| Welcome to our new website. We hope that you like our changes. We think that you will find it much easier to move from place to place. You will find some new areas, including pages dedicated to our service sites– Laguna Honda and Laguna Grove Care , as well as our Guest House. |
Marion Wilson-Gruzalski
Executive Director
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For many years, Zen Hospice Project has been associated with two sites—the Guest House and Laguna Honda Hospital. The dynamics and character of these two sites are quite different. The Guest House is a lovely old Victorian building with a home-like setting. Laguna Honda Hospice exists within a hospital with an open-ward design, enhanced by a gracious “social area” leading outside to a beautiful memorial garden. In the minds of some people, the Guest House is the symbol of Zen Hospice Project, while, for others, the hospice unit at Laguna Honda is the symbol of Zen Hospice Project.
But Zen Hospice Project is not a place. It is really a concept of care based on the Buddhist principles of mindfulness, compassion, generosity, and service. The recognition and real understanding of this can be quite freeing to the mind. And, in the up-coming months, you will have several opportunities to experience the flexible innovation inherent in our concept and philosophy of care.
In September 2005, we took Zen Hospice Project into Laguna Grove Care, a residential care facility just a few blocks from the Guest House. Also, for the past two years we have received several grants to help us develop a Bereavement Program. In the Spring 2006, we hope to offer bereavement services to the community. We also plan to begin renovations of the Guest House, making it more accessible with the addition of an elevator and ramps. Also, the kitchen and staff offices will be improved. In addition to preparing for these expansions of our service, Jennifer Block, our Public Education Director will bring new and interesting offerings to our community education and training programs.
Our minds always like to grab hold of things, especially the familiar, yet with our expanding services it will be increasingly more difficult to attach the concept of Zen Hospice to a familiar physical site. Instead, the focus will be on the contemplative, mindful, and compassionate care that we can bring to the bedside of those we serve. Our mindful and compassionate service—from volunteer work to staff administration to board participation—is really Zen Hospice Project. It is our flexibility and our willingness to be innovative, and to share with others what we see as the ultimate in compassionate service, that keeps Zen Hospice Project alive and healthy—and keeps requests for training and support coming in from all over the world.
I hope that you will find our website both interesting and inspiring. We have tried to keep it similar in look to our newsletters and brochures, and consistent with the image and philosophy of Zen Hospice Project. As we enter this new year may we all remember, especially in these difficult times that all beings want to be happy, all beings want to be peaceful, and all beings want to be free from suffering.
Blessings,
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