Sensei Koshin Paley Ellison visits The Road Home Podcast for a conversation about taking a wholehearted approach to our dharma practice.
Sensei Koshin Paley Ellison, MFA, LMSW, DMIN, co-founded the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care. The first Zen-based organization to offer fully accredited ACPE clinical chaplaincy training in America. Paley Ellison is the academic advisor for the Buddhist students in the Master in Pastoral Care and Counseling program at New York Theological Seminary. Learn more about Sensei Koshin and his offerings at zencare.org.
Slow Down, Help Out, Wake Up
Sensei Koshin shares the influences that led him to study and practice in the Zen tradition. What is like becoming a Western Zen monastic in the modern day?
Koshin talks about the creation and growth of the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care. A nonprofit center that teaches a more loving and open approach to care for the dying.
“A life of service and doing what is asked of me in this life felt most important.” – Sensei Koshin Paley Ellison
Explore a better approach for dying with Sensei Koshin, Sensei Robert Chodo Campbell and Sharon Salzberg on Ep. 67 of the Metta Hour Podcast
Wholehearted (21:50)
Above all, what can The Buddha’s instructions teach us about taking responsibility for where we are at? Koshin shares this premise for his most recent book, Wholehearted: Slow Down, Help Out, Wake Up. A book that examines the tools available for engaging in our lives and relationships.
Taking Responsibility (32:05)
What does it mean to take responsibility in today’s culture? Moreover, what does it mean to act responsibly in a culture with so much structural inequity?
“For me, I am also responsible for how I participate in a society that has so much inequity.” – Sensei Koshin Paley Ellison
Tradition & Lineage in 2019 (39:40)
How does Sensei Koshin approach upholding tradition and lineage while working directly with secular students and various religious organizations?
“To practice what is meaningful and brings people together, to me, is what is most valuable. We do a lot of work at our center with Christian and Jewish groups. Learning together what is meaningful – what spirituality is. The diversity of it, to me, is so cool.” – Sensei Koshin Paley Ellison
