Charlotte Joko Beck R.I.P.

I was saddened to hear of the death on Wednesday of the renowned U.S. zen teacher Joko Beck.

Beck promoted a very sincere zen practice which embraced Western cultural values while avoiding the strict adherence to monolithic Japanese values and trappings that can tend to distract from the pivotal matter at hand. I'm very grateful for her pioneering efforts in this regards, albeit from afar.

Her teaching seemed realistic and inherently humanistic, based in an intimate understanding of, and acceptance of, our human condition: She seemed to avoid the excesses of idealism that have dogged all religions. Truly a remarkable woman, and I'm sorry that she has left the world.

"When we refuse to work with our disappointment, we break the Precepts: rather
than experience the disappointment, we resort to anger, greed, gossip,
criticism. Yet it's the moment of being that disappointment which is fruitful;
and, if we are not willing to do that, at least we should notice that we are not
willing. The moment of disappointment in life is an incomparable gift that we
receive many times a day if we're alert. This gift is always present in anyone's
life, that moment when 'It's not the way I want it!" — Charlotte Joko Beck (1917 - 2011)