Jody Hojin Kimmel, Sensei
Zen Mountain Monastery, 08/02/2020
“Creativity is our birthright,” Daido Roshi wrote in the Zen of Creativity. In this talk, Hojin Sensei speaks about the essential practice of creative expression as a gate of freedom, a path of insight, and a way of encountering reality as it truly is. She invokes the many ways of expressing the dharma that have been passed down to us – the Buddha touching the earth or holding up a flower, Zen masters shouting, pointing, or uttering apparent nonsense – as performance art: a way of displaying the truth beautifully with body, mind, and speech. Artistic expression at its most powerful shocks us into recognizing what we already know – and it is that very recognition which allows us to live more fully, encountering the familiar world with greater freshness and curiosity.
