I am a Master Zen Teacher, Trainer, and Counselor who emphasizes the therapeutic embodiment of Applied Meditation Psychology, Applied Meditation Therapy, and Applied Core-Self Mindfulness in everyday life and relationships. I am also an internationally published author on Zen Meditation & the practice of living enlightenment right here and now. I have been married for 54 years and have been blessed with two wonderful sons, a daughter-in-heart, and four precious grandchildren. I am deeply grateful that both my sons requested that I officiate at their weddings. Next to the joy of marrying my wife Diana, conducting their marriage ceremonies was another deeply precious and fulfilling part of my life.

A few weeks after my marriage in 1966 I was in a very serious motorcycle accident. After I recovered from my six surgeries, I became increasingly interested in the application of Western Depth Psychology and the Asian Zen Psychology of embodied mindfulness and meditation. During this time, I practiced zazen meditation by myself for 15 years in order to clarify the great matter of life and death, investigate the true nature of humanness, and expereince the deepest most unconditioned embodiment of reality in a ever changing world embedded in vast impermanance. During that same time of increasing intellectual study and deepening practice in embodied meditation and mindfulness, I received my Bachelors and Master's degrees from San Francisco State University. My Master's Degree focused on the client-centered therapy of Carl Rodgers, the Self-Actualization Psychology of Abraham Maslow, and the General Semantics Psychology of Alfred Korzybski. My Master's thesis focused on "ego-self ideal discrepancy" and its impact on objective and openhearted interpersonal listening.

In 1978, I received my Doctoral Degree in Humanistic Depth Psychology from Saybrook University, which was established in San Francisco. My doctoral dissertation emphasized zazen meditation as a valid scientific methodology for investigating the true quantum depth nature of physical reality and the embodied experience of being human in this only moment body. The dissertation also explained how mystical, spiritual, and religious expereinces naturally arise from the quantum depth functioning of our human nervous system. You can view two diagrams of my quantum nervous system model and read about their theoretical bases in neuron functioning by Clicking Here.

The integration of zazen meditation into my professional practice, education and training is deeply influenced by the teachings of Shunryu Suzuki-Roshi, a Soto Zen Master, Buddhist priest and founding teacher of San Francisco Zen Center. From 1976 to 1987, I studied, trained, and practiced at Genjo-ji Temple under the guidance of Jakusho Kwong-Roshi, a Soto Zen priest in the lineage of Suzuki Roshi. During my practice at Genjo-ji, I was ordained as a lay-monastic practitioner of Soto Zen.

In 1988, I left Genjo-ji and founded Jotoku-Ji Zen Training Temple in Rohnert Park, CA. There I officiated my formal Tokudo ordination ceremony as a Zen Buddhist priest which was intimately witnessed and supported by my whole family. At Jotoku-Ji, I educated, trained and counseled Zen beginners and veteran practitioners in the Way of Living Enlightenment for over twenty-five years. I also founded four other Zen Temple Dojos in Long Beach, CA, Santa Rosa, CA, Sonoma CA, and Kamuela, HI.

In my professional face-to-face teaching and counseling practice, I work with individuals, couples, and groups from all religious beliefs and walks of life. I also teach and counsel people globally through my website at Zendoctor.Com. In my professional worldwide practice, I teach, counsel, train, and mentor individuals, couples and small groups in the embodiment skills, behavioral techniques, and mindfulness principles of Applied Meditation Therapy® (AMT). AMT is a "Somatic Core Self Mindfulness Based Practice" that promotes optimum wellness, longevity, stress reduction, personal growth, loving relationships, spiritual fulfillment, enhanced sports performance, peak states of human embodiment, competitive integrity, and visionary leadership.

Applied Meditation Therapy® (AMT) evolved over fourty four years of my own study, practice, and training in Zen meditation and my professional psychological research into higher states of human consciousness, peak states of experiencing, and the farther reaches of living everyday life and relationships with compassion, boundless intimacy, and bright wisdoming. I founded and publically extended AMT as an empowering therapeutic modality in 1996 and established its official trademark in 2002.

In 1996 I taught myself website coding to extend my teaching and counseling practice in Applied Meditation Psychology, Applied Meditation Therapy, and Applied Zen Core-Self Mindfulness to the global Internet community. This is how I established the public educational site of ZenDoctor.Com.

As of January 2005, my wife and I relocated from California to the Big Island of Hawaii. I feel blessed to have our two sons and their families with us here on the Big Island. While enjoying and deeply appreciating the simple blessings of life with my wife, sons, daughter, and grandchildren, I continue to counsel and teach individuals and groups, conduct workshops, develop and maintain my global website, direct the evolution of the Applied Meditation Therapy Institute (AMTIonline.Org), publish a monthly newsletter to 21,500 subscribers, share my Zen teachings on LinkedIn to 600,000 people in specialized groups and followers, and author a wide variety of articles in Europe and the United States. I also market my far reaching book on a variety of social media platforms. You can look inside my book by clicking on the title below: