Interview with my Father, Richard Josephson (Heng Kung)

On the afternoon of February 2017, I arranged a phone interview with my father. I was hesitant due to the formal nature of an interview and unsure of what to expect. To my surprise, my father was an open book; He was giving of his time and life's memories. 

During our interview, I learned many things about my father—like how he began his meditation practice and why he left his monastery without saying goodbye to his teacher. As our interview drew to a close, I found myself grinning from ear to ear. 

Growing up, I heard many stories about my father, but never understood the order or context in which they occurred. It was nice to to piece his life together, to have a timeline for the sake of having a timeline, but more importantly—to understand the life of one man who strived to follow the Buddha's path.

MUDRA LOVE: What was your first experience with Buddhism?

RICHARD JOSEPHSON: I just sat down to meditate. It was a spontaneous decision. I was very anxious and impatient. I felt really stupid and super uncool. I sat in between my father’s doorway and the hallway and lasted only five minutes, but that five minutes was enough to keep me going.

ML: How old were you? 

RJ: I was 17 years old, living in Santa Monica, California.

ML: What was happening around this time?

RJ: I was in my senior year of high school and everything just exploded—there were the peace marches in Berkeley and everyone was protesting the Vietnam war. I hitch-hiked up to San Francisco with my buddies and hung out on Height Street and slept on the floor. People were exploring LSD – everything was just happening all at once.

ML: What happened next?

RJ: I went to Hawaii to surf the waves! But really, it was my next big step. 

ML:  How so?

RJ: Well, all the surfers were meditating a lot. We meditated 2/3 of the day and surfed the remainder. I liked meditating so much that eventually, I quit surfing and just meditated all day.

ML: How long did this period last?

RJ: I meditated for a year and a half in jungles, beaches, caves, coffee plantations and abandoned homes. I had no job. I just lived in the fishing camps with the Hawaiians and begged for food.

ML: How did you eventually make it to Nepal?

RJ: I got a job at the first hotel ever built on the Big Island and earned $2,000 to take with me to Nepal and later India.

ML: Did you ever have any doubts about what you set out to do?

RJ: Never

ML: I remember you eventually got kicked out of India for an expired Visa...

RJ: I was Nepal for the first year and when my visa expired, I snuck off to India.

I stayed in India for another year before the police asked to see my passport. They saw that I had no visa to be in India and no exit paperwork from Nepal. So, straight to the airport I went!

When I got to the airport, they asked me to change clothes, but the only possessions I had were on my back. I left India wearing only a longi, t-shirt, and flip flops—my hair in a top knot. My sister laughed the entire way home from the airport and our first stop was a department store before we even made it home.

ML: You're back in California now?

RJ: Yes, I stayed at my dad’s for five days and then I wanted to find a temple or at least a place to meditate. My dad gave me his Volkswagen camper and I drove it to San Francisco. I found the San Francisco Zen Center and after only about a week, I found it a bit too easy for me.

I was used to meditating twelve hour days and at the Zen Center they were only meditating for two hours a day then drinking tea and chit-chatting.

I told them I needed a more rigorous practice so they told me about this Manchurian Chan Master meditating out of Gold Mountain. They said that it was a very strict place and no one can stay there. So, I knew this was going to be the right place for me...

Part Two: Life with Master Hsuan Hua

Venerable Master, Hsuan Hua

MUDRA LOVE: What happened when you arrived at Gold Mountain? 

RICHARD JOSEPHSON: As soon as I arrived at the temple, I saw a picture of Hsu Yun hanging on their wall. A few years earlier I had seen a picture of Hsu Yun on an altar in Hawaii. I knew he would be my Master. But then I forgot about that photo.

I asked the people at Gold Mountain if the Master was there, but they said no, another Master who received the Dharma transmission from Master Hsu Yun had taken his place after he passed away. Again, I asked if I could meet the new Master, but they told me he was away lecturing in South America and would not return for another two or three months.

So, I stayed at the temple and waited for the Master.

ML: Do you remember your first encounter with Master Hsuan Hua?

RJ: Well, when Shr Fu (Master Hsuan Hua) finally arrived no one had seen him for a long time so everyone gathered around him to talk. The monastery was undergoing construction at the time because of an earthquake so monks were carrying sheet rock up to the third floor. There was a large stack of sheet rock in front of the couch where Shr Fu was sitting, so I knelt before him and proceeded to carry the sheet rock one-by-one up to the third floor until it was all gone.

I did not say a word to Shr Fu, but I certainly felt his presence. 

ML: What was Shr Fu like?

RJ: He was like a mother and friend to me in many ways. We might have been friends in past lives who played together or maybe even were parents to each other. I was one of the few disciples that could joke with him and play around, but he was also my teacher and precept door.

My father, Heng Kung in meditation at Gold Mountain Monastery.

I also felt close to him in meditation, a feeling of being one. Sometimes, we would even talk during meditation, having whole conversations and getting lost in them. We needed very few words to understand each other. We would just sit and look at each other.

He would come into my room, which was right next door to him for many years and because I was usually meditating when he came in, he would whisk me off with his dust broom. He would say a word a two, sometimes just a gesture, and that would be my entire instructions for the day. 

ML: You stayed with the Master from 1972-1983 were you a fully ordained Buddhist monk?

RJ: Pretty much—I took lay precepts as a novice monk in 1972 and then became a fully ordained monk a few years later.

ML: When it was finally time to leave- you left without telling anyone, not even your Master. Why?

RJ: Because I didn’t feel like I needed to say anything. We were just too close that I didn’t feel there were any words that were adequate to say goodbye, so I just left.

Part Three: Nepal, Marriage, Family

From left to right: My father, sister, Rachel, mother, Kamala, and me.

MUDRA LOVE: Ok, you left the monastery, and you went to Nepal? What happened next? 

RICHARD JOSEPHSON: I returned my robes formally and decided I wanted to get married and start a family.

ML: Was this a difficult transition to make?

RJ: It was a very natural transition. I met your mom while she was doing a puja (prayer ritual) at Swayambu (Buddhist temple in Kathmandu). Mom meditated too and I just continued as before with my practice.

ML: Did you think about Shr Fu? 

RJ: Yes, I still felt very close to Shr Fu during this time.

Lamas reciting prayers in our house, Kathmandu Nepal.

ML: How did your Buddhist practice influence the way you raised your children?

RJ: Often you guys would sit down and meditate with us. I took you and your sister on my back every day to get blessed by lamas. You were completely immersed in Buddhism. 

ML: Any piece of advice you want to leave with people?

RJ: Getting married doesn't obstruct a spiritual lifestyle. Bringing children in the world if they are dharma practitioners and do good work is also a dharma. Introducing the dharma to your partner can also be very beneficial. Mom didn't have any teachers before she met me and then became close to many masters and embraced the spiritual Nepali lifestyle. She has her own unique dharma- she doesn't put on any facade or anything like that, she meditates, and lives very close to the earth.