Shodo Spring
Mountains and Waters Zen Group
Faribault, MN
Shodo Spring is a Soto Zen priest and dharma heir of Shohaku Okumura. Before encountering Zen in 1983 she had studied physics and social work, and practiced as a psychotherapist. She met the Dharma through Dainin Katagiri in Minnesota, studied at San Francisco Zen Center, and finally trained with Okumura Roshi. She was interim priest at Anchorage Zen Communityin 2010-11 and volunteered with Brahmavihara Cambodia in 2014.
In 2004 Shodo organized public sitting outside the political conventions and joined a group walking between them, from Boston to New York. In 2006 she walked the Texas-Mexico border with Claude Anshin Thomas in the American Zen Pilgrimage. After receiving Dharma Transmission, she organized and led the 2013 Compassionate Earth Walk, a 3-month spiritual walk along the proposed Keystone XL pipeline route in the Great Plains. That walk began with a vision and has shaped her whole life since.
Currently Shodo sits monthly Antaiji-style sesshins in the tradition of her lineage, and has founded Mountains and Waters Alliance to work together with all beings for the welfare of the whole earth. She lives on a farm, apprenticing herself to the plants, waters, animals and earth, learning to be human. She spends time with her children and grandchildren.
List of Publications
“When The World Is on Fire: Reflections on These Times“ in Zen Teachings in Challenging Times. Temple Ground Press 2018.
editor, The Mountains and Waters Sutra: A Practitioner’s Guide to Dogen’s “Sansuikyo” by Shohaku Okumura. Wisdom Publications 2018.
“Finding Home in the Vow” in Boundless Vows, Endless Practice: Bodhisattva Vows in the 21st Century, Published by Sanshin Zen Community. April 2018
“Right Action” in The Eightfold Path, Temple Ground Press 2016.
Take Up Your Life: Making Spirituality Work in the Real World. Tuttle 1996