About me
I teach the classes and organize the Sunday meditation groups that you’ll find listed here. I officiate weddings, blessings, memorials and other ceremonies.
More about me
I teach meditation to kids, teens, adults, and groups – and I love it – so much so that I (with some friends) have formed Clear Wheel to bring meditation, stress-reduction, wellness and social skills to schools.
I also love to officiate weddings and all ceremonies. I also love my family (inspiring husband, kids, pets, plants, my sisters, brother-in-laws, and my parents). I love nature, food, red wine or a Guinness beer, music, travel, stupid jokes, and driving on the freeway. I love living in Utah where I can (still) drive, hike, ski, golf, see the opera, symphony and dinosaur bones, and (if that’s not enough) fly off to some exotic or at least interesting place, and return to Happy Valley.
About my classes, groups, and ceremonies... and more about me
Along with this website, my classes, group and ceremonies are also “works-in-progress”. They are not pre-designed. They may have an initial idea or structure, but they are free to develop as the people involved, the situation and the environment, deems appropriate.
In the meditation classes, the first thing we do is find out why people are there. Often it is for relaxation and stress-reduction, but often people want a calmer and more focused mind, better concentration, pain reduction. Sometimes people take my classes because their doctor or therapist recommended they do. Sometimes people are interested in the spiritual aspects of meditation or feel connected and drawn to a more Buddhist “religious” experience or community.
For the needs of the group and its individuals, I’ll focus on specific aspects and techniques of meditation. Counting, for example, is good to engage the “needy” analytical mind in a way that reduces stress, anxiety and anger. Try it.
If there are things students want that I cannot (or would rather not) do, I happily will refer them to other resources. I am not a religious or spiritual advisor, or any kind of therapist.
I am registered with the Soto Zen Buddhist group of America as a Zen Priest. But I think of myself as more of a “Zen Countess”.
Even more about me
My Zen background and experience is this: I was the introspective kind of teen-ager that often heard “You should really study Zen.” “You are so Zen.” ... So, in my own true Zen fashion, I decided that “if I am so Zen-like already then why should I study it? What a waste. I’ll just be me!”
I did have my personal meditation practices, though I only now see them for what they were: self-discovered methods for coping in a very stressful environment. I would count. I would sit very still and quiet. Sometimes I would focus on breathing. Or focus on feeling. Walking, pacing, meditation. And other techniques.
During a 3 month sojourn in Austin, Texas, I was completely bored and at a loss for what to do next, so I read a book on Zen meditation techniques, along with a book on Shamanism practices, and a book on Self-hypnosis, and committed myself to a nightly meditation routine. After a week, at 23, I had the rude awakening that I had never before in my life truly been able to relax. It was mind-blowing, and humbling.
Then I found myself in Salt Lake City, and my new friends exposed my to the Native American tradition of Council, or Talking Circle. I realized that I could actually talk and people would listen. And that I could listen to others without thinking about how I would, or should, respond. Another friend introduced me to Zen.
Specifically, my friend introduced me to the Wasatch Zen Center, which later became the world headquarters for the Kanzeon Zen Center and Sangha (and training monastery). I studied under Genpo Roshi (Dennis Merzel), teacher in the Soto Zen Buddhism lineage. Genpo Roshi is the second dharma heir of Maezumi Roshi. You may know Maezumi Roshi better as the inspiration behind the Star Wars character Yoda.
I studied there on and off from 1991 - 2011, and had lived there for approximately 3 years at the beginning of that time, and then 3 years again from about 2004-2007, when I got married and my life changed drastically.
But before we turn that page, I received the lay precepts (jukai) in 1991, and then “became a monk” when I underwent the “home leaving ceremony” (tokudo) in 2001, and transitioned from “junior monk” to “senior monk” during my Shuso Hossen ceremony in 2003.
I also was a flight attendant for 3 years, 2001–2004... and that contributed a great deal to my Zen training, too.
Burning Man (1998, 1999, 2000) also contributed.
Taking a couple months to travel around the world for the first time, alone, in 1998, also contributed.
That trip was immediately on the heels of graduating from the University of Utah with a degree in Anthropology and one in Philosophy.
And that trip culminated with my 2nd trip to Japan, and then living in Kyoto for 4 months, training with Shiraishi-san., directory of the Kyoto Philharmonic
My third trip to Japan, in 2001, introduced me to my dear friend Zen teacher and mentor Jiho Kongo, aka “Hosan”. For the next several years I would visit Hosan and stay at his family temple, Syoganji, (Shogan-ji), in Saganoseki, Kyushu.
It was at Syoganji’s New Bell ceremony in 2003 (?) that I met the Head Monk of Syogenji, Sogen Yamakawa Roshi. He invited me to a sesshin (meditation retreat) at Syogenji (Shogen-ji. in Gifu).
Syogenji is one of the top Rinzai Zen training monasteries, and reputed to be the most severe. Hosan had trained there –and at 3 other training monasteries– and he agrees.
In 2005, I was honored to participate in a Dai-Sesshin at Syogenji. There were over a hundred full-time sesshin participants, mostly from Japan. There were some from Taiwan, and a group from Switzerland. There were a few from New York and part of Eido Roshi’s lineage. There were 5 Roshis in attendance. The sesshin culminated in a great ceremony with over 1,000 people in attendance. You can read others’ accounts of their experience of this pilgrimage, in the daibosatsu newsletter, here.
In 2007, I rejoined the Swiss group to participate in another sesshin with Yamakawa Roshi, at The Felsentor retreat center, on Mt Rigi, Switzerland. It was also severe. Also amazing. And beautiful! Here’s a video I found on YouTube.
I returned from sesshin in Europe, and went back to my life as a monk at the Zen Center. My main chore was organizing the Sunday morning Kids Class. I learned a lot during my (approximately) 6 years of organizing it. When I first volunteered, my primary motivation was to avoid the obligation of having to attending the Sunday Zen talks in the main meditation hall. After years of listening to talks, I found them tedious. I found my secondary motivation for “teaching” the Kids Class was to “get over” my fear of having to be responsible for a group of kids. After all, they don’t play by the same rules as adults. They don’t seem to play by any rules at all. And having to control a group terrified me. Investigating this terror, working through it, way my goal. And then, after a while, I just liked it. Liked hanging out with my buddies, the Kids.
But then one day, to my surprise, the handsome father asked me out and I knew he was perfect for me and I knew we would get married and we did. He was the father of two cute girls who had started coming to the class regularly while I was at the Swiss sesshin. I knew he was a great guy solely based on the interactions I would see between he and his girls each week. I would say “the rest is history” but it isn’t yet.
I moved out of the Zen Center for the 2nd time, and moved in with my new family, on the other side of town. Now, as when I was a flight attendant, I had to decide to submit to a totally different schedule. I drove girls to school, and picked them up. And did other things. I could no longer be a full-time trainee at the Zen Center, though for a while I still tried.
My husband, MIchael, encouraged me to shift my practice and bring it to a new level, and bring it to a new community (communities) and teach classes and lead groups in the southern areas of Salt Lake City – which I’ve been doing now, in different incarnations, since around fall of 2007.
