Untangling Ourselves with Koshin Paley Ellison
“All the time I work with dying people, and only a few of them know they are dying.”
On this episode of Being Well, Soto Zen teacher Koshin Paley Ellison joins Rick and I to explore living, dying, and personal practice in the midst of our beautiful, challenging, messy lives.
About our Guest: Sensei Koshin is an author, Zen teacher, Jungian psychotherapist, and co-founder of the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care. He began his formal Zen training in 1987 and completed six years of training at the Jungian Psychoanalytic Association. His most recent book is Untangled: Walking the Eightfold Path to Clarity, Courage, and Compassion.
Watch the Episode: Prefer watching video? You can watch this episode on YouTube.
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Key Topics:
0:00: Introduction
1:40: Koshin’s got game
3:20: The privilege of witnessing the dying process
11:25: Difficult emotions that come up when considering death
16:00: Entanglement vs. spaciousness
28:30: Windows of acceptance and the things we don’t want to accept
33:15: The capacity for compassionate presence
37:55: How Jungian training has influenced Koshin’s contemplative practice
42:35: What Koshin is still untangling, and the ground of being
48:30: Appreciating being alive
51:45: Recap
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