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My root teacher, Katagiri Roshi’s
encouragement to “just live”, expressed
the understanding that Spiritual life is not something
far away, but right under our feet; it slaps our nose
and rubs our cheeks.
It is… Just This!
So how can we allow our hearts to
open to the moment as it is and drop our ideas of how
the moment “should” be?
My mission is to help students to
go deep. Seminal to my teachings are many years of work
in psychotherapy and Recovery. The effect is that I
continually deepen in my own understanding and practice
and try to find ways to help others deepen into their
spiritual lives.
Zen life, our life, is to express
the paradox of the miracle of unconditional reality
completely merged with the ordinariness of life’s
activities. The sacred and ordinary expressed by “Being
Time” as Dogen, a thirteenth century Zen teacher,
writer and philosopher wrote about so strikingly.
My own teaching is a tapestry of
all my past influences: 17 years of study and practice
with Dainin Katagiri Roshi, 9 years of teaching at Clouds
in Water Zen Center in St. Paul, Mn. and a career as
a dancer, body worker, Oriental medical doctor and healer.
For 6 years, from approximately 2000-2006, I meditated primarily outdoors, by myself. This has had a powerful affect on my understanding and my teaching. I was very influenced by the wild, raw transparency of nature, unaltered by the human mind. I hold this experience as an ember in my heart and hope someday to create an outdoor retreat center.
Most of the lectures on this website were given between 2004-2006. During this time I was not associated with any particular sangha. In November of 2006 I was asked to be the guiding teacher at Clouds in Water Zen Center. All of my current teaching and lectures can be accessed through www.cloudsinwater.com.
Current on this website will be my 12 step lectures and classes and my artwork.
I hope you enjoy it!
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