Enhancing the experience
of caregiving by teaching
mindfulness and compassion

After thoughtful consideration and conversations with community members, we will be changing our public-facing name from Zen Hospice Project to Zen Caregiving Project. This change will help us to expand our impact by providing more clarity around our offerings.

We believe our new name holds all of our activities and is inclusive of everyone we serve. The name Zen Caregiving Project will best serve the organization into the future as we expand the reach and impact of our Mindful Caregiving Education, Volunteer Caregiving, and Community Partnership programs.

With the closure of our residential hospice in 2018, many have been confused about the organization's future. We draw inspiration from the thousands of heartfelt conversations that Zen Hospice Project has had over the years of caring for dying persons and their families. We invite you to join us as we shift our focus to the opportunity that the present moment holds.

The Zen idea of an appropriate response is the simple act of finding practical ways to work toward the goal of reducing suffering, an idea pivotal to Buddhist teachings. The creation of Zen Hospice Project was an appropriate response initiated in 1986 by Zen practitioner Martha de Barros, and other members of the San Francisco Zen Center. They saw a need to address the suffering they witnessed every day among the homeless population of the city, some of whom were dying on the street.

For 30 years, Zen Hospice Project has served people through our direct care and educational programs. Founded by members of the San Francisco Zen Center in 1987, the birth of Zen Hospice Project (ZHP) was an opportunity to "get off the cushion," the act of taking your practice out of the meditation hall and into the world.

As our first Director Frank Ostaseski said, providing this hospice service was "...an opportunity to bring together mindfulness practice and service practice… It was a whole new way to do hospice work." As we enter into our 31st year of service, we continue to see opportunities to enhance caregiving for people dealing with chronic and terminal illness to meet the needs of even more people.