Seungsahn

She's not even five feet tall.

And I'm like, "So you're Korean?" And she's like, "Yeah." I said, "Uh, you know, the only Korean teacher I know is Seung Sahn Sunim." She goes, "Seung Sahn, S." And I'm like, "So y- you know, you know him?" And she's like, "Yeah, yeah." So if you don't know who he is, he was an incredible Korean Zen master, uh, who he wound up in Rhode Island at one point.

His personal story is incredible.

His book, Dropping Ashes on the Buddha, is one worth reading.

There's a Zen Center in Berkeley, the E- Empty, the Empty Gate, which is part of his tradition.

And, and, um, so, so, you know, [laughs] I'm like, "Oh, this is cool." This, you know, uh, uh, the, the obscure, you know, the, the, the, um, Asian Buddhist teachers I know, often the Asians that I meet don't know them, you know? So, so anyway, we get up to the, [laughs] the ninth green, and both our balls are just off the green, like in a kind of tricky place.

And I go, I say to her, "Uh, what would Seung Sahn Sunim say?" He said, "Clear mind, clear mind.

Don't knowww." And she turns to me and goes, "Who am I?" [laughs] And I'm like, "Oh, shit." [laughs] I'm like, "This is awesome." So we're having this like heavy duty like Korean Zen [laughs]Golf moment together.

Find liberation within the disturbances themselves.

Find liberation within the disturbances themselves." [lips smack] Uh, Kyongho was a, a Korean Zen master who, uh, lived in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, and he was, uh, the great, uh, grandfather of Seung Sahn, uh, the Korean Zen master who is my, uh, grandfather in the lineage.

Uh, so, uh, uh, my, uh, great-great-great-grandfather, I suppose.

Um, uh, a-and, uh, uh, for all of us, uh, these many, uh, ancestors, these many, uh, women and men who came before us, uh, offering their teaching, and this teaching of find liberation within the disturbances themselves, [inhales] has been on my mind, uh, since I heard a, a radio show by, uh, uh, someone who had written an article in The Atlantic on, um, online sports betting.

There was no quantum Zen in Israel.

We heard about Sung San, but there was no quantum Zen in Israel.

Okay.

And...

And I don't think that I'm special in that.

Meeting the form of our school is not always an easy pill to swallow.

As Zen Master Sung San says, it's the first gate of our school.

But because it was in Korea, in a temple setting, so it was kind of, okay, this is what we do here, so I went with it.