another teacher interviewed named jan davis who is a teacher and then up in oregon and a former pediatrician infinitely says almost everybody who has spiritual life as a koan that they are caring around inside them. for example, at a catholic woman who came to a retreat. and i asked her, what is the question that you carry around with you all the time? she said, my question is, is there anything outside of god, for example, how could there be children caught in bombings in iraq? how does god allow this? so we melted it down to this. is there anything outside of god? shows she spent the week pondering that question and looking around her. is your computer outside of god? is your hand outside of god? is a homeless person at the side of the road with the a sign asking for a handout outside of god? so the koan is a way to take down through the layers of confusion to have insight into the deep truth. if you read about koans, they sound nonsensical. people read about the koan. what is the sound of one hand clapping? that's actually a very deep inquiry into sound first of all and then into deep lis