Three Disturbing Life Lessons From the American Soldier Who Became a Zen Monk
#3. War does not happen from one day to the next.
“I am a murderer. I have killed people in war, and the life I live today is rooted in this awakening. But if we do not wake up, these cycles of war, violence, and suffering will continue.”— Claude Anshin Thomas.
Claude Anshin Thomas volunteered for the Vietnam War at the age of 17; he writes in his book At Hell’s Gate: A Soldier’s Journey, “By taking up arms, I was directly responsible for the deaths of several hundred people, and the killing did not stop until I was discharged with honors and a purple heart.”
The curious thing is that Claude’s thirst for violence was quenched by the enemy he fought against in his youth: a Vietnamese monk who taught him Zen.
Since then, he has been a living example that change is possible and that a peaceful world is possible, and he spends his life traveling to places where peace is unstable, such as Colombia and other sites, to transmit his powerful message.
He is a spiritual model of the first order, and I want to share with you three powerful life lessons…
