The Zen Train

I like to 'Sit' allot and what I mean by sitting and what most Western practitioners would mean by, sitting is to sit in meditation or as in my case 'sitting Zazen'. I studied the Zen school of Buddhism art of sitting meditation. The school I attended was a  Rinzai Zen school for a brief period and then I transfered to the Soto Zen school. What's the difference? I hate to say it, but just to remind, google it, on YouTube and in Wikipedia you will find all the information you will need on the subject. The school I helped my first Zen Roshi open was located at 20, Magnolia Blvd., Corte Madeira, Marin County, California. It was roomed in two classrooms combined that my teacher Dennis Junpo Kelly had rented and turned into a Zendo where he taught Ashtanga Yoga and Zazen meditation in the Rinzai tradition. The center was called, Kanzeon Zen/Yoga Center. So I had my first taste of Zen and (Guerilla)  Yoga in the Ashtanga tradition as well the Rinzai meditation and Teachings given by a man who spent 3 years at San Quentin Federal Penitentiary, 3 odd years in Sri Lanka and India and who just recently been ordained as a priest from The new York Daibosatsu Rinzai Zen Temple under Eido Shimano Roshi; details.

I liked the Rinzai school of meditation practice but it was too tight and rigorous for me, I needed something more gradual and subtle to counter my already messed up character back then, perhaps still is but...who is keeping tab? When i fell ill with pleurisy I asked to be taken to green Gulch Zen Center where i knew that was my only option with nothing and no one to my name and being critically ill, i had to beg my way into the community and was accepted out of perhaps being sorry for my status, by my next Zen Teacher, 

ABOUT PAUL

A ordained Zen Buddhist priest, Paul Discoe studied art history and philosophy as an undergraduate in the United States and Buddhist temple design and construction in Japan. He became a student of Suzuki Roshi at the Tassajara Zen Mountain Center in California, and, after four years, Suzuki sent him to Japan to train under a traditional master builder for five years. Discoe founded Joinery Structures in 1988. His projects include the Kojin-an Zen temple in Oakland for the Akiba Sensei, the founder's hall and kitchen at Tassajara, the Lindesfarne guesthouse and Wheelwright Center, and the abbot's house at Green Gulch, as well as several private and public projects internationally. Paul recently completed the interior of The Perennial restaurant in San Francisco, and the amphitheater for the new BAMPFA building designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro in Berkeley. For Workshop Residence, Paul has designed a series of cheese boards, "molar" stools, and tabletops, all made from salvaged, locally sourced wood.

Green Gulch farm/Zen Center is part of the San Francisco Zen Center and it is located at Muir Beach, along a valley that ends up at the Pacific Ocean at one end and the Hope Cottage located at the top of the hill on the other. I had visited the place when I first arrived in San Francisco and need a place to stay for a day or two. I fell in love with the place at first sight and had decided that this was the place where I could heal myself even before i got seriously injured; it was more of my mental state that I had in mind. Had I not fell ill back then I most probably would not have been accepted to live at Green Gulch; providence? Perhaps. The cold and wet environment was not the best for my ailment but I was bound and determined to find the cure to my physical body as well as my mind; I was desperate and scared and I almost stooped to my knees to ask for the permission to stay.

I stayed for almost two years and never before was I more strong and healthy, cheerful and full of mischiefs than during those significant years of my life; I left the Gulch a changed man and am forever indebted to the Zen community at Green Gulch, Green Dragon Zen Center and just about everyone from the Abbot Reb Anderson and practice leaders like Paul and Blanch, Norman Fisher and Ed Brown and not to mention my practice period fellow students without whose help and tolerance, I could not have made it through. Hence I sat and I learned all I could about the Soto Zen tradition as handed down by Shunryu Suzuki Roshi; I was onboard the Zen Train and perhaps had never got off since.

to be contd.

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