Meet Joe Garvin!  Joe has been a regular at Red Cedar for awhile but slowly and happily continues to get to know more and more folks. Joe came to us through the suggestion of Seattle Soto Zen members when he was living in Seattle around 2 1/2 years ago. He is originally from just outside of Chicago and came to Buddhist practice from taking classes at Loyola University.  The classes happened to be with Taigen Dan Leighton--which many of you may know of from his well-known and much respected teachings and commentaries. Joe enjoyed his classes so much that he ended up taking several while he was attending the university. 

Joe's current focus is integrating practice with home life--and raising a 3 year old..."patience, tenderness, and humility" come to mind, he says! (good timing with our Shuso class on practicing as a layperson!) 

Also, Joe is very interested in how Buddhist practices and principles can be integrated with recovery from addiction. He is celebrating 15 years of sobriety and is the facilitator of a Buddhist Recovery group "Recovery Dharma", which currently meets at our new Sansui-ji temple on Thursday evenings!--This natural fit has been wonderful, he says.

Lastly, Joe wanted to share his impressions of the Red Cedar Community.  At first glance, he found that it is a very tight-knit community--but as he has kept coming back, he has noticed a very down-to-earth quality about our sangha--with a lightness and sense of humor about it. He feels that this is balanced by this commitment and earnestness.  "It has a sense of accessibility--committed but not taking ourselves too seriously" which he sees as the tone set by Nomon Tim and Kanho Chris.

Joe expresses that he is enjoying getting to know the individual folks here at Red Cedar, so, if you have a chance to stop by and say hello to Joe, please do!

Thank you so much, Joe!