Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune in to Truth
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE:
CITY: Brooklyn
STATE: NY
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY:
http://www.wisdompubs.org/author/josh-korda; http://tricycle.org/trikedaily/against-stream/
RESEARCHER NOTES:
LC control no.: n 2017007913
LCCN Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/n2017007913
HEADING: Korda, Josh
000 00281nz a2200109n 450
001 10375328
005 20170213000735.0
008 170213n| azannaabn |n aaa
010 __ |a n 2017007913
040 __ |a DLC |b eng |e rda |c DLC
100 1_ |a Korda, Josh
670 __ |a Unsubscribe, 2017: |b E-CIP t.p. (Josh Korda)
Josh Korda from DharmaPunx in New York City practices a unique mix of Buddhism and western psychology. We talked to him and his wife Kathy Cherry recently while they were facilitating a silent retreat here at New Life.
PERSONAL
Married Kathy Cherry.
EDUCATION:Attended college.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer, Dharma teacher, lecturer, and radio broadcaster. Formerly worked in advertising. Dharma Punx NYC, New York, NY, guiding teacher, 2005–; New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care, New York, visiting teacher; also leads online and residential retreats for Tricycle and Lion’s Roar magazines; conducts podcast. Weekly Dharma talks broadcast on WBAI radio in New York; has appeared on Viceland TV Channel’s public-service announcements.
WRITINGS
Contributor to periodicals, including Tricycle, Lion’s Roar, and Buddhadharma, and to websites, including the Huffington Post.
SIDELIGHTS
Josh Korda is a recovering addict who became a Dharma teacher in the Against the Stream lineage. Korda is also known for his podcasts, which have garnered more than 1.4 million downloads. He gives weekly Dharma talks on New York’s WBAI radio and is a contributor to periodicals and websites. Korda is also the author of Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune in to Truth. The book present’s Korda’s three-step guide to recovery from addiction. Korda, however, is not talking about addiction to drugs and alcohol but rather to consumerism, self-deception, and the life people think they have to live.
Writing in the book’s introduction, Korda informs readers that he was relatively pleased with his own life in fast-paced New York City. However, riding on the subway to work he kept hearing talk about something happening in the city. When he got off the subway and up onto the street, he looked up to see black smoke billowing out of the Twin Towers and then witnessed them collapse. The 9/11 tragedy led Korda to reevaluate his life and purpose for living, ultimately suffering a nervous breakdown. “It was then that his lifelong fascination for Buddhism and Western psychology, which he had rediscovered some years prior, deepened, and he sought a community to further his study,” wrote wrote Salvador Pantoja in a profile of Korda for the Asia Society website. The seeking eventually led Korda to join the Buddhist community Dharma Punx.
Korda’s three step program as outlined in Unsubscribe begins with reprioritizing goals to focus on a fulfilling avocation instead of a materialist vocation. The second step is to gain an understanding of self and specific emotional needs. The final step is to form meaningful connections with others. Korda tells readers that taking these steps is not necessarily easy and can be highly uncomfortable. However, he writes that the rewards are worth it. A major point is that people who gain a greater consciousness about their place in the world tend to find more meaning and purpose in their life. However, he stresses that society’s prescribed roles should largely be left behind. As a result, he urges readers to questions many things about themselves, from the job to their relationships with a focus on how meaningful and fulfilling they are. He goes on to provide various Buddhist practices to help people reevaluate their lives, ultimatley making them more meaningful. These practices focus on things such as being mindful of death and recognizing compulsive behaviors.
Korda has “developed a plan based around the Buddha’s teachings that gives readers another option, one that can lead to happiness independent of possessions and circumstances,” wrote Brent R. Oliver for the Tattooed Buddha website. A Publishers Weekly contributor called Unsubscribe “an intelligent, compassionate addition to popular Buddhist literature that doesn’t shy away from the grim and sometimes bleak realities of life.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, September, 11, 2017, review of Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune in to Truth, p. 62.
ONLINE
Asia Society Website, https://asiasociety.org/ (February 14, 2018) Salvador Pantoja, “How a ‘Dharma Punk’ Learned to Treat Addiction through Meditation.”
Pregame, http://www.pregamemagazine.com/ (December 1, 2017), Ciara Pressler, review of Unsubscribe.
Spirituality & Health, https://spiritualityhealth.com/ (October 31, 2017), Sam Mowe, review of Unsubscribe.
Tattooed Buddha, http://thetattooedbuddha.com/ (March 20, 2018), Brent R. Oliver, review of Unsubscribe.
Tricycle Online, https://tricycle.org/ (March 20, 2018), Josh Korda, “Now What? Life as a Recovering Addict.”
JOSH KORDA
Since 2005 Josh Korda been the guiding teacher of Dharma Punx NYC and is a fully empowered Dharma teacher in the Against the Stream lineage. In addition to his weekly classes, and meditation retreats for both institutions, he has led online and residential retreats for Tricycle and Lion’s Roar magazines. Josh is widely known for his podcast, which has over 1.4 million downloads, and has written numerous articles on insight meditation for Tricycle, Lion’s Roar, Buddhadharma and the Huffington Post. Josh can also be seen on Viceland TV Channel’s public-service announcements and his Dharma talks are broadcast weekly on WBAI radio. He lives in New York, New York.
Now What?
Life as a Recovering Addict
By Josh KordaFALL 2012
Photograph by A. Jesse Jiryu Davis.
Photograph by A. Jesse Jiryu Davis.
Of all the passages in our recovery literature I find unintentionally amusing—and there are many—one stands out. It is a memorable paragraph about those alcoholics who “for a variety of reasons cannot have a family life.” They are consoled with the wildly thrilling prospect of transforming themselves into “prodigies of service.” It’s supposed to be inspiring. I remember one friend who used to sigh audibly and cross her arms angrily when this portion was read aloud at Twelve Step gatherings. No doubt she was shuddering at the thrilling plans the program had in store for her. Perhaps she, like me, imagined armies of childless drunks and addicts, dressed in colorless work uniforms, dutifully sweeping up after their happily married fellows had gracefully departed the meetings, en route to the Hamptons. At least the industrious spirits left behind would be lifted by the thought of helping another alcoholic.
This patronizing pat on the head is by no means an isolated theme in recovery literature. The approved texts are very big on the idea that life, in essence, boils down to staying away from the bottle and helping others. We hit the jackpot when we find ourselves “arranging for the coffee and cake after the meetings” while being observed by “skeptical, suspicious newcomers.” Sober Utopia begins to sound like life in North Korea.
Now, before my words are misinterpreted: service, in proper balance, develops self-esteem, reins in ego, and establishes connectedness to the recovery community. Unquestionably. But there’s more to recovery than arranging cookies and stacking folding chairs in church basements. So now that we’re clean and sober, what next?
Life before getting sober didn’t exactly point me in the right direction. In lieu of developing interpersonal skills, crafts, facilities, or know-how, or for that matter developing a skill that could feasibly result in employment, I mastered the fine art of consuming alcohol in quantity. Liquor-store clerks had a bottle of Jameson’s set aside at the counter for me; bartenders kept a stool empty; fellow patrons took to drinking gin, knowing it was the only form of booze I couldn’t abide (I had a bad habit of stealing people’s drinks). An ex of mine took to distributing my spent bottles in the garbage bins of various neighbors. Apparently she wanted to put on a good front for the sanitation workers who removed our trash. So removing alcohol from my life meant, unquestionably, depriving me of my one highly developed skill. At 35, I faced life with the aptitude and smarts of a teenager—perhaps a decent scenario for a film starring Tom Hanks but not for a real-life adult.
In early sobriety I answered this mighty existential dilemma by honing my cigarette smoking technique, forcing down tuna melts at diners from hell, and flirting tirelessly with disinterested and emotionally unavailable women. The notion that life should mean more hovered before me like a disappointed tutor at an English boarding school. My early efforts were, to say the least, dismal. So I turned my attention to the various “cleaning house” projects bluntly recommended by gruff Twelve- Steppers with long-term sobriety: resentments were acknowledged; apologies made; funds owed were repaid. Fine ideas, yet I still longed for the big answer: What do I do if not drink?
Of course, this concern transcends recovery and flummoxes the best of us: rows of library shelves are stacked with largely unreadable philosophy treatises on the subject. Thinkers as varied as Sartre, Schopenhauer, Spinoza, and Sinatra (“Do be do be do”) have tackled it, few arriving at comprehensible solutions. If there is any agreement among the greats, it’s that we arrive in life without any determined purpose. Life is not about discovering some hidden raison d’être but about creating one. And so, to the already overcrowded mix of voices offering unsolicited opinions on this, I now offer a few of my own. (Don’t worry; this won’t turn into another homily on the joys of smelling roses or traveling by rail through Europe; those are sermonized enough as is.)
Learn to endure inner storms with style. In other words, develop ways to stop obsessing before being driven to the bottle. For years I warded off my repetitive fears by drinking myself into oblivion; now the inner voices that persistently remind me how bad my future will turn out, or how shameful the mistakes I’ve made are, seem to have found fresh ammunition and a bullhorn. Fortunately, when thoughts become maddening, today I simply say “Hello!” to them, rather than agreeing or disagreeing with what they would have me believe. It’s amazing what relief acceptance—without agreeing—can bring. And we now have the Internet at our disposal, which is packed with recordings of the wise and venerable. When the inner committee starts to pipe up, you don’t have to suffer: pull out the headphones.
Becoming at home in our own skin is an estimable accomplishment. For much of my life, my body felt like a distant cousin, making itself known at inopportune times with nagging demands and ever-present tension and stress. I didn’t feel comfortable with it, in it, even looking at it. Booze, of course, offered only temporary freedom from my physical anxiety. Today my solutions are far healthier and durable. I meditate every day for at least 30-40 minutes, much of which is spent calming the mind via the breath. On other occasions, you’ll find me either on my yoga mat, heaving into an ungainly warrior pose; down in Chinatown, receiving an affordable qigong massage; or schvitzing out the anxiety at the Russian steam baths. The result of all this near nudity is a state of physical ease that drinking could only hint at.
Pick up an absolutely pointless skill. I was 45 years old the first time I climbed onto a skateboard; this fact alone is impressive enough for many reasons. I well remember the scoffs of 10-year-olds flying past me, rubbing it in with their nosegrinds and ollies while I could barely manage to balance on one leg. But I persevered. In the last five years I’ve learned how to pick a banjo and play a melody on the harmonica, all without permission or encouragement. Had I the time, I’d take a language course in Icelandic. Here’s why: the profit in learning a new skill lies in developing thick skin, aka a willingness to suck at something in public. Fear of failing and being judged by others are life’s great hindrances to happiness. Following one’s harmless muse despite the opinions of one’s friends and families is liberating and lends life entirely new dimensions.
Do your thirteenth step. No, it’s not what you think, so take your mind out of the gutter. It may be little practiced now, but at one time the unofficial thirteenth step involved learning not to take ourselves too seriously, especially the mistakes we made during our years of addiction. (My good friend Oran wrote a hilarious tell-all about low-bottom heroin addiction that’s funnier than most TV sitcoms I’ve sat through.) Fortunately, getting a sense of humor doesn’t come with a price tag. It simply requires understanding that everything we experience is universal; all the humiliations and hijinks are a part of life; each and every one of us gets to slip on the banana peel. So pick yourself up, brush yourself off, and laugh about it, for crying out loud.
Finally, there’s more to life than work. While being a worker among workers is well extolled in recovery literature, a life spent laboring endless hours until we hit 65, then dragging a sagging ass down to Florida for a few brief years in the sun is not worth the effort. So pull yourself away from the cubicle, take a stroll to one of the few remaining bookstores on the planet, walk in and purchase a book. On a subject you don’t know anything about. The result of this is that your mind will expand, and a bookstore owner will be reminded of what it’s like to sell something. Then stop off for lunch at restaurant you’ve never entered, ordering a cuisine you’ve never tasted. Lastly, spend the rest of the afternoon at a cinema that shows those strange films with subtitles. At some point during all of the above I guarantee you the question, “I’m sober, now what?” will no longer haunt you, if only to be replaced by “Now that I’ve lost this job, where will I find another one in this economy?”
Temple
Dharma to your inbox
Sign up for Tricycle’s newsletters
Your email here
Josh Korda has been the guiding teacher of Dharma Punx NYC since 2005. He is an empowered teacher in the Against the Stream lineage and a visiting teacher at the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care.
How a 'Dharma Punk' Learned To Treat Addiction Through Meditation
Josh Korda
(Photograph taken by Alex Kusak Smith)
February 14th, 2018 by Salvador Pantoja
On September 11, 2001, as he took the New York subway to work, Josh Korda was finally feeling optimistic. After four decades of drug and alcohol addiction, he was now six years sober. He was married and had found a respectable career in advertising. But when he emerged from the subway that day, the sight of smoke billowing out of the Twin Towers forever altered his life.
Korda began to question his job and purpose in life. He suffered a nervous breakdown. It was then that his lifelong fascination for Buddhism and Western psychology, which he had rediscovered some years prior, deepened, and he sought a community to further his study. But his initial attempts failed. Korda, who is covered in tattoos, didn't look the part — and he felt uncomfortable with the groups' unfettered embrace of Western materialism.
Buddhism and Beyond Banner
Buddhism & Beyond is a series of programs exploring Buddhism, its practice, and its popularity in contemporary culture, organized in conjunction with the exhibition Unknown Tibet: The Tucci Expeditions and Buddhist Painting, on view at Asia Society Museum from February 27 through May 20, 2018.Learn More
Then he met Noah Levine. A former prisoner and recovering addict, Levine taught meditation to incarcerated youth and wanted help starting a Dharma Punx community in New York. Korda joined Levine, and over the course of a number of years gradually left advertising to pursue spiritual practice full time.
For the last 13 years Korda has been the guiding teacher at Dharma Punx NYC, originally founded by Noah Levine. He is also a contributing writer for the Buddhist magazines Lion’s Roar, Tricycle, and Buddhadharma. He recently published a book on meditation in the modern age called Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune In to Truth, where he shares his three-step guide to recovery from addiction and describes his transformation from ad man to Dharma punk.
In an interview with Asia Society, Korda discusses the origins of the Dharma Punx community, why he decided to become a teacher, and how Buddhism and punk rock are compatible.
What sparked your interest in Buddhism? When did you start practicing?
My father got sober in 1972 when I was a kid. To help him with sobriety, he was encouraged to select a spiritual path. He chose Zen because he didn't like the religious faith of his birth. He started to sit and practice with a Zen group led by the author Peter Matthiessen.
During this time, my Dad would take me to different events where Buddhists spoke at the Ethical Culture Society and other places where Trungpa Rinpoche and other Buddhist teachers would speak. Eventually, our bookshelves became filled with works on Buddhism.
At the same time, my mom was heavily into psychology and had lots of books by famous psychologists. The first book I read as a teen in the Buddhist tradition was Three Pillars of Zen by Philip Kapleau, and then there was Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha. From these influences, I conceived of the Buddha as a kind of psychologist of the mind rather than a spiritual figure.
When I went to college in the 1980s, I started studying more about Buddhism, got heavily into Zen, and wrote a lot of papers on Buddhist ideas and Buddhist psychology. I seriously began my deep practice when I got sober in 1995. So that was pretty much the beginning of my deep dive into both study and being a member of the Buddhist community and going on retreats and all that.
What is Dharma Punx? How are the teachings there different from other forms of American Buddhism?
Dharma Punx was started by a fellow named Noah Levine in California at around the turn of the millennium. He started it inside the Theravada tradition as a way to have a sangha (Buddhist community) that would attract a lot of people who normally didn't feel comfortable in a lot of other Buddhist groups. People like punks, recovering addicts, and members of anarchist and LGBTQ communities didn’t want to go into sanghas where everybody was in their 60s and looked like an Upper West Side therapist.
Dharma Punx was an attempt to start a community that would allow, encourage, reach out to, and openly welcome people from historically disenfranchised groups. Like a 12-step program, we have talks where practitioners go into their history of emotional struggles and issues with addiction and addictive behaviors. You use yourself and your disclosure as part of the teaching. We don't teach from a place of "I'm some venerable fixed emotionally resolved human being." We don't present ourselves like we are gurus. We acknowledge that, like everybody else, we’re a work in progress, and that we still have anxiety and other issues that we’re working with. I always share and acknowledge my own challenges. And using both Dharmic tools and psychological tools, I tend to present a psychological therapeutic-focused class.
What led you to start teaching?
I didn't decide to become a teacher. I didn't want to do it. When Levine left New York in 2005, he said: “I'm going to need you to continue the meetings.” To say the least, I was pretty surprised. And while I had a lot of the background — I had spent the years after 9/11 transcribing talks by Buddhist teachers such Ajahn Amaro and Sucitto, studying the Pāli canon, going on retreats, sitting with Noah and asking him questions, and meeting with other teachers — I never had any goal or intention to become a teacher. But he basically put it to me that Dharma Punx wouldn't continue unless there was somebody willing to step up.
I’m now in my 13th year of teaching. I went to teacher training, got empowered, and have gotten more comfortable in my role. When I started teaching I would literally need 10 hours just to prepare for one class. Now I've gotten it down to probably three or four hours every time. I spent a lot of time looking through the canon and I have always been deeply interested in contemporary psychology, so I always try to integrate the Dharma with therapeutic insights so that my students have access to beneficial contemporary tools and practices.
Addiction recovery seems to be a central theme in your work. How does this approach affect your interpretation of Buddhism?
I think all Buddhism is about craving — and addiction is just a form of craving. I don't think that there’s any branch of Buddhism that doesn't address it. I think teaching about recovery from addiction is essentially teaching the Dharma because I believe that's what the Buddha taught.
The first noble truth is that we have suffering and painful emotional experiences. And the second noble truth is that if we try to avoid, distract, not feel, or try to escape those pains, then an addiction to craving something that will help us not feel, repress our painful emotions, or escape those addictions will make life worse than simply feeling and dealing safely and constructively with our emotional wounds.
And the third noble truth is if you let go of your cravings to sensual pleasures, those that are short term, and instead turn to reconnect with other people in a harmless way, then you'll be able to live a life with so much less needless suffering and emotional pain.
In your book Unsubscribe you tell the story of how 9/11 shook you and helped you transform from an ad man to a dharma punk. Do you think one needs these types of critical moments to grow in one's spiritual practice, or are there other entry points for people?
I don't think you can have a life without experiencing the first noble truth. Every life has emotionally painful events. So to the degree that we don't deal with them, we set ourselves up for increasing amounts of craving and frenzied busy lives that are ultimately unfulfilled. I don't meet people that come into Dharma centers or at least come to Dharma Punx, simply out of curiosity. It's a lot like 12-step meetings — nobody comes in on a winning streak. People come in because they are looking for help dealing with depression, ongoing anxiety, feelings of being overwhelmed in relationships, or feelings of lack of fulfillment or meaning or purpose in life.
I'm sure that there are other centers that can attract people who are just interested in learning how to meditate, but I think the people that come through our doors are also looking for or have had some kind of challenge or struggle.
Are punk rock and Buddhism compatible?
Absolutely. Some of the great punk and hardcore punk in the 1980’s all had the spiritual practices. A lot of them were what's known as straight edge, which meant refraining from alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs. For some, it also involved refraining from killing animals by adhering to strict vegetarian principles. Hardcore punk had a lot of overlap with core Buddhist principles.
The original punk ethos was always about community. And that's what the Buddha taught. He said that a prerequisite for any spiritual path was having wise spiritual friends. That's what punks offered each other, as well as a deep questioning and even seeking of purpose in life outside of materialism.
3/2/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1520043544348 1/2
Print Marked Items
Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune
in to Truth
Publishers Weekly.
264.37 (Sept. 11, 2017): p62.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune in to Truth
Josh Korda. Wisdom, $17.95 trade paper
(272p) ISBN 978-1-61429-282-1
Korda, founder of the Buddhist community Dharma Punx NYC, teaches that the path to living a good life is
readily available, and that it requires one to engage in a profound radical questioning of one's conditioning.
Korda's teaching emphasizes three basic points for living in line with the Dharma in modern times:
skillfully reprioritizing goals, fully integrating emotions and feelings with rationality, and cultivating
authentic, empathetic connections with others. Korda writes that the work he prescribes is difficult and, at
times, uncomfortable. He stresses that by being more conscious and mindful of one's place in the world, one
can create meaning and purpose, but first one must extract oneself from prescribed roles. Korda particularly
emphasizes reorienting the self by feeling one's emotional, felt embodiment in the world, which comes
close to the meditation practice of paying attention to visceral sensations and physical surroundings. In
casual prose ("We survive by connecting to others. That's our advantage. We can bond, share information,
act as a team"), he offers guidance for everyday practice, including mindfulness techniques, visualizations,
and investigations of one's emotional, embodied experience. Korda's work doesn't tread new ground, but it
is an intelligent, compassionate addition to popular Buddhist literature that doesn't shy away from the grim
and sometimes bleak realities of life and practice. (Nov.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune in to Truth." Publishers Weekly, 11 Sept. 2017, p. 62. General
OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A505634963/ITOF?
3/2/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1520043544348 2/2
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=6ce84ada. Accessed 2 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A505634963
Book Review: Unsubscribe
by Josh Korda – Wisdom Publications
reviewed by Sam Mowe
EXPLORE
Cover image of Unsubscribe
“To be a spiritual rebel,” Josh Korda writes in Unsubscribe, “one has to give the middle finger to materialism, self-centered fear, self-serving luxury, financial security. We have to say no.” This kind of punk ethos animates much of Korda’s first book, which challenges readers to live authentic lives amid “soulless institutions and the spiritually weak.”
That Korda draws on punk values is to be expected—he is, after all, the guiding teacher of the Dharma Punx NYC community after having studied with Dharma Punx author Noah Levine. More surprising, perhaps, is Korda’s adherence to traditional Buddhist scriptures from the Pali canon, which he often interprets through the lenses of developmental psychology and neuroscience. For Korda, a lot of dukkha, or suffering, is the result of negligent caretakers from childhood or neural imbalance between the left and right hemispheres of the brain.
“If I could summarize my work as a Buddhist teacher and mentor into a single unifying goal or theme,” he writes, “it would be providing people with the many tools of the Dharma that allow us to translate and integrate the emotional mind into our conscious, ambitious life agendas.” Once we’re aware of our emotional needs—which often reveal themselves through the body, such as a locked jaw indicating unexpressed anger or frustration—we can begin to address them in tandem with our headier goals and aspirations through secure relationships with others.
Korda is most inspiring, however, when he encourages us to reprioritize our life goals around the pursuit of meaning and purpose. Is your job unfulfilling? Are you in an empty relationship? Korda suggests that deep transformation is possible through practices he describes, like “Mindfulness of Death” and “Understanding Compulsive Behaviors.”
When delivering lessons on authenticity, Korda seems credible due to both his transparency (“There are times I’m envious of other people’s successes, even other spiritual teachers I know well and like”) and his conversational tone. (The book ends with a section titled “How Do We Practice When Life Really Sucks?”) True to its message, Unsubscribe doesn’t come across as an attempt by Korda to build his reputation or make a bunch of money, but rather as a way for him to simply share some of the wisdom that he has discovered in his life.
This entry is tagged with:
• Spirituality • Buddhism • Authenticity • Book Reviews
Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune in to Truth {Book Review}
He wants to share some of his story to illustrate the point that the overhyped, consumer-based, American Dream we’re being force-fed may not be the best route to satisfaction. It certainly wasn’t for Korda, and he’s developed a plan based around the Buddha’s teachings that gives readers another option, one that can lead to happiness independent of possessions and circumstances.
By Brent R. Oliver
I’m a champion of the modern mindfulness movement.
I think the scientific path of rigorous meditation unbound from religious traditions is the key to improving our human condition. It’s easily accessible to a massive audience and doesn’t require any beliefs to yield benefits. It’s what I study; it’s what I teach; it’s what I practice.
But I am a Buddhist. Secular and post-traditional, but a Buddhist nonetheless. I’m not a joiner and I never settled on a specific lineage or approach that felt right for me. The one that comes closest, the one that’s always felt like my spiritual home base, is the Dharma Punx community. It’s founder, Noah Levine, is a fantastic leader whose teachings have really spoken to me, honestly moved me and truly shaped my practice and views. I finally met Noah a year ago at Against the Stream in Nashville and I was instantly comfortable with him and that sangha.
Someone else I’ve long-admired is Josh Korda, guiding teacher of Dharma Punx NYC.
I find his story inspirational and highly motivating. Korda walked away from a big deal advertising career, drug and alcohol addiction, and a life that he saw as empty and materialistic. He became a dharma teacher, living off donations rather than a high-roller salary, and has found deep meaning and fulfillment in a very non-traditional life.
In his new book, Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune in to Truth, Korda wants to tell you a little bit about that. This isn’t an autobiography, though. He wants to share some of his story to illustrate the point that the overhyped, consumer-based, American Dream we’re being force-fed may not be the best route to satisfaction. It certainly wasn’t for Korda, and he’s developed a plan based around the Buddha’s teachings that gives readers another option, one that can lead to happiness independent of possessions and circumstances.
It’s pretty simple, really. Unsubscribe isn’t a heady, mystical journey through Buddhist esoterica.
It doesn’t concern itself with metaphysics or speculation. Instead, it’s a practical, down-to-earth, how-to guide for living a more fully human life. Korda includes simple meditation practices that can be done by anyone, with full explanations of what they do and why they’re relevant. He also offers some of the Buddha’s philosophical and psychological views on why we’re unhappy and how we can change it.
Unsubscribe is a solid little book. It’s very friendly and approachable and won’t scare readers off with exotic terminology and a lot of talk about religion. As an introduction to Buddhist meditation practices and a short overview of how we create suffering, it’s an excellent choice. Pragmatic without being cold; spiritual without being goofy; personal without being boring; universal without being New Agey.
If you’re looking for something a little more than mindfulness, for something that has a solid Buddhist base and flavor, Unsubscribe is it. What’s more, the Dharma Punx community is warm, welcoming, and spread all over the country. If you like Josh Korda’s book, if it speaks to you as it did to me, there are plenty of ways to connect and learn.
Check out Unsubscribe here.
Book Brief: Unsubscribe by Josh Korda
Posted on December 1, 2017 by Ciara Pressler
Mollie_McKinley_Cacti_Offering
Unsubscribe
Unsubscribe: Opt Out of Delusion, Tune In to Truth
by Josh Korda
2017, Wisdom Publications
A three-step guide to recovering from the modern addiction to consumerism, social withdrawal, and emotional inauthenticity — from life as you thought it had to be.
The Idea
If you’ve ever felt like there must be more than the rat race, or that the modern American definition of success might not be all it’s cracked up to be.
Recommended For
Those of us who are searching for more depth and meaning beyond the mainstream American approach to life and fulfillment.
The Author
Since 2005 Josh Korda been the guiding teacher of Dharma Punx NYC and is a fully empowered Dharma teacher in the Against the Stream lineage. In addition to his weekly classes, and meditation retreats for both institutions, he has led online and residential retreats for Tricycle and Lion’s Roar magazines. Josh is widely known for his podcast, which has over 1.4 million downloads, and has written numerous articles on insight meditation for Tricycle, Lion’s Roar, Buddhadharma and the Huffington Post. Josh can also be seen on Viceland TV Channel’s public-service announcements and his Dharma talks are broadcast weekly on WBAI radio.
The Pros
Josh is incredibly smart. He brings a highly intellectual perspective, incorporating concepts from modern psychology to further highlight the science and wisdom of spiritual practice.
The Cons
Josh is not here to make Buddhism palatable for you. He takes care to honor the origins and spirit of the practice, and not to “Americanize” it for more popular appeal. This is not a lesson in learning to meditate so you can be more successful on a material level. This is about distilling the Buddhist path into modern-day practice.
My Take
I started my journey of incorporating Buddhist principles and mindfulness into my life at Josh Korda’s Dharma Punx sessions in New York City. Now that I’m on the West Coast, I still listen to every talk via his podcast. You can hear the street noise on the Bowery in every episode – now that’s a test for practicing meditation.
Fun Fact
Josh’s teacher is Noah Levine, author of several memoirs and books on Buddhism and recovery, and founder of Refuge Recovery. Noah writes the forward to this book.
This entry was posted in Culture, Life and tagged books, buddhism, happiness, spirituality. Bookmark the permalink.
Post navigation