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LZTA Member

Margaret Syverson


Name:    Margaret Syverson
Dharma Name:    Bushin Kōan
Title:    Senior Teacher
Preferred Name:    Peg
Organization:    Appamada
Lineage:    Joko Beck, Shunryu Suzuki
Peg has been studying and practicing Zen since 1966. She was ordained in the Soto Zen lineage of Suzuki Roshi in August, 2004, and received Dharma Transmission December 2014 with Kosho McCall. Since 1990, she had been a student of Joko Beck, who originally authorized her to teach. From 2001 to 2006, she also trained with Flint Sparks at Austin Zen Center. She had formal priest training in residence for six months at Austin Zen Center and six months at Great Vow Zen Monastery in Clatskanie, Oregon, under the guidance of the Abbots, Jan Chozen Bays and Hogen Bays.

In March, 1995, Peg had launched a Zen sitting group based on Joko's model, initially called Live Oak Zen Meditation group and later named Ordinary Mind Zen-Austin. The group met once a week on Sunday mornings at Live Oak Unitarian Church, and then after "camping out" in several other locations, finally moved to its present location at 913 East 38th St. in September 2005, when it was formally incorporated as a 501 (c)3 non-profit.

At that time we were able to expand the offerings to include daily morning meditation, Wednesday evening meditation, classes, one-day sittings, inquiry group, and retreats. In May, 2009, Ordinary Mind Zen-Austin officially changed its name to Appamada. September 11, 2011, Peg received formal teacher recognition in the Suzuki lineage with Flint Sparks and Kosho McCall officiating.

Peg is also an Associate Professor Emeritus at the University of Texas at Austin, in the Department of Rhetoric and Writing. She has taught courses such as Zen Rhetoric, Non-violent Rhetoric, Information Architecture, and Knowledge Ecologies, for undergraduates and graduate students. She was the Director of the Computer Writing and Research Lab for 10 years and the Director of the Undergraduate Writing Center, which provides one-on-one consultations for 11,000 student writers each year, for 8 years.

Peg has formal training and certification as a facilitator in these areas: Right Use of Power, Appreciative Inquiry, and Spiral Dynamics, and she has completed the three-level Hakomi training with Ron Kurtz, Flint Sparks, and Donna Martin. She has also completed Level I training for Internal Family Systems with the Center for Self-Leadership.