Zen Brush Classes!

There was a strong following for my Zen Brush classes up until the pandemic. Then we went online for a while but it was difficult; the students enjoyed one another and with 2 cameras I found a way to provide good information, but scheduling was hard and moral was low. And so slowly that ended.

Then after closing my dojo in 2014 and moving classes to the City Rec Department, I taught Aikido for 10 more years, but I wrote a book as my swan song and gave to my senior student, Dan Tran, my Aikido classes (He is currently teaching under his own banner.) I thought then that was the end of my teaching.

The Art Association to which I've been a member for almost 10 years, needed me to serve as VP in 2025 and so I did. I though perhaps administration was in my destiny. But after a year I realized my heart was really in teaching and I began a Zen Brush class.

I am very qualified, perhaps overqualified, but I find classes fun and I especially like it when others get excited about learning Zen Brush. Yes, one will brush with eastern style brushes, inks, and papers. Yes, you will be given instruction in how to brush Asian characters even though Zen Brush is not a language class. But the trappings are not the central lesson: relaxation is. I am an old Yoga teacher, teacher of sword arts and I teach everyone - no matter what class (philosophy, aikido, yoga, zen brush) they take from me - to breath, and to sit up straight. Relaxing is key to the good life. And relaxing changes a person's vision. Seeing a bigger picture gives a person choices and to have choices is to have freedom. As a by product, tension lessons, heart problems disappear, digestion issues abate, and deep sleep is a nightly visitor once again. Yes, I do believe that such a simple art as Zen Brush can change lives to this degree, and while we're at it great brush strokes appear, the kind of strokes that make for amazing paintings. Try it out.