Zen College Life

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I was recently approached by a student doing a paper on the Evolution of Zen.  She asked some pretty important questions, and I thought it would be a good idea to post them along with the answers here.  Maybe this will help us remember the importance and significance of everything we do in this life.  This one gets a bit deep.  Enjoy!

What does living a Zen Lifestyle mean to you?

Zen, as I understand it, is school of Buddhism, a religion that focuses heavily on meditation and simplistic, even minimalistic living.  While I’m not Buddhist, I understand and believe in the importance of simplifying life and living more consciously.  I think it is the responsibility of anyone with intellect to ponder on the importance of this life, and how to best serve humanity in a way that benefits us all.  This is why I chose the word Zen for Zen College Life.  It shows the importance that I put into educating ourselves, through not just academia, but with every experience we encounter in college, and the importance of doing good.

Western society deems it appropriate for us to work for a salary, to work to obtain a higher salary, to buy lots of stuff we don’t need, and upgrade to newer stuff we still don’t need.  There seems to be little space for spirituality in the western world.  I affectionately call this “the rat race.”  We are all racing for the newest craze, in an effort to find happiness and meaning.   If we can try for just a moment each day to remove ourselves from “the rat race,” I think we will find that life has a much greater meaning than a plasma tv or an iPhone (not that I don’t love technology, I’m a gadget fanatic, but I understand the importance of disconnecting every once in a while).  Life is so much more significant, so much more valuable than we take time to understand.  Life is grand, and many of us waste too much of it chasing money in this capitalist country.

The Zen theme allows me to borrow from the themes of Zen Buddhism to express a feeling of significance of spending time to improve the self, to better others around you, and to do better for society.

How can this benefit college students?

College students are a very dynamic crowd.  We are all very different, yet we are all going through so much of the same.  We are trying new things, living a different lifestyle than we did with our parents/families, we are developing the habits we will probably keep for the rest of our lives.  We are making mistakes.  And most of those mistakes have been made before us.

Taking the time to plan, prepare for, and understand the significance of these short 4-6 years that most of us spend in college will lend itself to us becoming greater human beings.  It allows us to slow down, to ponder, to make some sort of sense of all of this chaos.  Maybe college students aren’t ready for meditation, or even understand the importance of it, but we all know of the importance of planning.  I write at ZenCollegeLife.com to help freshman and upperclassman explore ideas and aspects of the college experience that they might not ever get in the classroom, library, or fraternity/sorority party.  I try to help students simplify, and choose their lifestyle consciously.

What are your thoughts on Zen in America? Is it necessary here, or are we as a society unable to comprehend its true meaning?

This is an interesting question.  It’s basic idea is something that I’ve thought about many times before, especially when I first chose the name Zen College Life.  I wondered whether or not the title would be successful, whether or not students would find the sight significant, whether the title would lend itself to students being interested in the ideas that I expressed or whether the title would be offsetting.

I can honestly say that I think students in America are ready for a change in lifestyle.  Society as a whole is ready for a change.  I think people are trying to get back to the importance of family, friends, relationships and humanity as a whole.  Sure, we’ve grown attach to worldly materialistic things, but we also crave significance.  We crave importance in this life.  And while I’m not endorsing Buddhism over any other religion (I’m actually Muslim), I think the significance of meditation and pondering those important life questions is something that could really change American’s lives if they were able to address them.

To conclude, Zen is for me something more than a religion, or even a set of beliefs.  It is a lifestyle theme that once made conscious to us serves as a reminder for all of the decisions we make in life.  Whether Muslim, Christian, Jew, or any other belief, the principals of slowing down, pondering life, and dedicating life to something greater than one’s self is something that would benefit not only American society, but humanity as a whole.

And while not all of my articles are as deep as this, I find that simple reminders of these principals lend to living a more significant life.  And in the end I think that is what we all want; To live a significant life of importance, and to be of value to more than just our family.  I know I want to be great, and I think most other students do to.

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