Featured Contributors

Tsoknyi Rinpoche and Daniel Goleman

A son of the late Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche, Tsoknyi Rinpoche is a Nepalese Tibetan Buddhist teacher, a tulku (reincarnate lama) of the Drukpa Kagyu and Nyingma traditions, and the holder of the Tsoknyi lineage. His books include Open Heart, Open Mind; How Mindfulness Works; and Fearless Simplicity. Daniel Goleman is a psychologist, bestselling author, and science journalist who has written on such topics as creativity, meditation, emotional intelligence, and the ecological crisis. Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, speaks with Rinpoche and Goleman about their work to unite traditional Tibetan practices with Western psychology and their upcoming book, Why We Meditate.

Daisy Hernández

Daisy Hernández is a journalist, memoirist, and cultural activist. She has reported on race, feminism, spirituality, and queer identity for the Atlantic, the New York Times, Slate, and other publications. Her book The Kissing Bug: A True Story of a Family, an Insect, and a Nation’s Neglect of a Deadly Disease won the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award. Her other works include A Cup of Water Under My Bed: A Memoir and Colonize This! Young Women of Color on Today’s Feminism. She is Associate Professor of Creative English Writing at Miami University in Ohio. Hernández interviews author Sandra Cisneros on Buddhism, sexuality, and her new book of poetry, Woman Without Shame.

Allison Aitken

Allison Aitken is an assistant professor of philosophy at Columbia University whose scholarly interests range from Indian and Tibetan Buddhist philosophy to early modern European thought. Her forthcoming book, Introduction to Reality: Srigupta’s Tattvavataravrtti, focuses on the 3rd-century Indian Madhyamaka philosopher’s commentary and the first-ever translation of a related Tibetan text. In this issue, she addresses a timely topic—­anger­—in light of what Buddhist literature says about dealing with it. For more on anger, including why we find it so seductive, check out her conversation with Tricycle editor-in-chief James Shaheen here.

Justin McDaniel

Justin McDaniel is a professor of religious studies and Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Endowed Professor of the Humanities at the University of Pennsylvania. His research interests include Lao, Thai, Pali, and Sanskrit literature, Japanese Buddhist architecture, and ritual studies. His book Gathering Leaves and Lifting Words, on Buddhist monastic education in Laos and Thailand, won the Benda Prize from the Association of Asian Studies. He has also received multiple awards for teaching, including being named one of the top ten most innovative professors in America by the Chronicle of Higher Education in 2019. Find his article about how amulets function in Thailand here.