Diamond Mountain:
For six years I have been studying and teaching at Diamond Mountain University, in preparation to do the Great Retreat. My studies have been focused on the Tantric Course Series, meditation, yoga, philosophy, debate and ancient languages. Much of my time at Diamond Mountain has also been devoted to helping build the retreat center. At DM I have taught beginning philosophy, meditation, yoga, and language. I also started a project called the Sacred Imprints Archive, under the umbrella of the Asian Classics Input Project. Through this we are preserving, restoring and reintroducing the sacred art contained within ancient scriptures. I cannot begin to express here the beauty and importance of these works.
When I am not at Diamond Mountain:
When I am not meditating, studying, practicing yoga, or digging ditches, I am either working, spending time with my family, or teaching. For about seven years I have been working in Santa Cruz, as a counselor in a group home (a six month rehabilitation house) for teenagers with substance abuse problems. I feel very lucky to be able to do such rewarding work and to be able study with such amazing teachers (the kids). They keep me grounded and always applying my studies and practices to the “real world”. 
In Santa Cruz, I also teach philosophy, meditation, and yoga to a small group of very dedicated students. I started teaching because my teacher told me to. He said that if we wanted to do the three year retreat, the most important thing we could do was teach. Initially, I was extremely nervous and apprehensive. It turns out helping people to be happy is one of the most fun things I’ve ever done. And of course, it keeps me connecting ancient wisdom with people’s everyday experiences, which I feel is absolutely crucial.
I also try to devote much of my time to my family. I’ve known for a long time that I would do the retreat. This has helped me keep a healthy perspective on what’s most important. It is like knowing that I’m going to die soon. I just make different choices. Over the years, next to DM and my practice, my family is the priority. So I do whatever they do: cooking, playing, going to the beach, surfing, snowboarding — just spending time together. I even teach them yoga sometimes. In addition to all that, I love to draw, paint, practice Qi Gong, take photos, surf, bike, dance, and write. Though very little time gets devoted to those things anymore.
So this is my life, in a nice clean package. But within it are just moments—good ones and bad ones, times when I’ve been good to others and times when I’ve treated others badly. An ordinary life. Over these years as my studies deepen, it has become very real for me that life has the potential to be extraordinary in every moment. Doing the Great Retreat means actualizing that potential. It means using what I’ve learned to someday soon be able to truly help someone; to become ultimately useful to humanity. Sometimes I imagine what would happen if the “me” who does the retreat and the “me” who doesn’t met on the street sometime in their old age. I doubt they would even recognize each other.
