Selected Writings
Right Action in the Face of Suffering
Dan Zigmond, Lion’s Roar, March 15, 2022
As we witness the great suffering of the Russian-Ukraine war, says Dan Zigmond, we have a moral obligation to pay attention. Through mindfulness, he suggests, we can see the world as it really is and take right action…
Shall I Stay or Shall I Go?
Dan Zigmond, Lion’s Roar, January 26, 2022
More people than ever before are changing jobs, or at least thinking about it. To help you decide, says Dan Zigmond, contemplate the nature of change…
You Are Not Your Job
Dan Zigmond, Lion’s Roar, November 19, 2020
A lot of people are feeling insecure about work these days. But no matter what happens, says Dan Zigmond, remember that it’s just a job. It isn’t you…
Practicing at the Office
Interview with Dan Zigmond by Karen Jensen, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, December 3, 2019
The Zen priest, writer, and data scientist Dan Zigmond discusses his book Buddha’s Office, and how we can wake up at our day jobs…
Hungry Ghosts
Dan Zigmond, Jikoji Zen Center, October 30, 2016
When you look around, whether you’re here in the temple or out in the world, you actually see a lot of Hungry Ghosts. All around you are beings suffering. Everybody wants something they can’t have, or clings to something they can’t keep. And maybe these days this is even more apparent. The current election has gotten very ugly, and is filed with stories of suffering. Whether it is physical abuse or economic hardship or countless other problems, our world seems especially filled with stories of suffering, as well as greed, hate, and other delusions. And whether we agree with these people or not, whether they look like us or think like us or not, it is important to live and act with compassion…
Diss Tech Buddhists All You Want—but Read This Book First
Tech veteran Dan Zigmond wants you to bring Buddha to the office. It's not as ironic as it sounds.
Emma Gray Ellis, WIRED Magazine, December 6, 2019
IN SILICON VALLEY, you are always an iPhone’s throw from a Buddhist. Some of them will have arrived at their Buddhism the usual way—family, culture—but a fair few will have adopted it later in life, as a piece of their adult identity. Even if they’re not checking the “Buddhist” box on the census, you’ll know them by their Zen meditation retreats, their references to “the Middle Way,” their wealth … of Steve Jobs trivia. Did you know that Steve Jobs was a Buddhist who studied under Zen priest Kobun Chino Otogawa and once wandered India in search of a guru? Did you know Jobs swiped Apple’s famous “Think different” slogan from the Dalai Lama? Did you know Buddhism and tech companies have a grand historical “synergy”? When I moved to California from the East Coast, I did not. After living and working in San Francisco for a few years, I see Buddha everywhere….
What Silicon Valley Can Learn From Buddha's Diet
Zen and the art of building the future.
Chade Metz, WIRED Magazine, October 31, 2016
AS WE WALK, Dan Zigmond pulls on a black baseball cap. The sun is high, and the trees give little shade. It's a big park---stretching across a good nine acres of grass, mulch, shrubs, and gravel paths---but from where we are, it looks much bigger. Beyond the nine acres, all we can see are more trees, more green, and the mountains in the east, so the park seems almost endless. "That always amazes me," I say. After all, we're on the roof of the newest Facebook building, a Frank Gehry creation called MPK20, right next to Highway 84, the Dumbarton Bridge, and the sprawling urban marshlands of Menlo Park, California, where the bog is decorated with so many power lines, transmission towers, and electrical substations….