Cuke Audio Podcast

Zesho Susan O'Connell was ordained and given transmission by Reb Anderson. She was VP and president of the SF Zen Center for ten years. She came up with the idea of the Enso Village retirement community and made it a reality. She had a 25 year career in the film biz before coming to ZC and produced ten ZC related films. She's been instrumental in promoting the ZC digitizing and archiving thousands of ZC lecture recordings. Here what she has to say about a lot of this and more in this podcast.

Gil Fronsdal is the senior guiding co-teacher at the Insight Meditation Center (IMC) in Redwood City, California and the Insight Retreat Center in Santa Cruz, California. He started Buddhist practice in 1975 at the San Francisco Zen Center, and has been teaching for IMC since 1990. Gil is an authorized teacher in two traditions: the Insight Meditation lineage of Theravada Buddhism of Southeast Asia, and Japanese Soto Zen. He holds a Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from Stanford. He is a founder of the Sati Center for Buddhist Studies. He is a husband and the father of two sons .Thanks for that Wikipedia. In this podcast, Gil takes us on his way-seeking mind journey.

Tai Sheridan showed up at the SFZC in the late sixties. He practiced at Tassajara in 1971 and later at Green Gulch Farm. He was close to Mel Weitsman and the Berkeley Zendo for years. while He's written many books including Buddha in Blue Jeans that are available  for free as ebooks. Recently he created a distillation of his writings into five books available from cuke.com for free download. He encourages a donation to Cuke Archives if one is so inclined. To download these new books search for Tai Sheridan on cuke.com or go to the bibliography. To donate just click on the donate button on the home and many other pages of cuke.com and shunryusuzuki.com. Find out more at taisheridan.com and listen to this podcast.

Ned Hoke was on Esalen Inst. staff when Shunryu Suzuki led a two day workshop there in 1968. After that, Ned came to Tassajara in the summers as a student. He's been an acupuncturist for forty years. In this podcast he talks about that, we talk about Bolinas, he tells about bringing Suzuki's headstone up to the hogback.

Steve Silberman came to the SF Zen Center in 1979 and worked with me, DC, at Greens Restaurant.. He's a writer for Wired Magazine. He talks about his bestselling Neurotribes: the Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity. He also wrote Skeleton Key A Dictionary for Deadheads.He talks about all this and more in this podcast. He has done his homework.

Alan Rabold's Buddhist study began before he came to the SF Zen Center in 1968 and continued on with Maezumi, long solo retreats, to Boulder and Trungpa and more. He had a career as a schoolteacher and a photographer. See alanrabold.com and get a copy of his beautiful book of photographs, Appreciating the World, and check him out on Instagram. He's teaching meditation these dats at Naropa University. In this podcast he talks about all that and more.

Peter Coyote is a Zen teacher, writer, activist, actor, and that's just a start. Check him out on cuke.com, at petercoyote.com, and in this podcast.

John Steiner came to the San Francisco Zen Center in 1967 a few months before the first practice period at Tassajara and participate in that practice period. His involvement with peace and environmental work began before then and continues to this day as does his spiritual path. These days he's focusing on getting young people and minorities registered to vote. In this podcast he talks about how he got on the so-called spiritual path and the engaged one and more. This is the 2nd of two podcasts with John.

John Steiner came to the San Francisco Zen Center in 1967 a few months before the first practice period at Tassajara and participate in that practice period. I recall him and Bill Lane being the trash collectors and moving materials around. His involvement with peace and environmental work began before then and continues to this day as does his spiritual path. These days he's focusing on getting young people and minorities registered to vote. In this podcast he talks about all this and more. Next week we'll continue our dialogue with John, my dear bodhisattvic friend.

Rick Wicks went to Tassajara briefly in 1971 . He returned there to practice in 1974. In this podcast he tells about living in Sweden for decades, traveling extensively in Asia and Europe, being at Zen Center, and more. He's got a doctorate in economics and is a consultant in that realm. He's worn lots of different hats. He calls himself a successful autistic in the podcast. There's a great deal on and from him on cuke.com. 

Rhonda Johansen Karzag was at Tassajara with her parents for three summers when she was in elementary school. In this podcast she talks about what that was like for her and reads from an account of it she wrote for school when she was in the fourth grade. You can read it while listening if you go to her mother, Toni Johansen Weisberg's cuke page where there's a link to it - in her excellent young handwriting.

Last week's guest, Toni (Johansen) Weisberg, reads from the notebook she created in 1966 at the request of Shunryu Suzuki - with some comments from him.  She calls it  Mad Monkey Mind.

Toni Weisberg was Toni Johansen in her Zen Center days.  She and her husband Tony came to the  SFZC in 1965. In this podcast she talks about how they got there, her close relationship with Shunryu Suzuki, and more. 

Lynne Lockie, then Warkov, came to Sokoji in 1960 with her husband Saul Warkov.  She  was a founder of the Minneapolis Zen Meditation Center in Minneapolis that invited Dainin Katagiri to be their teacher. She became a psychoanalyst and  retired recently from teaching mindfulness at the New College in Sarasota., Florida. She is still involved in contemplative practice.

Linda Hess came to the SF Zen Center in 1974 after a decade of studies and seeking in India. She has continued returning to India through the years. She became a senior lecturer emeritus at Stanford University in religious studies. She's written three books focusing on the poet Kabir and translating his songs/poems and is working on another.  The Bijak of Kabir 1983, Bodies of Song, Kabir Oral Traditions and Performative Worlds in North India - 2015. Emptiness. Kumar Gandharva performs the poetry of Kabir. She and husband Kazuaki Tanahashi live in Berkeley. She tells about all that and her life in this podcast.  

John Nelson was for years a Professor of East Asian religions in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, University of San Francisco. He is the author of Experimental Buddhism: Innovation and Activism in Contemporary Japan. His studies and teaching have included a good deal on Zen. In this podcast he talks about experiences and observations in Japan, Indonesia, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, and more. Check out his blog Far West Passage: Experimental Views on Asia, Buddhism, and the Awakening Mind at <nelsonjblog.wordpress.com>.. More on John Nelson at his page on cuke.com.

Stuart Lachs was at the first practice period at Tassajara. and has practiced  with many other groups through the years. including two years with Eido Shimano and eleven years with Walter Nowick. Check out his website Zen Perspectives: Commentaries on Zen and Society - https://lachs.inter-link.com and learn more about him in this podcast.

JJ Wilson founded the Women's Studies program at Sonoma State U. Her husband Phillip Wilson was one of Shunryu Suzuki's early ordained disciples. They came  to Sokoji , Suzuki's SF temple, in 1961. She wrote her thesis on Virginia Wolf there and is a leading authority on Virginia Wolf.

Daigaku Rumme is the teacher at the Confluence Zen Center (confluencezen.org) in Maplewood, a suburb of St. Louis, Missouri. He was ordained by and received transmission from Seikkei Harada and practiced for 27 years at Hosshinji in Obama, Japan. He was with the Soto Zen International Center for seven years while living at the SFZC City Center. For five years he was director of the Soto Zen Buddhism North America Office and the Head Priest of Zenshuji in LA.  In 2015 he moved to St. Louis and has been teaching there ever since. In this podcast, Daigaku fills in the blanks on all that, and talks about the latest book he's translated working with the author:  “The Formless Record of the Transmission of Illumination:  a Contemporary Commentary on Keizan Zenji’s Denkoroku - volume 1"   by Gien Inoue.

Neil Rubenking came to the SF Zen Center in the seventies and  had this interest in computers that benefitted the SFZC when hardly anyone knew anything about them and he sailed into a career with PC Magazine that continues to this day as their senior security analyst.  He also worked for the CIA as a student summer job. Listen to this podcast and you'll learn more vital information about Neil and so forth.