Sublime

With its characteristic emphasis on the concrete, Zen points out that our precious “self” is just an idea, useful and legitimate enough if seen for what it is, but disastrous if identified with our real nature. The unnatural awkwardness of a certain type of self-consciousness comes into being when we are aware of conflict or contrast between the id

To realize one’s true nature as no-self—a Buddha—is the fruit of zazen and the path of practice.

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? MARY OLIVER, FROM “THE SUMMER DAY”1

“Understanding” and “beliefs,” I had effectively learned from both Zen and est, are barriers to liberation.

Ordinary means that there is no need to add or take away from what is going on in the mind. Each portion of life has the whole of life. There is nothing wrong with what is in the mind except the sense that something is wrong. In this way simplicity turns to a form of compassion.

are we practicing just to express this limitless being, or because we think we’re not a limitless being? And once we discover we are a limitless being, will we continue practicing? Well, of course. That’s what limitless beings do. This is Dogen Zenji’s practice-enlightenment, practice-realization. This practice itself expresses the limitlessness th

Koans will change your idea of who you are, and this will require courage.

Zen practice is to see through our desire to cling to our history and to reasons (thoughts) for why we are as we are, instead of working with the reality of what we are.