Editing Bell hooks (section)

===Buddhism===
Through her interest in [[Beat poetry]] and after an encounter with the poet and Buddhist [[Gary Snyder]], hooks was first introduced to [[Buddhism]] in her early college years.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Tworkov |first=Helen |title=Agent of Change |url=https://tricycle.org/magazine/bell-hooks-buddhism/ |access-date=November 11, 2022 |website=Tricycle: The Buddhist Review |date=January 9, 2017 |language=en}}</ref> She described herself as finding Buddhism as part of a personal journey in her youth, centered on seeking to recenter love and spirituality in her life and configure these concepts into her focus on activism and justice.<ref>{{Cite web |last=hooks |first=bell |title=Building a Community of Love – Lion's Roar |date=March 24, 2017 |url=https://www.lionsroar.com/bell-hooks-and-thich-nhat-hanh-on-building-a-community-of-love/ |access-date=November 27, 2022 |language=en-US}}</ref> After her initial exposures to Buddhism, hooks incorporated it into her Christian upbringing and this combined Christian-Buddhist thought influenced her identity, activism, and writing for the remainder of her life.<ref name="Medine, Carolyn M 2022">Medine, Carolyn M. Jones Medine. "Bell Hooks, Black Feminist Thought, and Black Buddhism: A Tribute". ''Journal of World Philosophies''. 7 (Summer 2022): pages 187–196.</ref>

She was drawn to Buddhism because of the personal and academic framework it offered her to understand and respond to suffering and discrimination as well as love and connection. She describes the Christian-Buddhist focus on everyday practice as fulfilling the centering and grounding needs of her everyday life.<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Yancy |first1=George |last2=hooks |first2=bell |date=December 10, 2015 |title=Bell Hooks: Buddhism, the Beats and Loving Blackness |url=https://archive.nytimes.com/opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/12/10/bell-hooks-buddhism-the-beats-and-loving-blackness/ |access-date=November 27, 2022 |website=Opinionator |language=en}}</ref>

Buddhist thought, especially the work of Thích Nhất Hạnh, appears in multiple of hooks' essays, books, and poetry.<ref name="Medine, Carolyn M 2022"/> Buddhist spirituality also played a significant role in the creation of love ethic which became a major focus in both her written work and her activism.<ref>Medine, C. M. J. "Bell Hooks, Black Feminist Thought, and Black Buddhism: A Tribute". ''Journal of World Philosophies'', volume 7, number 1, July 2022, pages 187–196, https://scholarworks.iu.edu/iupjournals/index.php/jwp/article/view/5479 .</ref>