When I first came to InsightLA in the early days to take a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course, I was eager to deepen my practice. I was making a movie in Central America and knew I would miss classes. I asked Trudy, how can I make them... Read more

Trudy and I have had the privilege of staying at Montagne-Alternative, a visionary community high in the Swiss Alps. The community has rebuilt an ancient and semi-deserted Swiss Mountain village to create an elegant center for groups to learn integr... Read more

Our mindfulness rests on a foundation of compassion. It works like this: as we become more compassionately aware of our own suffering, we can perceive the suffering of others more accurately. A growing sense of being part of one family comes from cu... Read more

There are simple ways we can shape our experiences to include more compassion. I have a teacher, for example, who bakes beautiful pies once a year to bring to a family gathering. When it comes time to transport them, she has to be very careful. She ... Read more

Ive been spending time with a close friend, a deep practitioner who recently had surgery. Hes in a lot of physical pain as he recovers. Pain is hard to bear. On top of that, we tend to judge ourselves for the way we manage it. Even the Buddha had ba... Read more

This is special time of year for me. When I was 17 I found the Dharma, and I often joke that because of my inner and outer turmoil and suffering I was highly motivated to practice. The truth is thats not a joke at all. Theres a Buddhist phrase pract... Read more

Decades ago in the 70’s, before the Dalai Lama became famous, his smiling face was on the cover of a newspaper called The Snow Lion. The quote under his photo struck me so powerfully that I cut out the cover page and stuck it on a kitchen cupboard w... Read more

Frank Ostaseski is an internationally respected Buddhist teacher and visionary cofounder of Zen Hospice Project, and founder of the Metta Institute. ​ The Five Invitations: What Death Can Teach Us About Living Fully Life and death are a packag... Read more

We left Kyotos budding plum blossoms and camellias opening under grey skies, a smattering of tears falling as I looked out the rain-streaked window of the train to Osaka airport. Although we were here for less than a week of rare, liberated wanderin... Read more

The Buddha’s original instructions for meditation, or dhyana, ask us to go into a secluded forest and sit under a tree, a quiet place to allow deep concentration. If you’ve ever meditated outside in nature, you can feel the support of plants, landsc... Read more