A contemplative life. A creative life.
Our life and work in the world are manifestations of our inner work, our inner journey.
Zen Mountain Journal explores questions at the center of creating work of beauty and a life of beauty – a life on the creative fringes of the culture. Lots of what happens at the chaotic, frenzied center of our culture is not sustainable.
Zen Mountain Journal, the Substack, is an artist's journal of creative ideas dragged up from deeper levels of perception. It is a stream of consciousness journal – an artist looking for the idea that is looking for him. It is an exercise in the ancient art of wabi sabi — the beauty of the imperfect, the impermanent, and the unfinished. It is the art of things that are authentically themselves.
Zen Mountain Journal is the work of a searcher and seeker, a student of Zen and Taoism, in particular of the lives and poetry of the ancient mountain hermits of China and of the monks of old Japan.
Zen Mountain Journal is a chronicle of one artist’s efforts to live the principles of Zen. It is a journal of both surrender and struggle.
Life is a desperate struggle to be in fact that which we are in design.
- Ortega Y. Gassett
Knowing others is intelligence; knowing oneself is wisdom.
Mastering others is strength; mastering oneself is true power.
- Lao Tzu, The Tao Te Ching, Chapter 33
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Yielding is the way of the Tao.
The softest thing in the universe
Overcomes the hardest.
- Chapter 40, The Tao Te Ching
In the pursuit of knowledge, every day something is added.
In the pursuit of the Way, every day something is let go.
- Chapter 48
. . .
Lao Tzu (~4th century BCE):
Be still like a mountain and flow like a great river. . .
The anxious person is always looking for a foundation outside themselves. But the sage rests in the foundation that is inside.
. . .
According to the Taoist way, you need to nourish your vital spirit. To do so, you need to be silent...Conserving one’s inner energy is the essence of Taoism.
- From an interview of a hermit nun in the Zhongnan mountains of China by Bill Porter.
Zen Mountain Journal is shaped by time alone in wilderness, and by a creative life lived on the fringes of our culture.
Meditation in combination with journaling can help us understand the hidden but profound patterns that shape our lives, often without us knowing it.
Emptiness, stillness, tranquillity, tastelessness,
Silence, non-action: this is the level of heaven and earth.
From the sage’s emptiness, stillness arises;
From stillness, action.
- Chuang Tzu (Zhuangzi), 4th century BCE
I never get lost because I don't know where I'm going.
- Zen master Ikkyū, 15th century Buddhist monk
The Tao Te Ching Journal: A Path To Inner Quiet
Pre-publication price: $57. Post publication price: $67
All pre-orders receive a signed bookplate expressing the author’s appreciation for helping make this Journal possible.
Zen Mountain Journal blends Taoist hermit poetry, contemplative art, and reflections drawn from a lifetime shaped by wilderness, solitude, and decades doing creative work on the outer boundaries of our culture. These journals are companions for seekers — guides in the reconnection with inner quiet, beauty, and the “soundless music” of a life lived with simplicity and meaning.
• Size: 9.25 × 8.5 inches — convenient size for desk or lap.
• Hardcover — the book can be written in without a table or desk.
• Double wire-o bound to lay flat.
• Printed on Mohawk Superfine, a premium uncoated paper for a beautiful writing surface.
• 160 pages.
