Breezier Bio

Franz’s Life-in-Progress

My parents preserve my second grade yearbook and it says, right there, that I wanted to be an “editor.” Ah, but the desires of youth are fleeting; by age eight I had been seduced by the dusky allure of “fireman.” Though I feel I’ve always been destined to teach, I look back and see a varied past: the energetic and serious young actor in his twenties; the pilgrim in Asia who fancied he might become a photojournalist. I discovered, eventually, that I wasn’t a performer or a journalist. More than that, I discovered in Asia that though I loved Buddhism I wasn’t truly a Buddhist. I found myself irremediably thoughtful and irredeemably American: I lived on this shore of the Pacific Rim and I needed to understand my place on it. Returning from that year abroad, I knew I wanted to study religion and teach it, and that is what I have done.

I always thought Buddhism was cool. At least from the time I remember thinking specifically about it, which was in eighth grade social studies class, when we all did reports on different religions. I did Confucianism, but my heart was smitten by the dharma. To skip forward a bit, I got my masters degree at the Graduate Theological Union, which opened my eyes to the vigor and even the rigor of Western religions, but I was never a member of any church. When it came time to choose a school for my doctoral studies, I went hardcore. I chose the University of Chicago. As a doctoral student my studies afforded me training in psychology, anthropology, and sociology, in intellectual history, and in that mass of related methods known as “history of religions,” especially of Buddhism. I at last got my Ph.D. after eleven—count ‘em eleven—years of grad school. My dissertation and I asked the question, “Why Do Americans Practice Zen Buddhism?” We asked it of ourselves and of many senior students of Taizan Maezumi Roshi, the founding teacher of Zen Center of Los Angeles. I continue to pursue both personal exploration of the dharma and scholarly work on Buddhism and psychology.

On the scholarly side, I’m review editor for the Journal of Global Buddhism; past chair of the Psychology, Culture, and Religion Group of the American Academy of Religion; author of many chapters, reviews, and articles on Buddhism and psychological development; and instructor in comparative religion at California State University, Los Angeles.

On the personal side, I’m a founding member of The Forge Guild of spiritual leaders and teachers and general editor of the newsletter of The Forge Institute. But my main claim to (pseudo) fame is that I’ve written four books applying Buddhism to our everyday lives. My first, What Would Buddha Do?, has been published in, I think, a dozen languages now. My most recent book, Just Add Buddha, I lobbied to title Shallow Practice; and my most recent and treasured shallow practice is caring for my daughter, Pearl Miroku, who is teaching me how to run, eat tangerines, and sing songs from classic musicals at the same time.

I’ve been following Buddhist paths and while I have not reached annutara-samyak-sambodhi, I have reached the top of Mt. Whitney. I love camping, fine food, and my family and believe that if the Buddha had tasted properly aged red varietals, he would never have forbidden alcohol to the sangha.