Tricycle Talks

Meditation teacher Oren Jay Sofer discusses contemplative practices for meeting a world in crisis. They explore qualities of the heart for navigating personal and political crises, the power of everyday devotion, reclaiming the right to rest, and the role of curiosity in empathy and connection.

Lama Rod Owens is an author, activist, and authorized lama in the Karma Kagyu School of Tibetan Buddhism. In his new book, The New Saints: From Broken Hearts to Spiritual Warriors, he draws from the bodhisattva tradition to rethink the relationship between social liberation and ultimate freedom, putting forth the notion of the New Saint. In the process, he pulls from the wisdom of the Old Saints of Tibetan Buddhism and the legacy of Black liberation movements.In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Owens to discuss why he believes that the apocalypse is an opportunity for awakening, the power of connecting with our ancestors and unseen beings, why the New Saint is not necessarily a good person, and how fierceness can be a form of awakened care.

Jenny Odell, a writer and artist celebrated for her books "How to Do Nothing" and "Saving Time," dives deep into our fraught relationship with time and productivity. She discusses the emotional complexity of climate grief and how it intersects with our daily lives. Odell emphasizes the power of stillness and interconnectedness, exploring how moments of forced relaxation can reshape our perception of time. She intriguingly frames burnout as a spiritual issue and highlights how love can transcend linear time, inviting listeners to embrace a more profound, shared existence.

Michael Imperioli has a knack for playing mobsters and villains. Best known for his roles as Christopher Moltisanti on The Sopranos and Dominic Di Grasso on The White Lotus, the Emmy Award–winning actor has made a career out of exploring addiction and afflictive emotions on screen. Offscreen, though, Imperioli is a committed Buddhist practitioner. In 2008, he and his wife took refuge with Garchen Rinpoche, and during the pandemic, they began teaching online meditation classes together, exploring Tibetan Buddhist texts like The Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva. Though his practice no doubt influences his creative work, Imperioli prefers to focus on the everyday ways that Buddhism has restructured his life. For him, Buddhism offers a way to liberate harmful emotions and cultivate patience and compassion on a day-to-day level.In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Imperioli to talk about the dangers of the instrumentalization of Buddhist practice, what The White Lotus can teach us about craving and dissatisfaction, and whether he believes that liberation is possible in this lifetime.

In 2016, poet Ross Gay set out to document a delight each day for a year. After he published The Book of Delights, his friend asked him if he planned to continue his practice. Five years later, he began The Book of (More) Delights, demonstrating that the sources of delight are indeed endless—and that they multiply when attended to and shared. For Gay, delight serves as evidence of our interconnectedness, and it is inextricable from the fact of our mortality. With characteristic humor and grace, he chronicles his everyday encounters with joy and delight, from the fleeting sweetness of strangers to the startling beauty of the falsetto to the unexpected joys of aging. In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg sit down with Gay to talk about the relationship between delight and impermanence, how he understands faith, and how delight has restructured how he pays attention. Gay also reads an essay from his new collection.

Poet Jane Hirshfield shares her journey of questioning and not-knowing in Zen practice and poetry. She discusses the importance of service and explores the impact of her poem 'Let them not say'. The podcast also delves into the concept of justice in Buddhism and the transformative power of poetry. Furthermore, Hirshfield highlights the connection between poetry and beginners mind, as well as the use of syntax and attention to create impactful poems.

As a young oncologist, Anthony Back turned to Buddhism as a practical way of processing the suffering he encountered each day. Over time, his practice has become an essential support to his work in accompanying patients as they navigate illness and death, and it has radically transformed his understanding of what it means to provide care. Back currently serves as co-director of the University of Washington Center for Excellence in Palliative Care, where he trains clinicians to communicate more openly and effectively about serious illness. In addition, he regularly leads retreats on being with dying at the Upaya Zen Center with Roshi Joan Halifax. In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and co-host Sharon Salzberg sit down with Back to discuss how he integrates his practice into his work as a physician, how he deals with burnout and moral injury, and what James Joyce and Virginia Woolf have taught him about paying attention.

When Anne C. Klein (Rigzin Drolma) first read that everyone, including her, was already a buddha, she was so shocked that she put down the book she was reading. Now, as a professor of religious studies at Rice University and a teacher at Dawn Mountain Center for Tibetan Buddhism in Houston, she continues to grapple with the relationship between our buddhahood and our humanity. In her new book, "Being Human and a Buddha Too: Longchenpa’s Sevenfold Mind Training for a Sunlit Sky," she takes up the question of what it actually means for each of us to be a buddha, as well as what happens to our humanity when we seek awakening. In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Klein to discuss how she has come to understand buddhahood, the difference between wholeness and perfection, and why she believes that we are all backlit by completeness.

These days, with catastrophe after catastrophe, it can be easy to turn to despair and to believe that there is nothing we can do. But writer Rebecca Solnit is determined to change that narrative. Over the course of her career, Solnit has published twenty-five books on feminism, popular power, social change and insurrection, and hope and catastrophe. Her most recent project, "Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility," brings together climate scientists and activists from around the world to address the social, political, and spiritual dimensions of our current crisis—and to envision a path forward. In this episode of Life As It Is, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, and co-host Sharon Salzberg sit down with Solnit to discuss the power of hope in times of catastrophe, the dangers of hyperindividualism, and why she believes beauty is an essential piece of activist work.

When Tenzin Dickie was growing up in exile in India, she didn’t have access to works by Tibetan writers. Now, as an editor and translator, she is working to create and elevate the stories she wished she had had as a young writer. Her new book, "The Penguin Book of Modern Tibetan Essays," offers a comprehensive introduction to modern Tibetan nonfiction, featuring essays from twenty-two Tibetan writers from around the world. Taken as a whole, the collection provides an intimate and powerful portrait of modern Tibetan life and what it means to live in exile. In this episode of Tricycle Talks, Tricycle’s editor-in-chief, James Shaheen, sits down with Dickie to discuss the history of the Tibetan essay, why she views exile as a kind of bardo, and how modern Tibetan writers are continually recreating the Tibetan nation.