Meet the Sangha: Genryo Jones

with Kansei-san, the retired former abbot of Sogenji

I was very active as a teen in my local hardcore/punk music scene in the late 80s/early 90s. Me and a handful of friends formed our own bands, created an all-ages venue, booked touring bands from out of town, and put on hardcore shows almost every month for years. We created a scene that touched the lives of hundreds of kids.

So I saw how I could make an impact on the world through my work and passion. I was very inspired by the social and political activism of some of the bands I met, but most importantly, I experienced a raw aliveness and power through the group energy at these concerts that was astounding, way beyond anything I’d imagined possible, and nothing less than spiritual, with a real quality of purification and positive transformation. Heartbreakingly, I also saw how that powerful, raw energy could turn very easily into destructive violence and negativity. So I kept seeking.

photo by Roland Schmidt

Eventually, through studying poetry in college I discovered Zen Buddhism, and a local meditation group. In that group I found a mentor. There was something about him, an aliveness, an almost irritating directness, and a heartfelt passion that made him stand out. He had traveled and practiced in India and Japan, and on his recommendation I eventually went to Japan to do zen training at the Rinzai monastery and with the teacher he was connected with.

I’ll never forget entering the meditation hall for my first week-long intensive (O-sesshin)—there was a palpable electricity in the air that I recognized immediately. It was exactly like being in the throes of playing a hardcore show, except everyone was perfectly still and silent. Right away I felt like a fish in water, I knew I was home.

In a way, there’s not too much to tell about the life there—it was the traditional monastic schedule and environment that’s been maintained for centuries, one day much like the next. The Roshi there was one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met—a true force of nature. It was extremely rigorous and demanding, but so fresh, so real, so alive!

After enduring that first winter with little escape from the cold, I could feel the coming of spring in my bones in a way I never had before. I went there with some mixed-up ideas—like that the world was somehow bad and that I could escape it there, or that I could become something special there. And it’s not that I had my mixed-up ideas replaced with less mixed-up ones. But somehow it was just touching real experience in such a direct, visceral way—and not just touching it but soaking in it, steeping in it, for months and years. It really does get in your bones in a way that can’t be undone.

The three and a half years I spent there were by far the most transformative of my life, prior or since. I’m still unpacking that experience, it’s still very much alive and blossoming in my daily life and practice now—to an extent I could never have imagined at the time while doing it. The lifelong results of doing this training far outweigh what’s asked of us in the doing of it. Deep training is a bodily experience that fundamentally changes how you perceive and interact with the world. It’s not just a changing of the kinds of thoughts you think.

I went there because I just wanted to be less of an asshole. What I found is an aliveness in my body that is it’s own eagerness to participate in life itself—to get to do the work, to help out, and feel lucky to be here. I find that using that as my guide, I can be less the kind of person that everyone around me just has to put up with, and more the kind of person that has some okay-ness to spare—who can be of some use. For that I’m just so grateful!

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Genryo Jones is a late 80s straightedge kid turned former Rinzai Zen monk turned former Children’s Librarian turned Stay-at-home Dad. He currently lives in Tampa, Florida.