The Mystical Positivist: The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #259

Saturday, May 6, 2017

The Mystical Positivist - Radio Show #259 - 06MAY17

The Mystical Positivist is now a weekly radio show on KOWS-LP 107.3 FM, Occidental, CA. Listen live on Saturday evenings from 4:00 - 6:00pm, PST, via the web at KOWS Live Stream.

This week's podcast features:

A conversation with Jim Wilson, a poet and writer on religious and spiritual topics, and a co-founder of Many Rivers Books & Tea in Sebastopol. Jim is the author of at least 15 poetry titles, including A Night of Many Sonnets and Hiking the Quatrain Range. In the spiritual realm, Jim has written An Annotated Edition of A Guide to True Peace, Communion in the Manner of Friends: A Manual for Quaker Communion, and his latest work, which will be the subject of our conversation on today’s show: On Trusting the Heart: A Commentary on the Xin Xin Ming. This latest book was predominantly written thirty years ago, when Jim was acting as a teacher in the Korean Chogye Zen tradition, after having spent six years as a full ordination monk in that tradition, under his teacher Seung Sahn. Jim went on to become a Buddhist Chaplain at an institution for the criminally insane, and he eventually transitioned from Buddhism to the Quaker tradition, his current spiritual home. Jim has appeared on the Mystical Positivist multiple times.

More information about Jim Wilson's work and interests can be found at:

On Trusting the Heart - A Commentary on the Xin Xin Ming: On Trusting the Heart
The Guide to True Peace - The 1815 Edition: Guide-True-Peace-1815-Edition
Shaping Words Poetry Website: shapingwords.blogspot.com

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"The Mystical Positivist" Radio Show

The Mystical Positivist is a weekly radio show on KOWS-LP FM 107.3 Occidental, CA, and on the web at KOWS-LP Live Feed, Saturdays from 4 - 6pm PST. Coming up on The Mystical Positivist:

April 20: A pre-recorded conversation with Ken McLeod, Buddhist teacher and author of the newly released book, The Magic of Vajrayana. In this conversation, we plan to explore a compelling quote from Ian McGilchrist's The Matter with Things: If you had set out to destroy the happiness and stability of a people, it would have been hard to improve on our current formula: remove yourself as far as possible from the natural world; repudiate the continuity of your culture; believe you are wise enough to do whatever you happen to want and not only get away with it, but have a right to it—and a right to silence those who disagree; minimise the role played by a common body of belief; actively attack and dismantle every social structure as a potential source of oppression; reject the idea of a transcendent set of values.

One of the more innovative Buddhist teachers today, Ken McLeod is known for his clear explanations, poetic translations, and pragmatic approach to practice. He is one of the first generation of Western teachers in the Tibetan tradition and one of the few to be authorized to transmit the full scope of these teachings to students. In particular, his approach resonates strongly with those whose path lies outside established institutions.

After graduating with a degree in mathematics, Ken cycled across Europe to Istanbul and then continued his journey overland to India. In 1970 he met his principal teacher Kalu Rinpoche at his monastery near Darjeeling. There Ken began a study and practice in Tibetan Buddhism that lasted more than twenty years. He completed the traditional three-year retreat program two times, translated for many teachers, and helped set up Buddhist centers in Canada and the United States. After his teacher's passing, Ken moved away from the hierarchical structures of Asian Buddhism to explore new approaches.

In 1990, he founded Unfettered Mind in Los Angeles. His approach of one-on-one consultations roiled the Buddhist world in the early '90s, but was quickly recognized as a viable way to teach and guide students in the West. He made individual interviews a central feature of the many retreats he taught in California, New Mexico, and British Columbia. Through numerous small groups in Southern California, he developed the materials that became the encyclopedic meditation manual, Wake Up to Your Life.

Now retired from formal teaching, he lives in Northern California where he hikes and writes. His writings and translations include The Great Path of Awakening (1987), Wake Up to Your Life (2001), An Arrow to the Heart (2007), Reflections on Silver River (2014), A Trackless Path (2017), and The Magic of Vajrayana (2022), as well as a corpus of articles and translations in Tricycle and other Buddhist magazines.