Overview
This is my personal website. Here you can learn about my various hobbies and side projects which are not directly related to my professional work. -- Matt Munz
Photography
Here's a wall of my time-lapse photographs.
Music
Recordings
I have a small number of recordings online that I have made for fun or as part of my process of learning how to play the piano. Over time I intend to upload more recordings, including some more polished ones. Most of the ones currently available are low quality home recordings. You've been warned!
- Holiday -- A "scare track" for Halloween featuring my daughter, Lily, and an amateur performance of the 12 days of Christmas.
- Solo Piano Home Recordings -- some recordings of my amateur piano playing, which I do for my own entertainment.
- Father Fox's Feast of songs -- Performances by myself and Lily of several of the songs from this wonderful book of children's songs.
Scores
Only one of my compositions is available online as a score. It is an experiment in collective composition that has yet to be fully realized. Song for Everything invites listeners and performers to contemplate the evolution of musical ideas over vast timescales. Broadening one's imagination in this way promotes ethical and creative consciousness that challenges the bias for the speedy and superficial in our contemporary culture.
In the future I hope to upload more of the scores for my original compositions.
Zen
I have practiced meditation for over a decade, mostly in the mindfulness or Vipassana style. Post-pandemic I embarked on a study of Zen practice in the Soto Zen lineage. It has been and continues to be a tremendously meaningful and rewarding exploration and I am very grateful to the Zen practitioners from whom I have learned.
What is the way? This is a question that I feel I will be asking for the rest of my life.
Zen Mind Beginner's Mind Summary
Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind by Suzuki Roshi is an important text of the modern Soto Zen tradition. Having previously read many of the classic Koans of the tradition, on first encountering Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, I found it to be, by comparison, less concise or poetic.
Nonetheless it contains a treasure trove of wisdom, and it seems to me to be designed specifically for people like me -- Americans living in California who had little to no exposure to Zen in their upbringing and who are seeking its benefits, and the cultural context in which to receive them. As I read it I felt the desire to summarize or condense this collection of lectures into a concise poetic expression of the words of Suzuki Roshi.
The following documents comprise that summary. It is a work in progress. I am sharing it now in case others might like to use it to enhance their own Zen study. It can be read from beginning to end, of taken in parts. One may also bring a portion of the summary to their meditation practice, similar to how a koan might be used to enhance one's practice. The words of the summary are the words of Suzuki Roshi, somewhat rearranged and only slightly edited.
This summary could be considered the "third derivative" of Suzuki Roshi's words, as it is the result of three successive passes of editing, where unnecessary text was removed, and the remaining text was reduced. If you find this summary of use I'd appreciate it if you would let me know. Thanks, and enjoy!
Subtitle
Seeking wisdom is wisdom
Chapters
- Prologue: Beginner's mind
- Right Practice
- Right Attitude (TBD)
- Right Understanding (TBD)
Software Fun
Here are some of my software projects that have been more for fun than for any professional purpose.
Professional
For more about my career, please see my Nonzero Sum profile
Other Interests
I enjoy hiking, tabletop games, reading widely, talking about politics, and cooking.
