2/17/12

First of all I am curious how you began this healing work?

You mean, how I got started?

Yes.

I’m not exactly sure, to tell you the truth. Life is a continually evolving thing.  I started studying Chinese martial arts when I was fourteen.  I just got really into that.  In college I began practicing Zen (Japanese Zen) and started studying with Philip Kapleau Roshi.  That was probably 1970- 71.  I just continued doing that.  I was going to go to medical school and eventually decided, after getting into medical school, that I wasn’t going to go to medical school.  And I met an old Chinese doctor who had just moved here– James Tso, who wanted to start a school.  So we started the first school in the country, New England School of Acupuncture.  I was his apprentice, and that’s how I learned about Oriental medicine. And it evolved from there.

Many times people use the word “wholeness” to describe Buddhist concepts of healing.  If you were to use that word, what might it mean for your work?

 I take a very Buddhist- Taoist approach to things.  And so the first thing that comes to mind is looking at the yin- tang symbol.  Wholeness is the entire symbol: the whole thing.  And then it breaks down into the yin and yang and the ten thousand things.  Wholeness is the balance of yin and yang and the ten thousand things at any given time.  The key for me is balance, and the continual flow of the energy of the universe in trying to maintain that balance.  Because, you know- the balance changes, we change, seasons change, everything changes. So trying to maintain balance can be a difficult process. Illness is when some sort of disruption in the balance of things,

Thank you.  In what way does that vision of balance contribute to your healing work?

Well, that is the whole thing: that is what I do with people.  In addition to studying Zen and traditional Chinese medicine I got a doctorate in psychology and I studied a lot of shamanic stuff, so my focus is on the mental, spiritual, psychic aspect of healing. I don’t work on the physical so much: I work on the subtle realms and for me they affect everything else. It’s fine to work the other way round, too– you can obviously work the physical and back to the subtle but that’s what works for me.  And so that’s what I do.

 What are your practices of healing?  Whether, if you can describe that philosophically or with as much detail as you like–

A big part of what I do is getting people to recognize what kind of gifts they have in the realm of spirit and then how to use them. And of course, meditation plays a big role in that– whatever kind of meditation people want to do.  I do what I need for whoever is in front of me.  It tends to be more esoteric than something physical.

How are your practices of healing related to what you hope clients will experience?

Well to me they are the vehicle to get them there.  So basically– in my opinion, in order to heal– healing takes place when change happens.  And in order to make change, especially positive change, you have to make it in what is called a non-ordinary state of consciousness.  So the work that I do tries to get people into those places., in whatever way works for them.  So with some people it will be direct meditation. Other people do it through singing– or through music or through painting or through running or through yoga.  It doesn’t really matter to me what vehicle they use.  They are all just a technology, a spiritual technology to get to a place where change can happen.  The key is to get to some kind of change.

 Sometimes in Buddhism we use the phrase “upaya”, skillful means.

Definitely.

How or in what ways do you feel that this connects with your Zen practice?

I would say Zen is the basis of everything that I do.  Always was, still is, probably always will be.  I’m not very traditional in my Zen because I do lots of other things  But I look at them as just another Way to accomplish the whole thing.  I myself, in my personal practice, sit between two and four hours a day. And I’ve done that for over forty years.  It is the basis of all my teaching.  And I look at shamanic work as just sort of “applied Zen”.  It is just a more practical way to use it for healing.  In my own personal practice I just sit.  Without it I would say, there is nothing.  That is my practice.  I sit by myself. I like the quiet and the stillness of the early morning.

So how does that sitting meditation– how does that connect with your purposes for the healing, and perhaps your purposes for yourself– as a healer, or as an instrument of healing?

Well I think a healer– especially in this context we’re talking about– without healing themselves, without working on themselves- it’s not going to work.  And for me my Zen practice is the basis for my work on myself:  it all comes out of that area.  Without that work on yourself, I don’t think you can be a healer.  I’m not saying that’s true for everybody but for me it’s very true.

How have you been able to build your skills and knowledges about healing– across the years– and how or in what ways does that contribute to your healing practice?

I did acupuncture, studying with Dr. Tso, and we started a school and brought other teachers in, so I sort of ran the school and studied it at the same time.  And you take seminars over the years…shamanic work:  I apprenticed, the old fashioned way, one- on- one with a shamanic woman from Kenya: that was a five year apprenticeship. My major Zen teacher was Maurine Stuart Roshi at Cambridge Buddhist Association on Sparks Street in Cambridge.  And I’ve sat with other people too, but I would say she was my teacher.  But for me the basis of the whole thing is your own personal practice– I think everything comes out of that.    And I think those who are good healers are those who are off on their own.  They learn from someone,  and take it from there.  They develop their own style– that’s because it comes out of their own experience and their own practice.  For me that’s what’s worthwhile.

At the same time, it’s evolving.  People’s practice evolves– like mine does and everyone else’s. It’s the expression of your own experience.

In what ways does the client’s experience reflect that?  Does that also go through an evolution?

It is true.  I try to get people to find, what is their way:  to find out what their gifts are, how they relate to the universe, how they experience the One., how they do meditation. So, in a teaching group, I may have eight people, and each person will be doing something completely different.   That, to me, is the richness of it all. Traditionally, in a shamanic culture, there is no core curriculum:  each person, absolutely, did their own thing.  You learn from that person or you find a person who resonates with you.  And you are encouraged to do-it-yourself: that is the key.

How does that connection between you and your clients happen?

It happens over time, with trust I would say.  With opening your heart, and keeping your heart open, and not taking on any of their stuff, when you keep your heart open.  If you can keep it open like that then eventually they start responding to that. For some people it happens right away and for some people it takes time.  It just depends.  But generally I have been very fortunate in being able to connect with people.

Are there moments in your world when your understanding of your work has gone through a significant change or breakthrough?

I think it changes all the time.  You know, I think of it as changing moment-by-moment.  And to me that is really kind of cool.  It’s great because my own personal development and practice keeps on changing.   I try to practice “beginner’s mind” and just keep things as fresh as I can.  I try to stay as humble and gentle as I possibly can and things keep on changing.  That’s reflected in my writings and my work.

Are there ways that you help your clients ground their experience in their lives? When you’ve done work with them, do you give them homework, or some other way to anchor this insight, this experience?

I would say the key, for me, is practice. I think that is one of the harder concepts I have to get across to people.  You have to do this every day– whatever “it” is for people, for you.  And I’m not saying everyone meditates, or everyone does– whatever– but whatever it is for you, whatever your practice is about, you’ve got to do it all the time.  That is just a personal choice– and what you are called to do. I am called to practice. And I do it all the time.  It’s what I love doing.  It is what I am called to do. That’s all I can say.  There’s just something in me, or in the universe, that comes through me, and allows me to keep doing that.

And some people will get that and some people won’t, and that’s just the way it is.  It’s all– you know how it is.  Once you’ve had some experience… If you go to some weekend retreat, a workshop and you meditate for fourteen hours a day and you have some awesome meditation experience, then you go home and do nothing– a week later, you have nothing. If you go home and keep up the practice,  then it can deepen for you, and it can open more for you.  But it has to continue over time. You will find that those who are really good at the work, and successful at it, practice something.

Yes, yes. I was thinking of that quote from Carl Jung, where he says, “The attainment of wholeness requires one to stake one’s whole being.  There can be no substitutions, no compromises.

Absolutely.  Totally agree with that.  It has to be your whole being.  And to me, it’s my life.  So this is what I do.

So when clients come in- they come in with this malady or this predicament– are there ways in which the work you do with them helps bring them into a greater state of wholeness, a self- recognition?

I think that it’s like– and I’m not comparing myself to a great master– but it’s like when you’re in the presence of a great master. There is an emanation that comes from them.  All you have to do is to be in their presence.  And when you’re in that presence, things happen.  There is an energetic exchange:  a Dharma transmission., mind- to- mind transmission.  That’s how people are taught.  And that’s what I try to do with everyone who comes in.  I sit.  I try to hold the space.  I try to connect to them.  And when there’s a connection, then healing happens, without words.   Later we talk, we give it words.  But as it is, there’s no words. When I think back on my experience with my own Zen Master, just being in her presence was a good experience– just sitting.  Nothing else, nothing special, just being there.  And something happens– something changes, when you keep doing that.

That’s the main thing I do with people.  Sometimes we’ll do acupuncture, or we’ll do this, or that, but it’s really that gift of presence that is the medium of healing.  To me, that is the healing.  You get the presence, you get the mind-to-mind transmission, and something changes.  That’s the way it is. Something changes, and you start the healing process.  Every technique you do is just a way to get you to that place

Thank you very much.  That was beautiful.