Valora Midtdal, Rev.

In December [2013] I celebrated three years as a monk. Knowing a little about my life, you might think the road to monasticism was pretty straightforward. 1) Born into a Buddhist family. 2) Raised at a local Priory. 3) Throw in a little suffering and voila, the arising of monastic aspiration. True on all accounts, but the road to becoming a monk was not as straightforward as it might seem. It took many years, a moment of great desperation, and a trip to Shasta Abbey to drag me out of a thick fog into the arms of something much greater.

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