Hiding Out With The Enemy: A Zen Carpenter’s Tale

Books

Two reviews of Rico Provasoli’s recently published book

Hiding Out With The Enemy: A Zen Carpenter's TaleHiding Out With The Enemy
A Zen Carpenter’s Tale

by Rico Provasoli
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 979-8328434621
ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0D7GWCP71 and B0D7JSVQHF (kindle)
Independently published, 18 June 2024, 244 pages
Paperback and Kindle: amazon.com* – amazon.co.uk*

Carl Masi, a well-educated East Coast carpenter living in the San Francisco Bay Area, cresting sixty, staggers from one catastrophe to another as his life falls apart. He’s been dedicated to Zen for decades, has a nasty Inner Critic which robs him of any peace of mind, and falls for every illusion possible. The reader gets an insider’s look at what the mystery of Zen is really like for a regular guy. Carl wrestles with a cascade of adversities by applying his Zen teacher’s guidance and the hard-won insights of years of Zen practice, aided by the timely intervention of a deeply caring Catholic priest. The book portrays the spiritual path not as many imagine it to be – a single life-changing epiphany after which all is forever well – but the journey as it is, full of blind alleys, setbacks and periodic redeeming insights from within the crucible of day-to-day living and being.

There are thousands of books on Zen. And they all are pretty much the same. A master or priest or self-proclaimed guru tells us to follow the rigid rules, rituals and lifestyle of an ancient time and place. This we are told is how we reach enlightenment. But where are the books for the rest of us? Where are the stories of struggle to find the value of the Buddha’s teachings in the midst of our chaotic real world lives? Rico Provasoli has written such a book: Hiding Out With The Enemy ~ A Zen Carpenter’s Tale.

Drawing on his own diverse experiences of travel, adventure and personal Zen practice, Provasoli offers a novel about finding awareness even as we muddle through our everyday problems. The Zen carpenter of this story doesn’t achieve satori while sitting on a cushion in some incense-filled temple. Instead he deals with crappy cars, broken relationships, having no money, impotence, paralyzing anger and a dying mother.

Along the way he begins to understand that in the midst of these difficulties… maybe because of them… Zen (in the largest, inclusive form of the word) actually allows him a chance for understanding, redemption and ultimately the salvation of compassion. This is not a book about how to study Zen, but rather a relatable and inspirational tale of living with Zen – which might be the toughest, and most rewarding path of all.

Tony Head, Zen Teacher and author

Rico Provasoli’s deceptive and charming book comes closer to describing the Buddhist Path and one’s enemy seeking to throw us off it, than anything I’ve read in a very long time. A brilliant carpenter, with a hair-trigger temper, afflictions everywhere he turns, skillfully acquaints us with the enemy lurking within each of us – our personal junk-yard dog needing to be tamed. Rico knows whereof he speaks. We’ve practiced Zen together for many years. Rico’s strategy for telling the story will allow you to recognize yourself in its pages, comfort you in your struggles for clarity and self-control, and entertain the hell out of you while you read. Don’t miss it.

Peter Coyote, Zen Buddhist priest, actor and author

Read an excerpt from the book on Osho News

Rico Provasoli

Rico Provasoli (Prem Richard) has sailed widely, traveled to fifty-something countries, and has finally settled in Marin County, just north of San Francisco. He has meditated for decades and celebrates every morning that he wakes up, still alive after countless close calls with his death. He is also the author of Please Don’t Tell My Guru.

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