I was born into a normal, middle-class family just outside of Philadelphia. We even moved to the Town of Normal in Illinois when I was four-and-a-half years old. Clearly, it didn't do me much good!

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When I was 12 years old, I found an old world religions text book on my father's bookshelf called Man's Religions. I remember reading the chapters on Buddhism first which tells me I had some earlier interest in the Dharma, but I have no memory now of what sparked this interest. When I read the Four  Truths of the Noble Ones and the Eightfold Path of the Noble Ones my eyes nearly popped out of my head. There was a kind of buzzing in my brain - an excitement that was almost physical. I remember thinking quite clearly that this - the Buddhadharma - was what I wanted to learn.

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At the age of 15, I visited my grandparents in the Los Angeles area and received my first instruction in meditation at the Mt. Baldy Zen Center. You could see Mt. Baldy from my grandparents' front yard when the smog didn't obliterate the mountains. A few days later, walking back from the local library where I had been reading Zen and the art of Motorcycle Maintenance, I remember looking up at the mountains and thinking, "Someday, I'm going to be a monk".

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I was subsequently an exchange student in Japan my senior year of high school through a sister cities program, started college, and returned to Japan again my junior year. It took me until the age of 30, though, to ordain.

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I originally ordained in the Drikung Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism in 2001, and though I ultimately studied in Nepal for a year from 2009 to 2010, I ran out of funds and had to return to the U.S. Lacking an opportunity for a proper education and training in the Tibetan tradition, I moved into Chua Dieu Phap (Temple of Noble Dharma), the Vietnamese temple where I received the full ordination in 2008. When I moved into Chua Dieu Phap I also joined the Korean Taego order.

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I am currently working toward a Doctorate of Buddhist Ministry at the University of the West and hope to graduate by May of 2018. I previously completed the Master of Divinity for Buddhist Chaplaincy and the Master of Arts in Religious Studies also at the University of the West.

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