WELCOME TO THE APRIL NEWSLETTER
Spring is here. This month we are excited to be hosting our first Contemplative Care Awards event on Thursday, April 28. It promises to be a memorable evening to which you are all invited.
We appreciate the incredible artists who have donated their work to support NYZCCC at the Awards silent auction: Ross Bleckner, Laurie Anderson, Max Gimblett, Pat Steir and others.
In the newsletter you will find a new article about NYZCCC in the Huffington Post, words from our new Board of Directors Member, Joanne Heyman, new Advisory Council member Dr. Craig Blinderman, reports on Koshin and Chodo’s Opening Keynote at the Integrative Medicine Symposium, and their presentations at the Association of Professional Chaplains. In the coming month, join us at our meditation sessions on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays; join the Co-Founders and Advisory Council member, Polly Young Eisendrath, at our new workshop, When Change is Unwelcome: Embracing the Lessons of Loss; or come to Compassion, Care and Companioning of the Elderly and Caregivers at Union Theological Seminary.
It is a continuing pleasure to meet the wonderful group of new students joining our 2011/12 Foundations in Buddhist Contemplative Care. We encourage all those who are thinking of applying to do so soon, we are quickly reaching our student capacity.
We look forward to seeing many of you at our Contemplative Care Awards in April!
Wishing you ease and joy,
NYZCCC Leadership Team
Co-Founders
SAVE THE DATE: APRIL 28
Please join us and our honorees to the first Contemplative Care Awards 2011 on Thursday, April 28, 2011. It will be an exciting evening of community, nourishment, a silent auction of works donated by world-renowned artists, and also a special live performance. We are thrilled to have Laurie Anderson and Ross Bleckner as Co-Chairs for the event. We will be honoring three leaders in the field of compassion and contemplative care: Sharon Salzberg, Dr.Diane Meier, and Dr. Russ Portenoy. To sign up for tickets or become a sponsor, click here.
We Are Proud to Announce Our New Board of Directors Member, Joanne Heyman
Joanne Heyman, Founder of Heyman Partners, is a seasoned philanthropy executive with over twenty years experience in entrepreneurial organizations with a social purpose. Heyman Partners provides targeted services to foundations, corporations and non-profits enabling each to realize maximum benefit from the other. She offers these words describing why she has joined the Board.
"I have had the opportunity to work with NYZCCC in my capacity as the Executive Director of the Urban Zen Foundation, and was touched by Chodo and Koshin's grace, compassion, wisdom and ability to teach those who sought insight. And, having helped manage a pilot program at Beth Israel Medical Center that included contemplative end of life care, I have seen how powerful this form of support can be for patients, families and loved ones. The fact that NYZCCC is augmenting its care-providing services with training, education and meditation is brilliant, as they can share the techniques and insights that lead to a more peaceful engagement with illness...and being. It is a privilege to serve this organization in any way in which I can add value."
To read more about Joanne and the rest of the Board of Directors of NYZCCC, click here.
Words from Dr. Craig Blinderman, Our New NYZCCC Advisory Council Member
We are pleased to announce that palliative care physician, Dr. Craig Blinderman, has joined our Advisory Council. He offers these words: “In our health care system it is rare to meet professionals who recognize the spiritual dimension of human suffering as well as the deep desire of patients for wholeness and healing. NYZCCC not only recognizes these aspects of the patient experience, but trains chaplains to bring these dimensions into focus using contemplative approaches from the Buddhist tradition. Patients, families and other health care providers all benefit from their compassion and understanding. I would be honored to assist in furthering their noble efforts through membership of the Advisory Board.”
Dr. Craig D. Blinderman is currently the director of the Adult Palliative Medicine Service at Columbia University Medical Center. He was previously an attending physician on the Palliative Care Service at the Massachusetts General Hospital and directed the MGH Cancer Pain Clinic.
To read more about Craig and the rest of our Advisory Council, click here.
Applications Being Accepted for
Foundations in Buddhist Contemplative Care
2011/12. Class is filling up, apply early.
Are you ready to train in contemplative care skills for year with other like-minded people? Would you like to study with leaders in the field of Buddhist Caregiving? Our Foundations in Buddhist Contemplative Care Training Program is designed to meet the needs of people in a variety of ways such as:
- Building a community of caregivers interested in integrating care giving with contemplative practices
- Beginning training for those interested in becoming volunteer or professional caregivers in your local community, hospitals, hospices, and other places where spiritual care is needed.
- Basic training in spiritual care: attending the sick and dying, performing ritual, and offering spiritual direction.
For the application and more information, click here.
NYZCCC in the Huffington Post- Cultivating Wisdom: An Experiential Journey
Koshin and Chodo share the stage of a large ballroom, sitting comfortably side by side in their beautiful blue Zen robes, as they begin to explore the differences between compassion and empathy and the practical benefits of meditation practices. The two co-founders of New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care are the opening act of this year's Integrative Healthcare Symposium. Their lighthearted demeanor and easy-going banter is in bright contrast to their life work of training health care professionals and volunteers to face illness, disease, dying and living within a spiritually contemplative perspective.
Click here to read the full article.
NYZCCC AT THE ASSOCIATION OF PROFESSIONAL CHAPLAINS CONFERENCE IN DALLAS, TEXAS
Chodo and Koshin presented two workshops at the Association of Professional Chaplains Annual Conference. The three-day event is the largest gathering of professional chaplains in the country, and APC is the certifying body for Board Certified Chaplains. Among many other sessions, they offered a half-day retreat on the Great Matter of Life and Death, and a talk on Compassion and its Shadow. Both events were filled to capacity with chaplains of more than twenty faith traditions from Scotland to Hawaii. It is a pleasure for NYZCCC to be a part of the larger community of spiritual care providers and bringing our unique contemplative care approach. We were very well received.
Advisory Council member Rev. Jennifer Block also presented at the conference, and she continues to do great work in San Francisco at Zen Hospice Project. Jennifer has launched a brand new website for Buddhist Chaplains. The website is in it’s infancy and we look forward to it becoming a great resource for all those connected to the world of Buddhist Chaplaincy. We encourage you to join the directory, post a comment and contribute.
Well done Jennifer! For more information click here.
NYZCCC Delivers the Opening Keynote for Integrative Medicine Symposium 2011
On March 4, Chodo and Koshin opened the Integrative Medicine Conference 2011 to over a thousand people with their keynote entitled, Harmony of Mind: How Zen Can be Applied to Health Care Practice. The Integrative Medicine Symposium is the premier Integrative Medicine Conference where the integrative healthcare community gathers to hear from nationally recognized practitioners & experts in their fields. It was a wonderful morning of both laughter and tears and the huge crowd into a community. Stay tuned for the thought leaders’ video series of interviews compiled at the conference with Koshin and Chodo, Rachael Naomi Remen and others.
April 22 & 23, 2011
When Change is Unwelcome
With Polly Young Eisendrath, Koshin Paley Ellison & Robert Chodo Campbell
Unwelcome change is inevitable. It comes in the forms of betrayal, illness, loss, or bereavement, threatening to overwhelm us with negative feelings. When change is unwelcome, we must become more flexible in our identity to embrace the lessons of loss to see that when something is taken away, simultaneously something else is offered. New doors are opened when old ones close, but we can miss the new openings if we are focused only on loss.
For more information click here.
May 13-15 2011
Newark Peace Education Summit
Chodo will be speaking at the Newark Peace Education summit. For more information about the event click here.
Thursday April 14, 2011, 6:00 p.m.
Compassion, Care and Companioning of the Elderly and Caregivers at Union Theological Seminary
On March 17, 2011, the Center for Disease Control released their preliminary finding, "Americans are living longer." The average life expectancy in the U.S. is at an all time high: 78.2 years. This trend is also global. According to Julia Moulden of the Huffington Post, there were 600 million people 60 and over worldwide in 2000. By 2025, that number will double. And right now in the developed world, people 80 and over are the fastest growing population group.
Compassion, Care and Companioning of the Elderly and Caregivers is an inter-disciplinary panel of thought leaders working with aging and serving the aging population. As ministers and spiritual professionals, we need to be equipped to care for this fastest growing population. Join the Co-Founders of NYZCCC and other leaders in the field for a community meeting on this crucial issue.
This event is free and open to the public. Please RSVP online to attend.
OUR WEEKLY MEDITATION PRACTICE
NYZCCC offers meditation practice three times a week: Monday and Wednesday evenings and Thursdays mid-day. The heart of our work at New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care flows from our strong commitment in the practice of meditation and contemplation. To care for the world, we must care for ourselves. In caring for ourselves, we care for the whole world. Meditation is a practice that we do everyday, and we gather together in community to practice together to support one another. Our community is made up of Jewish, Catholic, Episcopal, Tibetan Buddhists, Zen Buddhists and those who don't wish to identify with a particular tradition. One does not need to identify as a Buddhist or Zen practitioner to realize within oneself the value of Zen practice.
To find out more about our meditation offerings, go here.
Make a tax deductible donation to support our work helping others. You can do that here.
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DEDICATED TRAINING SPACE NEEDED
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The New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care is actively looking for a new location. We have outgrown our present space at 80 East 11th Street and our rented spaces for our training programs. In the Fall, we are expanding our offerings to four year-long training programs in caregiving, as well as our regular weekly programs, retreats and public talks. At the moment, all our workshops, public education and trainings are held at various rental locations. Our administration and consultations are held in a separate office suite. While we are looking to realize our vision of a permanent home for the Center--including the end-of -life guest house--we need an interim space where we could expand our offerings, provide more direct care, train more people and increase our public education programs. Ideally, we are looking for 3,000 + square feet in the Union Square/Flatiron/Greenwhich Village/Soho areas—centrally located to public transportation and near our partner Beth Israel Medical Center. We are hoping for a donated or subsidized loft space. This new space will enable us to offer a 60 seat (or greater) meditation room, two/three consulting rooms, office, library, classroom, kitchen and multi-purpose common area. In an effort to better serve the needs of our caregivers and the New York City community, we ask for your support. All offers and/or leads are welcome.
Please contact us at: info@zencare.org.
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WAYS TO GIVING TO THE CENTER
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Use Your Birthday to Raise Money on FACEBOOK for the New York Zen Center For Contemplative Care!
How It Works:
As a supporter you can “donate” your birthday to New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care. Anyone can make a
Birthday Wish and ask friends to give money to your cause.
We need 10 black zabutons and 20 zafus for our weekly caregivers sitting group. If you can offer this generous gift, please email us at info@zencare.org
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Volunteer Transcribers Needed
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If you like listening to Dharma Talks on contemplative care and would like to offer your skill, we need you. We are looking to transcribe all of our core teachers’ Dharma Talks. If you can, please email Mary @ mary@zencare.org.
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Make a Donation to New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care
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Our mission is to make accessible, the wisdom, compassion and equanimity of the Buddha both locally and globally by: Creating and operating an end-of-life care residence within a larger Dharma center. To mindfully and compassionately serve people approaching death. To support the dying, their family and friends. To train volunteers, staff, monastics and medical professionals the ways of attending to the sick and dying from a Buddhist perspective. Attending to residents physical, emotional and spiritual needs cognizant of the fact that death is an integral experience of life. To provide the larger community, educational programs with a foundation in Buddhist teachings. To offer daily meditation practice, workshops and teachings from visiting Dharma teachers and Healthcare professionals. Your tax deductible donation will go toward making our vision a reality. |
