February 13, 2026
The way we respond to life’s deliveries impacts the world’s impact on us. Our response ability works to make things better than they are in each situation as it arises–and is our “first line of defense” in the work of making things as livable as they can be. Controlling what can be controlled helps to…
200 Zen Thoughts #2 By Jim Dollar
And you will get this for starters: The relationship between psyche (the soul/mind) and the Tao (the ultimate principle of the universe) is deeply explored in Jungian Psychology, viewing the Tao as the Self—the center of wholeness where inner psyche meets the outer world, achieved through individuation (integrating opposites like Yin & Yang), experiencing synchronicity,…
Three Points on Prayer
Excerpted from my eBook, A Handbook for the Spiritual Journey II available from Amazon Kindle with an internet search for “Jim Dollar Kindle” 1. Prayer is invalidated by its very premise and its posture as being driven by the profit motive and its interest in maximum benefit at minimum cost. Absolute gain with nothing ventured…
December 02, 2025
Silence and the stillness beyond silence and the emptiness that permits silence (by emptying ourselves of thoughts, fear, anger, all emotions, plans, all noise, are the essential elements in seeing, hearing, understanding, realization, enlightenment, awakening, knowing, doing, being, peacefully abiding here, now. Living a noise-free life–with noise understood to be diversion, distraction, disturbance of any…
Buddha Notes 01
March 29, 2025 The Buddha said, “Growing up is the solution to all of our problems today–or any day.” And, if he didn’t say it, he would have said it if it had occurred to him, because all of his sayings that he did say can be reduced to growing up. Enlightenment, for instance, is…
Comments to Articles in Tricycle 04, 11/12/2024
01) Zen is what happened when Buddhism met Taoism. And taking this article as an example of Zen having more to do with Taoism than with Buddhism, where in Zen would we find anything remotely suggesting that we strive “to attain the state of Noble Tara”? Yet, we speak of “Zen Buddhism” and not “Zen…
Comments Made To Articles in Tricycle 05, 12/28/2024
01) Putting pain in its place and keeping it there is a matter of seeing what we can get by with and being able to take “No” for an answer. I’ve been on cutches because of arthritic knees for 10 years, and allowing pain tell me what I can do and cannot do–and being fine…
In Response to Tricycle Magazine Articles
Habitual Intuition Protest, renunciation, repudiation I think of pain as “the inability to function normally.” I think of Zen’s gift to Buddhism as “If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.” Taking the Buddha out of Buddhism leaves us with becoming who the Buddha was. By being the Buddha, not as the Buddha…
Comments Made to Articles in Tricycle 03, 10/11/2024
01) I am glad to join the Buddha in not being a Buddhist, and to join the Christ in not being a Christian—and in being free of doctrine, dogma, dharma and able to to what is called for in each situation as it arises as those who are true to their original nature, their innate…
Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
Follow My Blog
Get new content delivered directly to your inbox.
Jim Dollar's Published Works 