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Steve Hagen Biography

Stephen Tokan "Steve" Hagen, Rōshi, (born 1945) is the founder and head teacher of the Dharma Field Zen Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and a Dharma heir of Dainin Katagiri-roshi. Additionally, he is the author of several books on Buddhism. Among them as of 2003, Buddhism Plain & Simple was one of the top five bestselling Buddhism books in the United States. In 2012, Hagen updated and revised How the World Can Be the Way It Is and published it as Why the World Doesn't Seem to Make Sense—an Inquiry into Science, Philosophy, and Perception.

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Steve Hagen Quotes

And here we are with our improved human world that we've spent a great deal of time and energy working on. We've improved the rivers and the lakes and the land and our society and our ways of living to the point where we now wonder if the human race will survive.

Deal, Lakes, Land, Living, Race, Rivers

The buddha-dharma does not invite us to dabble in abstract notions. Rather, the task it presents us with is to attend to what we actually experience, right in this moment. You don't have to look "over there. " You don't have to figure anything out. You don't have to acquire anything. And you don't have to run off to Tibet, or Japan, or anywhere else. You wake up right here. In fact, you can only wake up right here. So you don't have to do the long search, the frantic chase, the painful quest. You're already right where you need to be.

Buddhism, Japan, Look, Notions, Presents, Running

What makes human life--which is inseparable from this moment--so precious is its fleeting nature. And not that it doesn't last but that it never returns again.

Fleeting, Inseparable, Lasts, Nature, Precious, Return

True freedom doesn't lie in the maximization of choice, but, ironically, is most easily found in a life where there is little choice.

Choices, Found, Ironically, Littles, Lying, Maximization

Mindfulness of the body is awareness of. . . the taste and smell of this moment.

Medicine, Mindfulness, Moment, Philosophy, Smell

We're never called on to do what hurts. We just do what hurts out of ignorance and habit. Once we see what we're doing, we can stop.

Habit, Hurt, Hurts, Ignorance, Stop

Whatever the world dishes up, we take it on--not on our own terms, but on the world's.

Dishes, Term, Terms, World

There's nothing to prove, nothing to figure out, nothing to get, nothing to understand. When we finally stop explaining everything to ourselves, we may discover that in silence, complete understanding is already there.

Everything, Figure, May, Silence, Understanding

You want to not have any problems.

Problem, Problems, Want

Nothing holds us back but our thoughts.

Back, Holds, Nothing, Our Thoughts, Thoughts

[When we drop our agendas] we begin to cultivate a mind of true goodness and compassion, which comes out of a concern for the Whole. As we live out of such a mind, we become generous, with no sense of giving or of making a sacrifice. We become open, with no sense of tolerance. We become patient, with no sense of putting up with anything. We become compassionate, with no sense of separation. And we become wise, with no sense of having to straighten anyone out.

Compassion, Drop, Open, Sacrifice, Wise

We've formed many a theory and belief, but as we look about the human world, it is clear that nobody actually knows what's going on. Yet claims to Truth are being made at every hand, including the claim that there is no Truth.

Claims, Clear, Formed, Hands, Looks, World

Socrates pointed out that we carry on as though death were the greatest of all calamities-yet, for all we know, it might be the greatest of all blessings. What are we going to call good? What are we going to call bad? Good or bad is never our choice, or even the issue.

Blessing, Carry, Choices, Death, Issues, Socrates