Forty Years of Bringing Mindfulness to the Masses
An Interview with Matt Friberg, Publisher of Parallax Press
For all our years in the book industry, we know a good story when we see one—and a company with a stated mandate to “help transform suffering and injustice,” while bringing about a “more joyful, healthy, and compassionate society” is as compelling a mission statement as you’ll find in publishing. Parallax Press, we stand in awe.
On the occasion of their 40th year, we asked Executive Editor Matt Sutherland to reach out to newly-named Publisher Matt Friberg to hear more about Parallax’s history, the art of publishing books on mindful living and Engaged Buddhism, how Zen Master Thích Nhất Hạnh fits into their story, and Matt’s goals moving forward.
Tell us about the history of Parallax Press. What makes this year significant for Parallax?
This year is an exciting one for Parallax Press as we celebrate forty years of publishing books on the art of mindful living. Parallax was officially born with the publication of Being Peace in 1986, but the press had really begun the year prior, when Arnold Kotler, then in training at the San Francisco Zen Center, agreed to organize the influential Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh’s first extended period of lectures and retreats across California. Over the course of those six weeks, the two decided to start a press specializing in the kind of engaged Buddhism (later called “applied Buddhism”) that Thich Nhat Hanh pioneered and continued to develop throughout his life.
Just before the time of Parallax’s founding, Thich Nhat Hanh’s residential community of mindful living, called Plum Village, began to take shape in Southern France, near the city of Bordeaux. From about thirty monks, nuns, and lay disciples living in Plum Village in the mid-1990s, Plum Village has grown in size to accommodate over two-hundred monks and nuns and thousands of retreatants each year. In addition to Plum Village, the practice center in France, the Plum Village community has expanded to include ten more practice centers and countless lay mindfulness communities practicing in the Plum Village tradition around the world. Throughout its forty years, Parallax Press has been recognized as a vital part of this larger Plum Village community. Our publishing program is deeply rooted in Thich Nhat Hanh’s singular approach to mindfulness and engaged ethics.
How did you become involved in all this?
I found the Plum Village community while living in Los Angeles for graduate school. I attended a practice community, or sangha, that met a few minutes’ walk from my Hollywood apartment, but I only went a few times. I didn’t begin practicing regularly with a community until moving to New York the following year, where I was lucky enough to tap into a long-standing network of sanghas meeting across the city. By then, I’d also begun working in publishing.
I’ve since moved away from the city, but sangha practice continues to be a vital part of my life. I’ve been incredibly fortunate to find mentors in the practice all along the way—from Vermont to the Hudson Valley—and to find, time and again, a deep and joyful sense of community unique to this style of meditation practice. I’m incredibly grateful to serve the Plum Village community as the publisher of Parallax Press.
How has mindfulness evolved since its introduction to the West?
Since its introduction to the West as part of a larger countercultural movement sixty or so years ago, mindfulness has been plucked from its spiritual context and integrated into mainstream culture. In some ways, that’s a beautiful thing. All of us stressed and scattered people really do need a way to manage our stress and sharpen our attention. And we needn’t look beyond the success of the mindfulness and stress reduction industry to see that mindfulness works—we really do become calmer, more at ease, and more focused on the (usually work-related) task at hand.
I’m sure it’s apparent that I feel like something is missing from “mainstream mindfulness.” And I certainly didn’t come to that understanding on my own. As Thich Nhat Hanh reminds us, mindfulness is a path, not a tool. We cannot simply extract the useful practices from the spiritual and ethical fabric of which these practices are a part. So using mindfulness as a means to increase productivity at work, or to live a less-stressed version of the exact same life we’ve been living, severely underestimates its real value as a deeply transformative practice. Since the beginning, with Thay’s teachings as our guiding light, Parallax has been dedicated to presenting mindfulness in its true form. And I feel that sets us apart in a big way.
As Thay reminds us in books like Work and Happy Teachers Change the World, practicing true mindfulness in the workplace means to generate peace, ease, and freedom in the here and now—not as a means to an end, but for its own sake. When we are present with ourselves and our colleagues, harmony becomes possible. We can release our own suffering and help our colleagues to suffer less, too. And with the insight generated through mindfulness practice, we may even recognize the suffering caused to others, or to the environment, by the work we currently do; we may touch true happiness for the first time, uncover our deepest aspiration, and choose to take our career in a different direction. If we remain open to change with honesty and courage, mindfulness really can transform our lives.
Publishing books that explore this “deeper” form of mindfulness doesn’t mean that we’re focused on arcane sutras or esoteric teachings. True to our roots in the Plum Village tradition, we aim to bring Buddhist practices, teachings, and insights into the ever-evolving spaces of modern life. This attention to context and applicability was central to Thay’s approach. At Parallax, each of the books we publish has the power to reshape our entire experience of daily life.
As you step into your role as publisher, how do you relate to the press’s past as you shape its future?
At Parallax, we’ve always underscored the ethical dimension of mindfulness practice. As Thich Nhat Hanh reminds us, awakening must lead to action. And this is a particular insight we’ll lean into even further at Parallax in the coming years, as we ask questions like, “If our current ways of seeing, being, and thinking haven’t adequately addressed climate change, senseless war-making, and so on, where does that leave us? Can changing how we know the world encourage new, collective approaches to these intersecting crises? If so, how do we generate this deep change in perspective?”
Thich Nhat Hanh has given us a roadmap for approaching these questions. From Vietnam: Lotus in a Sea of Fire to Being Peace to Zen and the Art of Saving the Planet, Thay’s teaching has been clear: our very way of seeing who and what we are affects how we relate to ourselves, each other, and all of life. I’m convinced that Parallax Press has a responsibility to find and elevate the voices of dreamers and doers who share Thay’s radical approach to systems change; those who see a collective shift in consciousness as a basic condition for life—of all kinds—to continue. We want these fresh ideas and strategies to inspire change, to influence discourse and action at the highest levels of the “problem-solving” infrastructure.
As we begin to develop this approach, Parallax is collaborating with Kosmos Journal to bring Thich Nhat Hanh’s insights together with some of today’s most inspiring thought leaders on these and other critical issues facing our world: crises of meaning, social fragmentation, next-generation AI systems, and so on. We’re excited to see what new pathways emerge from this highly experimental and open-ended forum.
The implications of mindfulness practice are far-reaching, and yet the practice itself is as basic and gentle as can be. Parallax Press offers a wide range of books that cover the essentials of mindfulness practice—mindfulness of breathing, sitting and walking meditation, taking care of strong emotions, and so on—both for seasoned practitioners and those who are just getting started. Most of our books—then and now—guide readers in bringing that simple practice of awareness into some realm of everyday life. Our relationships at home, at work, at school; how we handle the birth of a baby or the death of a loved one; how we relate to burnout, trauma, and instability—any situation we find ourselves in is an opportunity to stop and look deeply. It has been Parallax’s great privilege to collaborate with a long list of distinguished authors who, each in their own way, have helped us see clearly and act courageously, from a place of equanimity and peace.
The well-being of future generations depends on how we live in this moment. It’s up to us to become aware of our habits of mind, our patterns of consumption, and how we relate to the world around us. And this is where the basics of mindfulness practice come in. Becoming aware of one in-breath and one out-breath can change everything in a very real way.
Any last thoughts? Any great books coming soon?
Looking ahead, Parallax Press will continue dedicating itself to helping readers see differently—and live differently—for the benefit of all beings. As a team, we feel solid enough to hold the increasing urgency of our mission, yet free enough to smile and let go. Increasing our resilience has been an ongoing, shared practice. And we need to keep at it: we can only address a world out of balance if we also cultivate balance within ourselves.
This is why, as we move into the second quarter of the twenty-first century, “the art of mindful living” takes on an ever-growing significance. We can no longer afford (if we ever could) to trade in the deep understanding of mindful living for the commercial one. Parallax Press, with firm roots in the Plum Village tradition, knows the difference.
t’s clear that I’m excited for what lies ahead at Parallax Press. I’m also incredibly proud of the books we currently have on deck and those we’ve just published. On Mindful Democracy by Jeremy Engels, a fresh take on civic discourse and political burnout, was released last month to wide acclaim. A significantly revised edition of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Breathe, You Are Alive, featuring insights on mindful breathing from his final years of teaching, will arrive later this year. Live Beautifully, Die Beautifully by Buddhist nun Sister Dang Nghiem and 12-Step Zen by Peter Kuhn both share vulnerable, first-hand accounts of suffering—around death and addiction, respectively—and provide clear pathways of acceptance, healing, and recovery. Also this year, with Love is Liberation, Valerie Brown and Marisela B. Gomez, MD, deliver a set of ongoing practices to address systemic injustice and moral fatigue. And last but not least, the long-awaited Plum Village Cookbook—full of delicious plant-based recipes and practices for cooking and eating—will be released this summer.
Matt Sutherland
