Roshi Daniel Terragno
Ki Nai Nan Ko
For many years, Daniel has lived in Sebastopol, Sonoma County, where he founded the Rocks & Clouds Zendo in 2001. He has founded and led multiple sangha's around the world and regularly teaches in Sebastopol, Ohio, Chile, Argentina and Brazil.
​Daniel Terragno was born in Santiago, Chile, in 1947 and grew up in Melipilla, Chile. Seeking more, he came to the San Francisco Bay Area of California in 1967 to pursue a formal education, continuing to study economics after finishing his first college year in Valparaiso, Chile. In his adopted country, he enrolled at the Golden Gate University in San Francisco, as well as pursuing a formal student relationship with a group of G. I. Gurdjieff students in 1969, whose teacher, W. A. Nyland, lived in Sonoma county, two counties north of San Francisco.
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​When Daniel first discovered Sonoma County, the trip was taken on a two-lane highway from Santa Rosa to San Francisco. With two other Gurdjieff students, he apprenticed and became a master cabinet maker, building cabinetry throughout Northern California for some thirty years. His work combined precision craftsmanship with a quiet reverence for form and function, reflecting the contemplative discipline of his early studies.​
​In 1986 Daniel started practicing meditation, left the Gurdjieff group, and eventually in 1988 joined the California Diamond Sangha in Santa Rosa, California. ​The Diamond Sangha is a Zen lineage coming from Harada Roshi and Yasutani Roshi, founders of Sambo Zen lineage (formerly Sambokyodan), which includes elements and practices of both Soto and the Rinzai Zen tradition, the leader of which was the highly respected Robert Aitken Roshi, who practiced most of his life in Hawaii, after many years of living in Japan.​
Daniel studied and became a Dharma heir of John Tarrant, Roshi, teaching as an Apprentice Teacher in 1995, and in 2001 received Dharma Transmission from John.​ He travels to Ohio twice a year to lead sesshin with the Zen group Yellow Springs Dharma Center, and in October 2024, gave transmission to that group’s teacher, Roshi Katie Gyosei Egart. Also in Ohio, Daniel teaches at Zen on High in Columbus.
Daniel's Dharma Name is Ki Nai Nan Ko, “Returning Home to the Temple of Southern Light,” a name fulfilled, as for over twenty years he has travelled to South America and spent one month teaching every year.​ In Buenos Aires, Argentina, he meets and practices with Grupo Zen Viento del Sur (Southern Wind). Starting in the summer of 2005, he also traveled to Zen Montañas y Mar in Santiago, Chile to carry out similar activities.​ He maintains contact with his students when away from students and practitioners through popular video software.
Daniel maintains permanent contact with his groups, guiding, supporting, and containing the practice of their students with their weekly talks via zoom, and holding Dokusan (private interviews with the teacher) with some of their members.​ Outside of Zendos, Daniel has taught meditation in prisons, hospice, and to those in drug and alcohol recovery centers. His way of guiding and transmitting the teachings of Zen is strongly rooted in tradition, and enriched by his openness and commitment to the reality of our time.
Daniel is fond of music, literature , architecture, painting, and loves hiking on the hills, wherever they might be.​
