An Indigenous & Zen Perspective on Living Into a World Beyond Crisis

• Online Conversation 
• Register to Access the Livestream and One Week of Ad-Free Replay Access 
• Books are available to add to your order at check-out for pick-up from Marcus Books in Oakland, California or delivery within the United States 

Join 86th generation Zen master and Indigenous Hawaiian leader Rōshi Norma Wong for an illuminating conversation with CIIS Associate Professor Sonya Shah exploring spiritual activism and how to envision co-creating new worlds from one in crisis. 

In her latest book, When No Thing Works, Norma inquiries into the ways we can live well and maintain our wholeness in an era of collective acceleration: the swiftly moving current, fed and shaped by human actions, that sweeps us toward ever uncertain futures.  

Grounded in Zen Buddhism, interconnection, and decades of community activism, Norma examines: what practices, strategies, and spiritualities can align to vision a sustainable future for our communities and descendants? How can we step out of urgency to tend to our crises with wisdom, intention, and care?   

Holding our collective moment with gravity and tender care, Norma asks us to not only imagine but to live into a story beyond crisis and collapse—one that expands to meet our dreams of what (we hope) comes next, while facing with clarity and grace our here and now in the world we share today. 
 
 

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Norma Wong (Norma Ryuko Kawelokū Wong Roshi) is a Native Hawaiian and Hakka life-long resident of Hawai’i. She is the abbot of Anko-in, an independent branch temple of Daihonzan Chozen-ji and serves practice communities in Hawai‘i, across the continental U.S., and in Toronto, Canada. She is an 86th generation Zen Master, having trained at Chozen-ji for over 40 years. Her book on the necessity and ways to leap beyond this fraught societal moment will be published in the Fall of 2024 by North Atlantic Books/Penguin Random House. 
 
In earlier years, Norma served as a Hawai‘i state legislator, on the policy and strategy team for Governor John Waihee with federal and Native Hawaiian portfolios. She led teams to negotiate agreements on the munition's cleanup of Kaho`olawe Island, ceded land revenue for Native Hawaiians, and the return of lands and settlement of land issues for Hawaiian Homelands. She was active in electoral politics for over 30 years.   
 
In recent years, Norma has been called back into service to facilitate breaking the impasse and transforming policy and governance on issues of seeming contradiction. In the conflict between native culture/science and western discovery science posing as a dispute over the construction of a telescope on Mauna Kea, Norma was a team member narrating and facilitating a path forward through mutual stewardship. She is currently an advisor to Speaker of the Hawai‘i House of Representatives Scott Saiki, serving in policy development and facilitation roles on issues such as the protection of the aquifer from fuel contamination at Red Hill, and the long-term response to the Lahaina wildfires.  
 

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Sonya Shah initiated the Ahimsa Collective in 2016. She is also an associate professor at California Institute of Integral Studies. Central to her core values are nurturing community belonging and collective care, healing, compassion, love, and transforming harm. She is a first-generation immigrant from the Northwestern part of India and feels most at home in nature. She has two amazing children who remind her what it means to be in love all of the time and currently resides in Northern California.
 

We are grateful to our Bookstore Partner

Marcus Books is the nation’s oldest Black-owned independent bookstore celebrating its 60th year. Marcus Books’ mission is to provide opportunities for Black folks and their allies to celebrate and learn about Black people everywhere. Learn more about Marcus Books.

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Important Event Information

Access to the livestream event is limited to registered guests. Registered ticket holders will receive the link to watch the livestream, will have access to chat and Q&A, and will have an ad-free watching experience.

Recording Policy

Ticket holders will have access to an ad-free replay of the event for one week after the live event. A replay with ads will be released on our YouTube channel one week after the livestream. Portions of the audio will also be released on our podcast. Only registered ticket holders who choose to watch live can participate in the chat and Q&A.

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