In this tender and illuminating talk, Jack shares a Zen love story and a path of mindful presence that brings us home—from the stories of the mind to the truth of the heart. Through embodied awareness, we discover that the end of exile begins with loving what is here now.

Join the Year of Awakening with Jack Kornfield for a monthly group livestream Q&A hang with Jack, along with weekly modules and prompts to keep your life focused on awakening!

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.

“The end of exile is when we see all the stories of what should be, and what is, and what will be, passing through the mind, and we rest in some place of peace in the heart.” – Jack Kornfield

This week on Heart Wisdom, Jack heartfully ponders:

• Freedom and the spiritual path
• The Dharma’s ‘one taste’ of freedom 
• The Sure Heart’s Release
• Present, past, future, and Being Here Now
• Life’s often dreamlike quality
• The evanescent present moment 
• Noticing the dreamlike quality of life
• An enlightening Zen love story
• Uncovering your true self
• Overcoming exile with softness of heart
• Mindfulness as the end of exile
• Embodied awakening and finding liberation within the body and mind
• Accepting and including all parts of ourselves
• Mindfulness and reuniting with your body and feelings
• Cultivating “mindfulness of mind” and forgiving its stories
• Watching the mind, resting in the heart
• Stories and poems on the end of exile in our lives
• Finding true kindness through accepting sorrow

“The past disappears, the future isn’t here yet—all there is is this evanescent present moment that’s here for a moment and then changes.” – Jack Kornfield

This Dharma Talk recorded during a desert retreat on 04/05/1993 was originally published on DharmaSeed.

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

“The real koan is: who is your true self?” – Jack Kornfield

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

From gender equity to joyful adaptation, Jack recounts how the Dalai Lama challenged teachers to reshape Buddhism for a modern world in need of heart.

This Dharma Talk recorded on 03/29/93 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed.

“Somebody said the Dalai Lama’s mind is like a diamond, and whichever facet, whichever direction he turns it to, it comes with clarity and beauty. Everything that he did had a sense of graciousness and beauty about it.” – Jack Kornfield

In this episode of Heart Wisdom, Jack holds a thought-provoking talk on:

• Counseling, ethics codes, and teacher-training for a new era
• Sectarianism vs. the shared heart of awakening
• A dramatic call for gender equity: nuns, councils & training funded “on the spot”
• Sylvia Wetzel’s meditative reflection: What if the Dalai Lama had always been a woman?
• Humor & honesty: “rebirth control” and other Dalai Lama one-liners
• Engaged Buddhism: arms sales, poverty, over-population, climate
• Drafting a pan-Buddhist code of conduct; yearly councils of elders
• Spirit Rock as a living experiment in consensus leadership
• The invitation: awaken the Buddha-heart in every man, woman & child

“There is no price worth paying to hide what is wrong—tell the truth.” – H.H. the Dalai Lama

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

“Use your heart to awaken that spirit of the Buddha in every being you meet—that’s all that really matters.” – Jack Kornfield

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Jack shares stories and insights from a rare gathering with the Dalai Lama on what really makes a teacher, and how compassion—not titles—spreads the Dharma.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.

This time on Heart Wisdom, Jack thoughtfully explores these themes & topics:

• Spring renewal at Spirit Rock & the wider Buddhist boom
• 1,000 U.S. meditation centers — a movement far bigger than any one sangha
• The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra on gathering “in harmony and concord”
• The Dalai Lama: compassion over conversion; students over titles
• What really authorizes a teacher? (Hint: their students’ freedom)
• “Spy on your teachers” — trusting slowly & wisely
• The scent-test of liberation: recognizing authentic peace
• “Bodhisattva off-duty?” — practice everywhere, even with late-night TV temptations
• Spiritual life as engagement with, not escape from, difficulty
• Interdependence: why true emptiness embraces every creature
• Speaking out against spiritual misconduct & retraumatization
• The wounded student, the wounded teacher — bringing psychology into Dharma

This Dharma Talk recorded on 03/29/93 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed.

“The Dalai Lama said, ‘Nirvana has a wonderful scent—like flowers.’ You can tell it when you're around someone connected with nirvana. You can tell it around places where there’s that fragrance of peace, well-being, and liberation.” – Jack Kornfield

“Deep down, what matters is only the spirit of compassion—only what benefits beings in every form, in every realm on this earth. Don’t think about how to spread Buddhism. It doesn’t matter if there are even one or two more Buddhists. The only thing that matters is the well-being of each person and the well-being of the earth that we live on.” – Jack Kornfield quoting H.H. the Dalai Lama

Photo via Wikimedia Commons

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

“Only the benefit you bring to others proves the depth of your own practice.” – Jack Kornfield

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

What if the blueprint for a more beautiful world is already within you? Jack explores how trust, joy, and imagination awaken transformation—from the inside out.

Join the Year of Awakening with Jack Kornfield for monthly livestream Q&A hangs with Jack, and weekly lessons and reflections to keep your year focused on awakening. Use code AWAKEN50 for 50% off entry.

“In the chrysalis, as the caterpillar imagines itself into the butterfly, there’s a message: trust that transformation is possible. Not only is it possible—but from the heart, you can help shape it. You can make a difference.” – Jack Kornfield

In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:

• What brings us joy in this life?
• Trust, morals, justice, and taking the long view
• Enlightenment and cultivating a trusting heart
• The imaginal cells of the butterfly
• How your voice, joy, imagination, and trust can truly make a difference
• Stories on trust, love, and making a difference
• Mindful presence and the Awakened Heart 
• Sangha/Satsang, community, and helping each other
• Imagining a beautiful new world together
• Feeling yourself as a playful child of the spirit
• Spelunking the great mystery of life and the universe
• Adding your make-weight of hope to the world
• Allen Ginsberg’s poem Howl
• Bringing our joy, love, tenderness and compassion to the world
• The big questions: how to hold suffering, and those causing suffering
• The power of protest, standing up, letting go of fear, and embracing the strength of joy
• Questions and Responses on how to navigate modern times skillfully and joyfully with trust, balance, love, gratitude, equanimity, and compassion

“Trust that you make a difference, and that each one of us makes a difference.” – Jack Kornfield

This episode was recorded on 04/07/2025 for the  Spirit Rock Meditation Center Monday Night Dharma Talk and Guided Meditation. 

“We’re in this together, we can awaken together, and we can support our hearts, minds, and the beautiful world that we can be—it’s in us as part of our imaginal cells.” – Jack Kornfield

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Jack invites us to walk the path of joy—no matter the circumstances—showing how living joyfully and tenderly is a courageous, radical, and transformative act.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.

Join the Year of Awakening with Jack Kornfield for monthly livestream Q&A hangs with Jack, and weekly lessons and reflections to keep your year focused on awakening. Use code AWAKEN50 for 50% off entry.

“What I’ve seen in visiting refugee camps is that they don’t want you to come in feeling depressed—they have enough of that themselves. They’re not looking for people who are frightened, worried, or downhearted. What they long for is someone who can bring a sense of uplift, possibility, and joy.” – Jack Kornfield

In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:

• Living joyfully with a positive attitude
• Joy as a necessary quality of enlightenment
• How can we have joy in times of chaos, disruption, and suffering?
• Joy as a true service to others and the world
• Uplifting others through our joy and positivity
• Wavy Gravy and the Transformative Power of Joy
• How suffering is not the end of the story; it’s the beginning of the Four Noble Truths
• Bringing joy, beauty, and humor to our protesting, activism, and standing up for what matters
• Being hopeful despite the outside circumstances, and emphasizing compassion, sacrifice, courage, and kindness
• The joy and playfulness of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu
• How we can bless and heal each other with our joy
• Living in joy, love, health and peace even amidst hate, affliction, and troubles
• Experiencing the sweet joy of living in the way
• The radical joyful presence of Ajahn Chah and Maha Ghosananda
• Risking delight
• Jack’s rapturous experience of meditative bliss
• Learning to step out of the battle and embrace life
• Thich Nhat Hanh and the practice of smiling
• Becoming a make-weight of joy, tipping the scales to hope
• Unshakeable integrity, generosity, gratitude, and tenderness
• Tuning in with nature, relationships, and the mystery
• Father Gregory Boyle and the possibility of transformation and renewal

This episode was recorded on 04/07/2025 for the Spirit Rock Meditation Center Monday Night Dharma Talk and Guided Meditation.

“Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.” – Wendell Berry

“Live in joy and love even among those who hate. Live in joy and health even among the afflicted. Live in joy and peace even among the troubled. Look within, be still, free from fears and attachments. Know the sweet joy of living in the way.” – The Dhammapada

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Sharing deep spiritual secrets of love and attachment, Jack transforms our unhealthy attachments into Wise Relationships through vulnerability, inner joy, and shared humanity.

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.

“The secret is, the opposite of attachment is not detachment, but love. Because true love does not seek to possess or control, it doesn’t separate or fear what is there. True love is the ability to be present without grasping. From this place, love offers its blessings.” – Jack Kornfield

In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:

• Transforming unhealthy clingings into Wise Attachment
• Not getting stuck in our ideas and views 
• The global price of collective addiction and attachment
• Moving past our attachment to our sense of separateness
• The big spiritual question—who are we really?
• His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and keeping a healthy curiosity around death
• Lowering our defenses and helping others lower their defenses around us
• Parenting with trust and connection rather than clinging and control
• The good side of attachment—connection, well-being, mirroring
• Transforming low-self-esteem and the body of fear into self-confidence and openness
• Using spiritual practice to open to a love that includes our full humanity
• Finding the true possibilities that the spiritual path offers
• Resting in our being—how not to seek and chase, and how not to run away and hide
• Touching our incompleteness, our brokenness, with compassion
• Expanding our heart and connecting with our shared humanity
• Uncovering within us our inner knowing, The One Who Knows
• How to be true to yourself, and make a light of yourself
• Meditation as an invitation into vulnerability
• Moving from unhealthy attachment into Wise Relationship
• How Being Here Now, our capacity to be present, transforms our life
• Nirvana as the absence of struggle with the world as it as

Please help support Jack's daughter Caroline's Oasis Legal Services in their mission to help persecuted LGBTQ+ Asylum Seekers gain citizenship and safety in the U.S.

“We want to be loved, we want to be held, and it’s so hard to be vulnerable. Meditation is an invitation to that vulnerability, the rawness and openness of the heart. Not because it’s good for us, but because it moves us back to the truth that we are held. If we can sit and open, we’ll discover that this universe that has given birth to us really does hold us.” – Jack Kornfield

This episode recorded on 03/08/1993 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed. 

“Nirvana, which is the absence of suffering, doesn’t mean that the world goes away. Nirvana is the absence of struggle with the world as it is.” – Jack Kornfield

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Exploring the ancient Zen teaching of the Great Way, Jack guides us toward freedom from attachment, clarity beyond preferences, and the liberating joy of letting go.

“The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When attachment and hatred are both absent, everything becomes clear and undisguised. Make the smallest distinction; however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart. If you wish to see the truth, then hold no opinion for or against anything.” – Third Zen Ancestor

In this episode, Jack mindfully explores:

• Finding freedom from attachment by learning to let go
• Can we meditate society’s problems away?
• What does it mean to seek wisdom, compassion, freedom?
• The Third Patriarch of Zen
• Finding the Great Way and seeing the truth
• Moving past our opinions and preferences
• How our desires blind us and manufacture our reality
• Suffering, impermanence, grasping, and not relying on reality
• The path to liberation from our grasping and fears
• The joy of letting go of our attachments and relaxing into what is
• Training ourselves to have an obedient mind of the Buddha
• Is there appropriate or wise attachment?
• Clarifying the full spectrum of attachment
• How to get out addiction and the Realm of the Hungry Ghosts
• Dealing with attachment to our isolation, our separateness
• Commitment as a healthy devoted attachment  
• Seeking a Wise Relationship to ourselves, others, and the world
• The slippery slope of pleasure, into desire, into habit, into need
• Wise attachment vs unwise attachment
• The full spectrum of attachment and love

“Go where you wish—cave, monastery, India, Tibet, do what you like—your mind goes with you, that’s the problem.” – Jack Kornfield

This episode recorded on 03/08/1993 at Spirit Rock Meditation Center was originally published on DharmaSeed. 

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community members, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

“Often we think attachment is only to other people and things, but often what we are attached to is our own isolation, our own separateness.” – Jack Kornfield

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Jack and Ocean continue their deep conversation, exploring how to create positive change in the world without losing our spiritual center and loving essence. 

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.

“Neither meditation nor activism has to be a grim duty. These are invitations to open the heart and be present for everything. In activism you stand up because you care and you love, and then you bring your best to it.” – Jack Kornfield

In this episode, Jack and Ocean mindfully explore:

• Activism and creating positive change in the world
• How to save the world without losing yourself
• Acting beautifully without attachment to the fruits
• How not not to let the immense suffering of the world get to us
• Wes Nisker, Gary Snyder, and saving the world because you love it
• Acting in this world with peace, love, courage, and nobility
• Honoring our emotions, grief, and fears, but not letting them control us
• Becoming what you want the world to be
• His Holiness the Dalai Lama and meeting our lives with honesty and joy
• Fighting for freedom and justice, but having fun doing it
• Making activism fun, joyful, and beautiful
• Emphasizing the positives acts in the world
• Life changing wisdom from the Buddha
• Holding it all in the great heart of compassion
• Adding your voice, love, energy, and compassion
• If your grief is big, hold it from something bigger

This episode was originally recorded for the Food Revolution Network in November of 2024. 

Discover Your Buddha Nature with Jack Kornfield, an online journey for reclaiming our dignity, compassion, and generosity, beginning June 2.

“It says in the Bhagavad Gita, the essence is to act beautifully without attachment to the fruits of the actions. What it means is, you don’t get to determine how it turns out, but you do get to plant your seeds of goodness. And as Thoreau says, ‘Convince me you have a seed there, and I’m prepared to expect miracles.’ You get to plant the seeds, and eventually, in their own time, they bear fruit. That’s not your job. Your job is to make a beautiful garden, to plant beautiful things, and to tend them.” – Jack Kornfield

About Ocean Robbins:

Ocean Robbins is an American entrepreneur and author, best known for his role as the co-founder of Food Revolution Network, Inc. This California-based company is dedicated to advocating for a whole foods, plant-based diet. Check out Ocean’s book, 31-Day Food Revolution, to learn more about healing the body and transforming the world. You can keep up with Ocean on his website, HERE.

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community members, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

“If we don’t look, if we don’t acknowledge the children who are hungry, if we don’t acknowledge not just Ukraine and Gaza, but Sudan, and the Congo, and Myanmar, and the Rohingas—if we turn our gaze away in denial, we can’t make a difference. Our heart has to be big enough and our dignity strong enough that we’re willing to see it. And then some of us are called to do that work in the way that we can.” – Jack Kornfield

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Jack is interviewed by Ocean Robbins to explore the big spiritual questions—why there is suffering, how to navigate duality, making the ordinary holy, and cultivating a loving witness.

Discover Your Buddha Nature with Jack Kornfield, an online journey for reclaiming our dignity, compassion, and generosity, beginning June 2.

“It’s important to not use spiritual practice to set up an ideal or judge yourself. Sometimes you need to shut down, and then you open again. So the spiritual path is really about being with both the calm ocean and the storm.” – Jack Kornfield

In this episode, Jack and Ocean mindfully explore:

• What first got Jack into mindfulness and meditation
• Life as beautiful, and an ocean of tears
• Suffering, Buddhism, and the end of suffering
• Why is there suffering in the world?
• Navigating the reality of duality—form and emptiness, life and death
• The recycling nature of the universe
• How to make the ordinary holy
• Meeting our lives with presence
• A simple way to explain “The Witness”
• The magic of consciousness
• A calming and deep guided meditation 
• Holding fear and grief in compassion
• Not getting caught in reactions and anger
• Acting the nobility of heart and your original dignity 

This episode was originally recorded for the Food Revolution Network in November of 2024. 

“Life is extraordinarily beautiful, and it’s an ocean of tears. You can’t have birth without death, you can’t have light without dark, you can’t have beginnings without endings. We live in a universe constructed of opposites. That’s just the game of form, of duality. You can’t have form without the emptiness from which it comes.” – Jack Kornfield

About Ocean Robbins:

Ocean Robbins is an American entrepreneur and author, best known for his role as the co-founder of Food Revolution Network, Inc. This California-based company is dedicated to advocating for a whole foods, plant-based diet. Check out Ocean’s book, 31-Day Food Revolution, to learn more about healing the body and transforming the world. You can keep up with Ocean on his website, HERE.

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community members, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

“We live in a universe that’s recycling itself—the ultimate recycling of birth and death, form and rebirth. For us as human beings, the question is not why or how. The Buddha didn’t actually answer those questions. He said those are questions that don’t tend to have understanding. He said, what I’m interested in is how to navigate the universe as it is, in a way that brings love, well-being, and freedom to all who want to awaken to this.” – Jack Kornfield 

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In this guided breath meditation, Jack Kornfield invites listeners into a space of ease, trust, and ardent gratitude for our bodies, hearts, and minds. 

Today’s podcast is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/heartwisdom and get on your way to being your best self.

Learn to cultivate dignity, compassion, and generosity in Discovering Your Buddha Nature with Jack Kornfield, an online journey beginning June 2. 

This week on Heart Wisdom, Jack leads listeners through:

• The true purpose of meditation and returning from the outer world to our inner selves 
• Softening the body and releasing any physical and emotional tension
• Grounding ourselves as we sense the weight of our body being fully supported by the earth 
• Receiving whatever thoughts and emotions arise during meditation with compassion and openness
• Noticing how the body breathes itself, relaxing into each breath, and inviting a sense of ease and trust 
• Feeling the rise and fall of our bellies with each inhale and exhale
• Bowing inwardly to our life-sustaining breath and thanking it for keeping us alive
• Expanding the field of mindful loving awareness to the entire body, heart, and mind 
• Finding the parts of our body that are storing buried difficulties 
• Considering the energy of the mind and how occupied it is most of the time
• Welcoming a sense of peace and presence with a quieter mind and a tender heart 
• Resting in ‘the awareness that notices’ and de-identifying with the breath and body

"This is your life breath. It breathes you together with all living things. It breathes you with everyone in the room, the ocean of air in the trees. As if to make an inward bow, you can say thank you to your breath for keeping you alive so steadily." – Jack Kornfield 

This meditation was originally recorded for the InsightLA Sunday livestream on April 20, 2025.

“Notice that you are not your breath and body. You are not your feelings and thoughts. But, who you are is the awareness that has been kindly witnessing. You are the loving awareness itself.” – Jack Kornfield 

About Jack Kornfield:

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India, and Burma, studying as a monk under the Buddhist master Ven. Ajahn Chah, as well as the Ven. Mahasi Sayadaw. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. Jack co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, with fellow meditation teachers Sharon Salzberg and Joseph Goldstein and the Spirit Rock Center in Woodacre, California. His books have been translated into 20 languages and sold more than a million copies.

Jack is currently offering a wonderful array of transformational online courses diving into crucial topics like Mindfulness Meditation Fundamentals, Walking the Eightfold Path, Opening the Heart of Forgiveness, Living Beautifully, Transforming Your Life Through Powerful Stories, and so much more. Sign up for an All Access Pass to explore Jack’s entire course library. If you would like a year's worth of online meetups with Jack and fellow community, join The Year of Awakening: A Monthly Journey with Jack Kornfield.

Stay up to date with Jack and his stream of fresh dharma offerings by visiting JackKornfield.com and signing up for his email teachings.

"The goal of meditation is not to get to somewhere else, to get from here to there, but to come from there to here. To be present, awake, kind, alive." – Jack Kornfield

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