Suddenly, You Are Always a Teacher

A Conversation with Jiří George Hazlbauer JDPSN

An interview conducted by Veronique Struis and Boaz Franklin

When did your journey with Buddhism start?

I have been looking for the meaning of life for as long as I can remember. In puberty, life took me away from this kind of question, but this nagging question in the back of my mind “What is life about?” remained.

I entered high school in Czechoslovakia under the Communist regime, but I graduated from high school after the regime changed to a democracy, which was an important change for many of us. Suddenly this question “What is life about?” was even stronger, because after the regime change, we knew much less what to do with our lives. We suddenly had so many opportunities, but many things were not defined yet, and we had no idea what was next.

So, I started working at seventeen in construction and quickly started my own company providing work for up to fifty people on some construction projects. And from this not knowing what to do with life and being told by my family that I was not going to achieve anything in life, suddenly within a year I had a successful company.

At that time there was mandatory military service, and I ended up going into civil service at a home for the elderly instead. Seeing old age, and seeing people die, returned me to the question “What is this life about?” After I finished civil service, I returned to my company, and I just felt this emptiness of life. At twenty-one, I had achieved everything I ever imagined.

My interest in the spiritual resurfaced, and at one point I just hit the wall. I gave my company to the people who worked for me and gave all of my belongings to my friends. I started traveling, looking for a spiritual teacher. During my travels I stayed with the Bedouins in Israel, and during that time I narrowed down my interest from any kind of spirituality to Buddhism and slowly focused on Zen. During this time, I read the book Dropping Ashes on the Buddha by Zen Master Seung Sahn, it was the clearest teaching I had read so far in any book.

As I am a slow reader, when I finally got to the end of the book, I found an address for the Kwan Um School of Zen in the Czech Republic, and instead of continuing my travels to Asia to find a spiritual teacher I returned to the Czech Republic.

After I returned, I went to the address and I met Misa Mazacova, who lived there. She practiced with the Kwan Um School, but the Zen center was no longer there. She still tells new people our exchange after I rang her doorbell. I said I wanted to practice and she said, “But this is my apartment. We don't have a Zen center.” And I said, “What? You don't have any Zen center? Well, I'm going to build you one.”

And about three weeks later, there was a retreat with Zen Master Dae Kwang in Brno, which I joined, and I never looked back. And then through together action we had the Zen center in Prague about three years later.

How did your relationship with your family and friends affect your direction?

My father died around a year before I joined the school, which was also one of those things that made me question life. Shortly after that, one of my best friends overdosed. So I had two significant deaths in a really short period of time, which was part of the process.

I didn't have a good relationship with my father, but I was fortunate enough to heal it just before he died. My mom was confused about what I was doing and especially the giving everything away part. But after a few years, she kind of got over it and in some ways understood not necessarily why I did it, but she said one thing that was really important to me: “I don't understand what you are doing and why, but you are the happiest person I know. And for me as a mother, that is the most important thing.”

My friends were confused because I kind of switched directions almost overnight, which may have been a little extreme. When I felt I needed to do something, I did it. Many of my friends left me because they didn't understand what I was doing. And I don't blame them. If I look at myself at that time, I was probably not necessarily a pleasant person. I was trying to show everybody how wonderful this Zen thing is and how they should all do it. I just completely left all of my friends, family, everything, and I started my Zen life. And then through that, once I got a better hold on myself, on the practice and how it relates to this world, many of my friends started coming back into my life.

What attracted you to Zen Master Seung Sahn's teachings?

What attracted me to this teaching the most was the emphasis on real life. I like to bring our practice to day-to-day life. Meditation is not the point of Zen. It is a tool to wake up and help this world, to be a more compassionate and helpful person—this had a really strong attraction to me. And the emphasis on helping this world was also important to me. But mainly it was the emphasis on applying our practice in everyday life, which I didn’t encounter in many other spiritual teachings.

How does that manifest in the way you teach?

I keep saying “What is this?” to people. And yes, formal practice is important. But the point of formal practice is not the formal practice itself. I emphasize this point often, because it can be confusing for people, especially when you are starting with Zen practice. You often see people getting stuck, thinking they only need to do practice, and they give up on their friends, they give up on their families. They actually often give up on their responsibilities in life. And that is not our teaching.

I understand that for many people there is a need to take a step away from the situation they are in and create a new one. I did it as well in an extreme way. So I sometimes say that you can do this, but it's not necessary. If you need this experience, sure, do whatever you want, but it is not necessary, especially now with the online access we have to teachers around the world.

What was your path after you established the Prague Zen Center?

I wanted to practice, and the closest place to practice formally was Warsaw. So I went to Warsaw and sat my first Kyol Che there. There I saw a poster for a Kyol Che at the Providence Zen Center, and it showed the question “What am I?” which I really liked from the very beginning. I received a scholarship, learned some basic English, and went to the Providence Zen Center. Because I was a professional carpenter, which they needed, I ended up spending almost eleven years there. During this time I remained involved in activities in the Czech Republic and would fly back to organize Kyol Ches, always returning to the United States.

What brought you back to Europe?

I was not planning to come back to Europe. I never felt strongly about being Czech. What happened was we had a sangha weekend in Brno, and a sangha member told me that he felt that all senior students had left the sangha. I realized I needed to do something about it and believed that I had enough credibility in the sangha to build the Zen center we always wanted to have.

So we decided we were going to try, and I started looking for a place for the Zen center. And meanwhile, they voted me in as abbot of Providence Zen Center. Since I already made the promise to the Czech sangha, I told the board in Providence that I would serve as abbot for only one year. Meanwhile, we purchased the place in Vrazne. I returned to the Czech Republic and started building the Zen center.

When you returned, you were not a teacher. How did things change after you became a teacher?

I did not really have an ambition to be a teacher, and when you become a teacher, suddenly all of the sangha are your students. With the new people this is easier, but if there is someone with whom you have practiced for the last fifteen years, it is a shift in the relationship. It took a while for both the sangha and me to adjust to the fact that I am the teacher now.

What kind of growth happened to you when you became a teacher? What does that require of you in relationship to the sangha?

As a teacher you can be friendly, but you cannot be real friends or buddies in many ways. So one day I could tell them whatever is happening with me. And then after I became a teacher, I could no longer do so. It was kind of a wake-up call, as suddenly there were things that were just not appropriate for a teacher to say or do, as people see you differently. This shift was kind of difficult for me, as the sangha was pretty much my whole life at that point, and I felt I had lost my support network.

Suddenly, no matter what you do, you are always a teacher. It was difficult in many ways, but also it was a great teaching for me to be fully aware of every moment. So every moment, we have correction situation, relationship, function. I really had to learn that, and to be more aware of it all the time I am around the sangha, which of course is necessary in any situation we are in.

Do you feel this means you lost some of your authenticity with this change?

I do not think so. I mean, it can feel like that, but like in some ways you are always in some kind of role. Like when you put on your nice dress to go to the opera, are you losing your authenticity? Or are you just acting according to the situation? So I'm authentic to the situation I am in. I’m not trying to pretend to be somebody else, but I also need to see what is my relationship and function in that situation.

When I go out with my old friends, I can be me without any filter. It is wonderful, and sometimes that is something you need to do. But I don't see that as inauthentic. I see that as being there for the people you are with, like we change our behavior depending on the situation we are in.

Every teacher has their own strengths and their own direction in their teachings. How would you summarize your teaching style?

I think my biggest strength, which I definitely got from my mother, is I am extremely social, and I really love people. For me, human relationships are the most important thing there is. So sangha was always important, and I may not have been in this school if there had been no sangha, or if the emphasis were more on the teachers and less on the sangha. So I always felt that the sangha is an essential part of the practice. I was trying to build the sangha before I was a teacher. And as a teacher, I am really trying to focus on the sangha. It’s essential to help them to develop their relationships with one another and the relationships with the larger community.

And of course there is my engagement with other religions. I was always inspired by what Zen Master Seung Sahn used to do with other religions. I was already doing some interfaith activities when I was in Providence. And when I returned to the Czech Republic, I really wanted to do something like this. Together with some other people I started a nonprofit organization for interfaith dialogue. And nowadays I work with multiple orders within the Catholic church, different Protestant groups, and some Jewish groups. This opened up new opportunities for us, including teaching about Buddhism in multiple universities, doing retreats with Christians. We have an active exchange between us and mainly the Catholic orders. It's inspiring for our practice, but also it allows us to be part of the broader society. It also helps our sangha members to connect their practice with their regular life.

One of the things I have seen is the disconnect between sangha life and what we call normal life. The fact that families of sangha members would hardly ever visit any of our events, like there is a sangha and there is the rest of the life. I am trying to create situations where it is encouraged to cross these barriers. So we organize family events in Vrazne, work retreats, we engage with Catholics, and so on. And we can learn from the Catholics—for example, their engagement with their families or with the larger Czech society is much more extensive because they have been in Europe for centuries, unlike Buddhism, so they know what they are doing, and we have a lot to learn from them.

It strengthens our practice. Not just that we have more possibilities to practice, but that we see different practices. And because we create this more inclusive environment, our sangha members are more likely to be able to go on a retreat because their families see it is not a problem. It is a part of normal life.

The connection with the Catholic church, is that also because it's more connected to Czech society, or have you considered engaging with other social organizations?

The Czech society is primarily atheist. They do not really see the point of Buddhism. There is often a disconnect between the larger society and religion in general. And if they are inclined to work with a religion, it would be likely an already established religion. So for me the main thing is that these Catholic people we work with are absolutely wonderful practitioners. They are great people, good teachers. They are like dharma brothers and sisters, but just within a different religion.

And as I said it was difficult for me to lose my peers in some ways. Suddenly I had peers who are going through the same things, just in a different religion. If you are a priest in a monastery, and you are in charge of your congregation, it is really similar to being a teacher in the Kwan Um School of Zen.

We shared our problems, which are very similar problems, and I heard how they deal with them. And so again, it helped me to grow as a person, as a teacher, and it allowed us to start working together.  And many of them see there is a need for Buddhists to be within our society. We can be helpful, but we need somebody to open the doors for us. And so often that is what they do for us. This is also how we started working with universities, got into the media, and collaborated on different books about spirituality. As a result, we are more seen. And that again allows us to do more things and grow our sangha. Our sangha members are happy with the opportunities they have. And we feel like a community which belongs to the larger community of Czech society.

What is your vision for the Czech Sangha?

My vision is that we will survive to the next generation. We really need to be inspiring enough for the next generation to join us and continue with this teaching. That is the biggest aspiration at the moment, because I believe that as a school we struggle to bring in young people. Sometimes they come, but to keep them, that does not seem to be something we are really successful at. And so that is at this moment my biggest focus—to find a way to connect with the new generation, to show them that what we are offering is something which can be helpful to them. And of course, helpful to the whole society.

And I would love for the sangha to grow so we are able to do more things and have more retreat centers. And it is really important that it is not just about what it brings to me or to the sangha, but what it brings to the larger human society and how it is relevant to today’s life. And how to connect what we are doing with the people who are around us.

Do you feel like something new is needed to attract the younger generations?

I think we should have really deep and regular debates on this topic within our school.

For example I do love the robes, but I can see how, for a Czech atheist who just wants to learn meditation, it can be off-putting to come to a place where they have to wear Korean robes. We do have a great teaching around it, but they can go two streets over where they would do very similar meditation, and they do not wear the robes.

To me things are perfect the way they are, because I grew up in it, and I am fine with it. But we really should look into what is needed, because that has been done through the centuries in every culture where Buddhism was introduced. It adapted to the new culture.  And to me, what Zen Master Seung Sahn did was great, but I do not think we should think that it is finished. I think it was just the first step for Zen to take root and become a part of our societies. We do need to really find a way to survive into the future.

We should be open to the possibilities of change and see that the change is not necessarily bad. And even differences may not be bad. For example, if you look at Asia, Hong Kong and Korea are quite different. And at the same time, it is still distinguishably Kwan Um. I can see that there is an American flavor of Kwan Um and a Czech flavor and German and Israeli. I do not see a problem, because each of these cultures has something which is unique to them. And I think that we should be open minded enough to recognize that and be able to accept those cultures, and adapt to their needs.

Any final words?

It has been an incredible journey with the school with a bunch of ups and downs. Anytime I am visiting any of our sanghas I cannot believe that this is my life and that I can share it with every one of you. And the question remains how to share it with the rest of the world, how to make our school visible enough that our teaching can reach through society, to make it accessible to everyone who sees this as their path. To see us as part of daily life, which I can see in Asia or here in Europe with certain traditions that have been around for a long time. And to meet people where they are.