Eve Myonen Marko - The Book of Householder Koans

In The Book of Householder Koans Nakao and Marko wonderfully carry into contemporary life the spirit and color of the Zen koan tradition in all its mystery and brazennessand, at the same time, provide a wonderfully wise, knowing, and light-hearted look at how we can live this one precious unrepeatable human life in beauty. The koan stories they provide (submitted by many of their students) are pithy, funny, and perfectly apt for the times we live in. What a lively book! Norman Fischer, poet, Zen priest, and author most recently of The World Could Be Otherwise: Imagination and the Bodhisattva Path

I was blown away by the force of The Book of Householder Koans as it establishes Western Zen as a new center of enlightenment. Roshis Eve Myonen Marko and Wendy Egyoku Nakao present Zen koans, exquisitely digested from everyday life, that retain the ancient and authentic power to stop you in your tracks while they beckon you onward. Read this book, emerging from two female Zen masters lifetimes of practice, and enter an intimate world that opens your awareness in relationship, work, and current worldly puzzles. Grace Schireson, author of Wild-Ass Zen, Enlightenment Wherever You Are, Zen Women: Beyond Tea Ladies, Iron Maidens and Macho Maters, and Naked in the Zendo: Stories of Uptight Zen

In this wonderful collection, Eve Myonen Marko and Wendy Egyoku Nakao write that Zen is about letting go of our fixed opinions. One opinion about Zen, when it came to this country, is that it is for monks and priests who live in monasteries or as hermits. In fact, most Zen students nowadays are householders who have issues that are different from those of our ancestor monks in China. The training for priests cannot be the same as the training for householders. Householders lives are messy. Roshis Eve and Wendy use the ancient wisdom of Zen to illuminate modern-day practice. Their insight and compassion have provided us with an important collection of koan stories that illustrate how Zen can bring deep insight to all meditators, whether householders, the homeless, women, men, or even ordained priests. Roshi Gerry Shishin Wick, spiritual director of Great Mountain Zen Center, and author of The Book of Equanimity: Illuminating Classic Zen Koans

The only real Zen is the Zen of our actual lived lives. Zens koans are stories that take us to where we really live, that show us who we are when we let go of the false stories weve been trapped within. The collections of these true stories, which open our hearts, started in China. And China gave us many that we cherish to this day. Others come from Korea and Vietnam and Japan. And now, in The Book of Householder Koans, we are given a selection collected from four Western countries by two preeminent American Zen masters. And this is real Zen. These are the true stories of who we have always been from before the creation of the stars and planets. This is Zen made out of our bones and marrow, our tears and laughter. This amazing book is one of a handful written in this time that will be recalled as classics of our way. If youve never practiced Zen, read this book. If Zen has been your way for forty years, read this book. It opens our way and reminds us of where to find it. The Book of Householder Koans is a direct pointing to our hearts longing. True stories. James Ishmael Ford, author of Introduction to Zen Koans and If Youre Lucky, Your Heart Will Break

The Book of Householder Koans is like a sumptuous feast. The teachings, deep rooted in Zen practice, bring to the table all the ingredients of our life, including heartbreak, fury, and joy. This book shows us that in each moment there is an opportunity to enter a gate to wakefulness, receptivity, and love. Savor each morsel! Sensei Koshin Paley Ellison, author of Wholehearted: Slow Down, Help Out, Wake Up

The Book of Householder Koans is a remarkable, inspiring, and ground-breaking book that revolutionizes the age-old tradition of Zen koan practice and plunges it right into the heart of our contemporary, 21st-century lives. As Zen teachers, authors Nakao and Marko have been deeply immersed for decades in the practice of life clarifying itself right in the midst of its most knotty challenges and confusions. Along with sixty-six new koans gathered from householders around the world, they offer their profound insight and expertise to help contemporary readers spring open even the most seemingly unresolvable of personal, modern dilemmas. Beautifully written, with a life-affirming wisdom and spirit, this book will come to be a modern classic that helps us to live with a clarity, freedom, and joy beyond what we had imagined possible. Open the cover, take the plunge! Peter Levitt, author of The Complete Cold Mountain: Poems of the Legendary Hermit Hanshan and One Hundred Butterflies, and guiding teacher of Salt Spring Zen Circle in British Columbia

A wonderful book on koans comparable with koan books from the Song Dynasty China. Wendy and Eve pull no punches in laying out Zen practice in daily life and the challenges we face in leading a full and inclusive life. In fact, they leave no places to escape to. They deal with everything: relationship, work, family, aging, addiction, emotion, and ambiguity, to mention but a few. I dont usually read Zen books, yet this one had me riveted from page one. All they left me, after reading, was to just do it. Roshi Charles Tenshin Fletcher, abbot of Yokoji Zen Mountain Center, and author of The Way of Zen

I wish Id been able to read the Book of Householders Koans to help integrate practice with my everyday life when I started Zen training. This book is not only for householders, its also for everyone. Using both the rich stories of ancient Zen masters and current everyday people, the authors explore the human journey: relationships, raising children, work, illness, old age, death, how to ground spiritual practice. This book is a guide for collective awakening, as if one were sitting in a circle with friends with everyone being heard fromsharing their questions, dilemmas, learnings transparently and intimately. And from that sharing, the readers heart-mind-spirit is expanded through the common threads that unite us all, grounded in the everyday, no matter where we are in our life. The wisdom of these two Zen teachers, Egyoku Roshi and Myonen Roshi, is very accessible, encouraging, and freeing. I highly recommend this bookits a treasure trove, a true find! Nicolee Jikyo McMahon Roshi, marriage and family therapist

This beautiful book is an important resource for Zen in our time. This collection opens our eyes to the koan of our life right now. Easy and fun to read, these householder koans are not just for Zen students, but relatable for all. Maezumi Roshi would encourage his students to study the ancient texts, and then he would say, I want you to create the modern Shobogenzo (Treasury of the True Dharma Eye). Reading the householder koans, I felt that I was encountering a fresh expression of true dharma that maintains the spiritual rigor of old texts. I love these new koans. I love how the layout is reminiscent of traditional koan presentation with verses and comments. And I love how relevant these koans are for our time. The authors are encouraging all of us to create our own householder koans, and I am finding myself seeing koans everywhere. It is a lot of fun and encourages me to see my whole life as spiritual practice. Congratulations to the authors for creating a seminal work. It is a gift for everyone who wants to deepen their appreciation of life. Anne Seisen Saunders, abbot, Sweetwater Zen Center, and president, White Plum Asanga