Natalie Goldberg

Natalie Goldberg is the author of Writing Down The Bones: Freeing The Writer Within (Shambhala 1986), The Great Spring: Writing, Zen and This Zigzag Life (Shambhala 2016), and other books on Zen practice and the creative process.

Books

Recent Articles

Zen Mind, Writer’s Mind

Author Natalie Goldberg discusses Zen and the writer's practice.

Another New Year

Sitting still in the dark zendo and breathing with others is exactly what Natalie Goldberg needs. On this last night of the year, she wonders what this human life is all about.

Bed with books.

Waking Up to Happiness

Natalie Goldberg was awfully sick yet she was happy. Happiness is available to everyone, she realized, but we can find it only when we’re still.

Losing Katherine

Katherine was the sort of person who might suddenly ask, “How do you know love?” Natalie Goldberg recounts what she learned from this friend.

Meeting the Chinese in St. Paul: Rhino Hits the Midwest

Meeting the Chinese in St. Paul: Rhino Hits the Midwest

A season devoted to the koans of the ancient Chinese Masters gave Natalie Goldberg a taste for the stripped-down, naked truth of things.

When the Candle is Blown Out: On The Death of Katagiri Roshi

Natalie Goldberg offers a remembrance of her teacher and a cri de coeur over all that is left incomplete and unanswered by his death.

The Rain and the Temple

"Pushing the dripping hair from my face, the rain running down my cheeks, I speak to my old teacher. ‘I’m here. It took me a while, but I made it.’