What brought you here?
I was practicing at Akazienzendo, a Branching Streams Sangha in Berlin, Germany. I remember thinking that the teacher there was such a deeply caring and insightful person and that whatever he had done, I was interested in checking out. At the same time, I felt that my job was not really of benefit to the world outside my bank account and felt the calling of residential practice once again, so I asked him where he would recommend. I can't remember what he said about Tassajara, but I remember it intrigued me.
What practice did you find to be most supportive?
I found the practice of no distractions to be very powerful. The Shingi strips away so many of the things we use to take ourselves out of the present, to distract ourselves from what is. Being forced to live my life as it actually was, to see it and be with it, and also to see the value in doing so, was a wonderful gift, and one I have endeavored to keep up since leaving.
On top of that, or perhaps to add to it, was the structure of the three month commitment. It was yet another form of forcing me to be present with whatever arose. It was long enough to see the randomness and impermanence of the moods of the mind—long enough to be with whatever arose, and then whatever arose next.
What do you love about Tassajara?
The remoteness. When I decided to go, Bernd, the teacher at Akazienzendo, asked me if I had ever really been in the wilderness before. When I arrived, I felt pulled down into the valley, as though my scattered thoughts, formerly able to fly about and multiply at will, had been magnetically sucked down, trapped between the nearly sheer walls on either side. More concretely, I really felt like I was there. I couldn't leave and couldn't even see anything outside the Valley. There was nowhere to go but there. It felt like a crash course in the wisdom of no escape, to borrow a phrase from Pema Chodron. Also those two red chairs in the Stone Office. I really loved those. Especially when it got colder.