The Future is Now

Establishing Matilija Salon

Matilija was the name of a Chumash village by a river in what is now called Meiners Oaks about an hour and a half north of Los Angeles. It is also the name of a mythical figure of legend, Chief Matilija, which tells the creation story of the Matilija Poppy. It’s a love story, of course.

Matilija Canyon is farther up into the mountains along that river and that is where my parents arranged to purchase some acreage land in 1979.

My two great phobias emerged from this place… heights and snakes, which I struggle with to this day. But there were far worse things cultivated in this endeavor that also continue to define my life.

Matilija was also sanctuary to me. A sacred place where the land spoke loudly and taught me of reality. A place of clear water and air. A place of profound silence and freedom from the oppression and toxicity of society.

There were a great many forces conspiring in this occurrence. An intersection of cause and effect, of history and identity, belief and denial. An embodiment of the colonial enterprise and it’s many arms, legs, circumstances and consciousness.

This is the land I was born to. Along the ocean and in the mountains. From the marshland of Venice Beach to rivers of Matilija, the land spoke to me, told me what was there, what was buried and what was missing. The land missed it’s people, it remembered, and it told me that the truth was not in the lies the monuments were telling.

And so, from the time I was very young, I realized that everyone was lying all the time and that many did not realize that is what they were doing because they believed the lie. And that many did know what they were doing, because they were there to create and enforce the lie.

Facing the lie is extremely painful. It is intricately woven into identity, this is what makes it so effective. Attachment to identity is so powerful, that even those with good intentions will choose the attachment over liberation.

Letting go is not in any way the same as being stripped of truth by an oppressive force. Letting go is accomplished through acceptance, which is quite straightforward. It is simply being with what is here, with what is real. So it is not something that truthfully can be used to justify any position.

It is something that allows one to exist in reality and understand the truth of the condition and self, which in my experience, inherently manifests compassion. It is an intrinsic cause and effect. Like gravity.

Observing reality is something I was instructed to do one day when I was about three and some adults wanted to talk about me without me hearing and so I was left unsupervised.

I was escorted to the porch and instructed to sit there and look out into the desert. I was told not to go into it because there were snakes there, but to look at it, notice it, the bushes and the shadows, and then to share what I observed when they came back to get me.

I remember my thoughts as I sat there alone. I thought with exasperation, “These people have no idea what is going on.” I was annoyed, but took a breath and noticed the land as instructed.

The land was where Dhamma Dena – Desert Vipassana Center was founded. My parents also purchased this land in 1977, the year I was born, and transferred it to my godmother Ruth Denison for the center.

Ruth had been authorized to teach by her Burmese teacher Sayagyi U Ba Khin as a result of her practice and study of Buddhism over many years with her husband Henry. They lived in a house in the Hollywood hills which was home to a salon of visionaries notable for establishing the consciousness movement in the West. Alan Watts, Aldous Huxley, Lama Govinda, Timothy Leary… were friends and contemporaries intent in their way to examine reality and uncover what remained mysterious to them within their conditioned experience.

This soup of influences did cause some significant confusion. So, I took it upon myself to conduct my own investigation in order to determine what was valid and observable.

These conditions have conspired within me to form a particular kind of space and I have chosen to name this space, Matilija Salon.

The intention is to cultivate consciousness and community through various applications and experiences clearly rooted in the understanding and practice of buddhadhamma.

The lived truth of impermanence and the disciplined practice of awareness aligns us with a compassionate path whose intention and purpose is the lessening of suffering. This is observable and actionable. It requires no belief, just commitment and healing.

And this awareness can be applied to and include all things, when approached sincerely with clarity and honesty.

---

For three years, I have held group Vipassana practice on Zoom at least once a week. It has been an incredible foundation for teaching and astonishingly transformative. Beginning as an experiment while we were still in significant pandemic based isolation, it has become the nurturing earth from which my present has grown and continues to develop.

I have held workshops and retreats focused on the nature of the creative process which explore methods of establishing conscious and healthy relationships with our process and the things we choose to create.

And I consult on worldly identities and support transformation and development within the established business practices of the current culture.

My focus is always on integrating mindful practice into daily life for everyday people.