestern University and a Tricycle contributing editor. Her new book, Citizenship: Notes on an American Myth, blends memoir and political analysis to examine the …
Show notes
Daisy Hernández is an associate professor at Northwestern University and a Tricycle contributing editor. Her new book, Citizenship: Notes on an American Myth, blends memoir and political analysis to examine the shifting narratives around citizenship and what it means to be an American. This episode is a little different from our usual focus, but we wanted to talk with Hernández about how she brings her Buddhist practice to bear on this timely topic.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Hernández to discuss her own family’s immigration stories, why she views citizenship as a story or a myth, how she works with feelings of political despair, and what she’s learned from revisiting Thich Nhat Hanh’s writings on the Vietnam War in our current moment.
Dementia and the Sense of Self with Philip Ryan
Philip Ryan is Tricycle’s executive editor, and he has worked at Tricycle on and off for the past thirty years. In the Spring issue of Tricycle, he wrote an article, "Old Friend," about his father’s dementia …
Show notes
Philip Ryan is Tricycle’s executive editor, and he has worked at Tricycle on and off for the past thirty years. In the Spring issue of Tricycle, he wrote an article, "Old Friend," about his father’s dementia diagnosis and the questions it has raised about memory, impermanence, and identity.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Ryan to discuss how Buddhist teachings on the mind have helped him to make sense of his father’s diagnosis, why we are ultimately unknowable to each other and ourselves, and how dementia is the perfect illustration of the truths of impermanence, suffering, and nonself—or maybe a mockery of those truths.
Demystifying Tantra with Richard Payne
Tantric Buddhism is often mischaracterized or misunderstood, both in the academy and in the popular imagination. Scholar Richard Payne has dedicated much of the past twenty years to studying tantric teachings …
Show notes
Tantric Buddhism is often mischaracterized or misunderstood, both in the academy and in the popular imagination. Scholar Richard Payne has dedicated much of the past twenty years to studying tantric teachings and practices—and to dispelling some of the common misconceptions associated with the tradition.
Payne is the Yehan Numata Professor of Japanese Buddhist Studies at the Institute of Buddhist Studies, Berkeley, as well as an ordained priest in the Shingon tradition of Japanese esoteric Buddhism. In his new book, Tantra Across the Buddhist Cosmopolis, he examines the evolution of tantric traditions from early medieval India to the present day.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Payne to discuss the difficulties in trying to define tantra, how tantra challenges popular and scholarly notions about the nature of religion, and how he came to ordain as a Shingon priest.
The Practice of Refuge with Sunita Puri
Sunita Puri is a writer, a palliative medicine physician, and an associate professor of medicine at the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine. She is the author of That Good Night: Life and …
Show notes
Sunita Puri is a writer, a palliative medicine physician, and an associate professor of medicine at the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine. She is the author of That Good Night: Life and Medicine in the Eleventh Hour. She recently wrote an article for the Spring issue of Tricycle called “Seeking Refuge,” where she discusses how she has found refuge in nature in the face of burnout.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Puri to discuss what first led her to turn to nature as a way to hold her grief, how her relationship to the concept of refuge has evolved over time, why she views refuge as a practice rather than a place, and how Buddhist teachings on impermanence have shaped her life and her practice.
Poet Li-Young Lee on Awe, Adoration, and Turning Toward the Unknown
For poet Li-Young Lee, writing is a deeply spiritual practice. Taking inspiration from Daoist and Christian texts, his poems investigate the paradoxical relationships between silence and sound, stillness and …
Show notes
For poet Li-Young Lee, writing is a deeply spiritual practice. Taking inspiration from Daoist and Christian texts, his poems investigate the paradoxical relationships between silence and sound, stillness and motion, and form and formlessness. He recently published his sixth collection of poetry, The Invention of the Darling, as well as a translation of the Dao De Jing, which he completed with the poet and cosmologist Yun Wang.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Lee to discuss the spiritual influences on his poetry, why he views every poem as a descendant of God, how he writes from a state of don’t-know mind, and why he believes the task of the poet is to reconcile all opposites. Plus, Lee reads a few poems from The Invention of the Darling.
‘To Live the Right Way’ with David Guterson
David Guterson is a writer based in Washington State. His new novel, Evelyn in Transit, follows the interlocking stories of Evelyn and Tsering, a young woman from Indiana and a Buddhist monk from the mountains …
Show notes
David Guterson is a writer based in Washington State. His new novel, Evelyn in Transit, follows the interlocking stories of Evelyn and Tsering, a young woman from Indiana and a Buddhist monk from the mountains of Tibet. Their lives come together when Evelyn’s son is revealed to be the seventh reincarnation of a high lama, and Evelyn must decide whether to send her young child to Nepal.
In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Guterson to discuss how a childhood fight with a member of the Sakya family first introduced him to Buddhism, the remarkable story of the Sakya family and the real-life inspiration for the novel, the relationship between faith and doubt, and what it means to find freedom from the self.
Into the Long Dark with Francis Weller
Francis Weller is a writer and soul activist who has worked as a psychotherapist for forty years, and he is currently on staff at Commonweal Cancer Help Program. In his most recent book, In the Absence of the …
Show notes
Francis Weller is a writer and soul activist who has worked as a psychotherapist for forty years, and he is currently on staff at Commonweal Cancer Help Program. In his most recent book, In the Absence of the Ordinary: Soul Work for Times of Uncertainty, he lays out practices for embodying new ways of being so that we can meet the anxieties and unknowns of our time with presence and faith. Weller is also the author of The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief and the companion workbook, Entering the Healing Ground, which will be released on February 24.
In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Weller to talk about why he views listening as an art of reverence, the subversive power of restraint, how not knowing situates us at the edge of discovery, and the role of ritual in navigating what he calls the Long Dark. Plus, Weller leads a guided practice.
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