Laziness is one of those words we throw around without thinking much about what we actually mean. We call ourselves lazy when we skip the gym. We call someone else lazy when they don't answer an email fast enough. But in Buddhism, laziness gets unpacked into something more specific — and more interesting. What we tend to lump together as a singl...

There's a moment in most people's encounter with Mahayana Buddhism where things start to feel genuinely strange. You've been following along — the teachings on suffering make sense, the compassion practices feel meaningful — and then someone mentions emptiness, and the whole thing seems to slip out from under you.