Boundless Way Zen Temple Dharmacast · Boundless Way Zen Temple

Melissa Blacker - Facing Everything

·26 min·2 clips

Melissa shares how Joanna Macy's despair workshop in the 1980s confronted nuclear fears with raw, collective anguish.

This Dharma talk by Melissa Blacker explores the Zen practice of directly facing all aspects of experience, inspired by a text from the ancestor Hongzhi and the work of teacher Joanna Macy. Melissa Blacker is a guiding teacher at Boundless Way Zen Temple, and the episode includes reflections from community members. The talk centers on Hongzhi's instruction to "face everything, let go and attain stability," treating each moment as "just this." Melissa recounts receiving an email about Joanna Macy, a 96-year-old Vipassana teacher now facing ill health, which sparked these reflections. She describes attending Macy's "Despair and Empowerment" workshop in the 1980s, which focused on nuclear proliferation fears of that era. The workshop structure involved a morning of meditating on collective despair, followed by afternoon practices to transform that energy into empowerment. A key teaching from Macy was "owning our own life" in this historical moment, including the reality of being born into an age of potential global destruction. Melissa and her co-teacher David led a similar workshop at their temple in 2016 following a U.S. presidential election, where participants physically felt the "weight" of shared despair. A core insight is that avoiding difficult emotions like despair gives them more solidity and power, whereas facing them initiates transformation. The practice involves turning toward whatever arises—despair, joy, fear, or even avoidance itself—both in meditation and in daily life. Melissa emphasizes that this "facing" is not complicated, though the world seems to be, and is cultivated through zazen, retreats, and even face-to-face meetings in dokusan. The talk reveals that every human is considered a Buddha with a unique capacity to offer their specific gifts to a suffering world. One participant, Rich, shares how the idea that "when you avoid it, you solidify it" felt profoundly counterintuitive yet true. Another, Madhu, observes how one person turning toward a collective difficulty can shift the energy for an entire group. The tone is contemplative, personal, and instructional, weaving ancestral teachings, personal anecdote, and live community interaction. Listeners interested in Buddhist psychology, emotional resilience, or Joanna Macy's "Work That Reconnects" will find this episode deeply valuable. Those seeking purely doctrinal analysis or a fast-paced narrative might find its reflective pace less engaging.

As heard by us

A calm Zen talk on facing fear, distraction, and ordinary life without flinching.

Hongzhi's line about facing everything gives the talk its center, framing Zen practice as meeting despair, fear, birdsong, power tools, traffic, and the ordinary pull of breakfast or lunch plans.

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Why you'd press play

When you need Zen teaching that meets despair without looking away.

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