How many Zen masters does it take to screw in a light bulb? The plum tree in the garden!

It's crazy to me how concerned people get with what it looks like and what you can do there. People may as well be talking about JRR Tolkien or Star Trek or something.

What attracted me to Zen was my first teacher, Tim McCarthy. He was extremely genuine. It wasn't even really a Zen thing, that sort of came along later.

If he'd [Jesus] been a little more concerned for his own safety and well being he may have toned things down a little bit and probably at best he'd be remembered as a Rabbi who said some cool things but that nobody really reads anymore. There's tons of them.

So when we come across somebody who does understand this and makes an effort to try and explain it to us, some people freak out and turn that person into either an object of worship or, some people freak out and want to kill that person. I think it's because they know what's true but they don't want to know, they don't want to face up to what that actually means. So they're going to kill the messenger and hope that by doing so they'll destroy the message so they can go back to living their ordinary life again.

Jesus was probably a guy who thought, "This thing that I've discovered can save the world and everybody is miserable without it." So he was probably a very kind and giving person and thought he had to give it to people, even if it killed him. He had to make sure they got the message, and he paid the ultimate price as they say due to his insistence.

Faith keeps you going, but doubt keeps you from going off the deep end.