Relaxing into Wholeness
Matthew, co-founder of the Institute with his wife Hiromi, serves in several roles at the Green Phoenix. He sees clients as an acupuncturist, herbalist, and biodynamic craniosacral therapy practitioner in the Holistic Clinic; he is the Taiji Academy’s chief instructor; and he is a spiritual teacher and minister for the Center for Sacred Sciences, which meets at the Green Phoenix Institute in down town Eugene area.
Matthew, a Eugene native, graduated from South Eugene High School in 1994 and went on to study at The Evergreen State College, in Olympia, Washington, where he received a B.A. degree in Psychology in 1999. His studies also involved Philosophy of Science. He met his wife Hiromi during college in a senior year program they shared studying Multicultural Psychological Counseling. He was particularly inspired to pursue the path of the healer by their professor, Dr. Heesoon Jun, a Licensed Psychologist, brilliant therapist, and impassioned teacher.
After working in the fields of mental health and special education for two years, he commenced his training in acupuncture and Chinese medicine in 2001 at the Seattle Institute of Oriental Medicine. There, he had the good fortune to learn from several luminaries in the field, including Stephen Brown, Dr. Craig Mitchell, and Dr. Daniel Bensky. He has been in private practice since he graduated in 2004 with a Masters in Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine. Since 2005, he has been practicing in Eugene, Oregon.
Matthew holds a Diplomate in Oriental Medicine (Acupuncture and Chinese Herbal Medicine) from the National Certification Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (NCCAOM), and is trained in several styles of acupuncture, including Shudo Denmei’s Japanese Meridian Therapy, Yoshio Manaka’s meridian balancing methods, Chinese TCM, and several ear and scalp acupuncture systems. He is also thoroughly trained in the sophisticated methodology of Chinese herbal medicine, and carefully personalizes his herbal treatments to his patient’s health conditions and symptoms. He specializes in musculoskeletal pain conditions, emotional-body regulation, and family medicine.
Matthew has been studying and practicing Craniosacral Therapy since 2010, after many years of treatments with local expert craniopath Benjamin Matson-Bell proved profoundly beneficial to his own health. He employs Upledger bio-mechanical methods as well as Biodynamic methods in his practice and is currently working toward certification in the Upledger school. He loves cranial work and especially enjoys guiding his clients to deep states of body-mind stillness and integration.
Matthew’s journey in the martial arts began in 1990, when he commenced training with Master Kyuchin Hwang of Hwang’s Martial Arts in Eugene, studying the Korean discipline of Tae Kwon Do. In 1997, he began intensive study of Northern Shaolin Eagle Claw Kung Fu under Grandmaster Fu Leung. In 2001, he started training with his current martial arts master, Harrison Moretz of the Taoist Studies Institute in Seattle, Washington. Under Harrison Moretz’s guidance, in Autumn of 2007 Matthew was accepted as a lineage discipline in Grandmaster Feng Zhiqiang’s system of Chen-style Xinyi Hunyuan Taijiquan, and represents the 3rd-generation of Hunyuan Taiji and the 20th-generation of Chen-style Taiji. He continues advanced studies in Taijiquan, as well as Baguazhang and Xinyiquan, under Master Moretz.
Matthew’s spiritual path began in 1994 at the age of eighteen. He became interested in mystical spirituality after discovering that his youthful atheistic and materialistic world-view was belied by his own direct experience. After a fruitful but ultimately frustrating autonomous exploration of consciousness studies, he began his formal spiritual training with Geshe Jamyang Tsultrim, a highly-trained Tibetan Buddhist lama of the Sakya order and a mental health therapist, in 1998. He traveled with Geshe Tsultrim and Evergreen State College Professor Ryo Imamura, a Japanese Buddhist Priest, to Nepal in the Spring of 1998. There, he studied Tibetan Buddhism with several lamas of the Sakya order, and also made a pilgrimage to Lumbini in Southern Nepal, birthplace of the Buddha Sakyamuni. In summer of 2000, he and his wife Hiromi were married by Geshe Tsultrim in a Buddhist service in Seattle, and later that summer he took refuge in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition during a ceremony presided over by Sakya Trizin, head of the Sakya order. In 2000 to 2001, he studied with Rinzai Zen Buddhist and Korean Mountain Daoist Master Hyunoong Sunim, at the Dohn-O Zen Center in Seattle. There, he studied Daoist Yoga and Zen. In 2001, he began the study of Daoist philosophy, qigong, and meditation with Harrison Moretz, Longmen Quanzhen Daoist Adept and Director of the Taoist Studies Institute in Seattle. Lastly, he met his final spiritual master, Joel Morwood, Spiritual Director of the Center for Sacred Sciences, in 2005. Under Mr. Morwood’s guidance, in Autumn of 2009, Matthew attained decisive and doubtless insight into the nature of his own mind, an awakening that was confirmed by his teacher. This opening stabilized and continues to inform his life moment by moment. In 2010 he was asked to become a spiritual teacher for the Center for Sacred Sciences, a position which he gladly accepted, and on September 21st, 2011, he was ordained as a Minister of the Center for Sacred Sciences.
Matthew has this to say on the subject of his service as a spiritual teacher:
“From where I sit, all people are already perfect. My greatest joy is to be present as others recognize this in themselves. This is the only true gift we can give the world: to finally recognize who we are. This is the gift of the divine to the divine.“
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