The Invention of Nothing
The history of zero, shunya, and creation ex nihilo
Emptiness
Emptiness in Buddhism, or sunyata in Sanskrit (sunnata in Pali), is the Buddhist principle that everything—including ourselves—is empty of inherent existence and arises interdependently. In the Pali canon, the earliest Buddhist scriptures, the Buddha uses the term to describe how we don't have a fixed, permanent self. In Mahayana Buddhism, the concept became central and extended to all phenomena. The Heart Sutra, an especially famous Mahayana teaching about emptiness, is chanted daily by many practitioners and is also popular among Western Buddhists.
Mindfulness in the Office
Andrew Olendzki explains how a challenging—even overwhelming—job can be an ideal practice ground for insight meditation.
Seeing in the Dark
Zen priest Kurt Spellmeyer discusses cigarettes, samadhi, and “dwelling in emptiness.”
Meditating With Emptiness
In this Dharma Talk, Kurt Spellmeyer—a Zen priest and a professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey—discusses the importance of emptiness in Zen Buddhism.
When You Greet Me I Bow: Relationship, Emptiness, Activism
Poet, translator, and Zen Buddhist priest Norman Fischer shares lessons from his decades of practice: from relationships, to emptiness, to activism, to cultural encounters between East and West.
Letting Go to Find Yourself
How one writer’s confrontation with emptiness helped to shed and define their identity.
Magazine | In Brief, Teachings
In Brief
Select wisdom from sources old and new
The Three Principles of Awakening
In Tibetan Buddhism, view, meditation, and action frame the path to enlightenment. In this series, Dawa Tarchin Phillips breaks down the way these three principles build upon each other to give rise to and stabilize direct…
Personal ReflectionsMagazine | Feature
Circling Emptiness
Recalling his friendships with Norman Mailer and Samuel Beckett, a Zen student and writer grapples with a central Buddhist teaching.
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