Advanced Training

The New Earth School for Embodied Enlightenment

“To be Born as the Earth is not the same as being born. It is to realize that these Mountains and Rivers and the whole Earth itself is your true human body.”
- Zen Master Daido Roshi (1931-2009)

Born as the Earth Zen Academy (BEZA)

Our Mission

With a vision to meet the imperative for a shift in human consciousness Born as the Earth Zen Academy (BEZA) exists to transmit a tried-and-tested, practical spirituality to create a new human story. We are the first school on the African continent merging authentic Zen Buddhism and Earth-based wisdom. BEZA is a rites-of-passage initiation school for grounded higher learning. Our curriculums and offerings are deep, broad and evolutionary. All training is experiential, hands-on, and co-operative. Students work independently, collaboratively, and at their own pace, facilitating long-lasting authentic transformation in themselves and their relationship with the communities of all beings.

Generational Healing

The Way of the Ancestors

Make the invisible, visible. Our connection to our Ancestors and Gaia’s Elemental Bodies stretch beyond the boundaries of time. We carry their memories, medicine, elemental and genetic imprints within us. Through this deep bond, we access ancient wisdom, and guidance for the repairing of wounds. Acknowledging and embracing this connection allows us to heal not only ourselves but also the generations that came before, and those that will follow.

Enter the Way of the Ancestors

Meditation

The Way of Balance

Meditation (zazen) instruction rooted in Zen Buddhism, providing you with guidance to unlock the transformative power of this practice. Our expert instructor will open the Way of Meditation and help you cultivate mindfulness, find inner-peace, and embark on a journey of self-discovery. BEZA is the perfect school to initiate and develop your meditation practice.

Enter the Way of Balance

Mentoring

The Way of the Heart

Holistic, practical life remedies support the totality of your being. Practicing the Way of the Heart, the spiritual, mental, emotional and physical energies constellating in your being are grounded, releasing what blocks your inherent gifts. Your demons and angels become allies and as heart confidence and awareness grows a sacred ‘Homecoming’ to your True Self unfolds.

Enter the Way of the Heart

Shamanism

The Way of Medicine

Shamanism, in the lineage of African Nature-Based Indigenous Wisdom, is the first and longest expression of human spirituality. Learn the Way of Medicine where Nature’s transformational and spontaneous power reconnects you to your unconditioned, authentic self. Guided by an initiated elder and shaman, Nature’s gifts will become medicine tools for you to transform every-day practical actions into spiritual deeds.

Enter the Way of Medicine

Council

The Way of Story

At BEZA we train you in an essential ingredient in building and maintaining healthy community – The Way of Council. There is an immense need now, more than ever to slow down, to listen and speak with heart wisdom. To find solutions to our challenges as a collective we gather in Community Council to share our perspectives and stories, and to recognize and honour our shared humanity and interconnectedness.

Enter the Way of Story

Your Mentor

Glenn Nangaku Leisching

Glenn Nangaku Leisching, a student of Suzuki Seido Roshi of Tōshōji Training Monastery in Japan, is working with the first generation of students to establish a training center on the African Continent.

Nangaku, the founder of BEZA, is a Zen monk who has taken vows to liberate all beings. He is an initiated elder & shaman, meditation teacher, mentor, diviner and writer, and has studied with Zen masters, indigenous shamans, psychotherapists and mythologists for over 35 years.

Spiritual awakenings took Nangaku on a quest across the globe to find the golden thread uniting all spiritual traditions. While living in the USA he ran several environmentally sustainable businesses and founded BEZA. After returning to South Africa he began offering authentic spiritual training in the Stanford area of the Western Cape where he has facilitated the planting over 10,000 trees.

He has guided students in reclaiming their natural sovereignty. A lifetime of experience allows him to meet students at any stage of their journey and offer appropriate tools to birth their full potential.

Read more about Nangaku

Earthen Zen

The Elemental Journal

The Transformative Power of Talismanic Art

“Becoming aware that the art I had been instinctively creating using sticks, stones, feathers and bones, is my unique medicine gift to the world, I completed my first “conscious” Talismanic Art Piece. I based it on my journey with Born as the Earth School so far.” - Alison Evans
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Artificial Intelligence vs Authentic Intelligence: A Zen Buddhist Perspective on Consciousness

“Everything we are talking about AI or computing power will never be able to beat the complexity that nature presents to us. The real intelligence is Nature’s Intelligence. AI is good, but AI is just a tool to Nature’s Intelligence. Nature’s Intelligence is four and half billion years old. To think that something that is less than a hundred years…
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Forest Bathing, Shinrin Yoku: What is it, and How to Practice it.

In a world that is constantly on the move, where stress and anxiety seem to be an integral part of our daily lives, there’s a Japanese practice that offers a refreshing escape into nature’s embrace. Its called Shinrin Yoku, or forest bathing, and it’s a profound way to reconnect with the natural world while reaping numerous health benefits. In this…
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