You Are IT

Gain and renown are hindrances
To students of the Way;
They taint our purity of heart.
Uncentered,
How can we comprehend Tao?

– Loy Ching-Yuen (1873-1960)

This is work that is alive,
Effervescent, free, liberated,
Gloriously enlightened,
True, and great.
Do you think it can be attained
By people who shut the door
And sit quietly with blank minds?

– Liu I-Ming

Its boundary is wider than the world,
But where to find a trace of it
Once relativity is broken?
Only fools examine their own hearts
It’s like measuring the sky or binding the wind.

– Chunkyung Haewon (1691-1770)

I live beneath a green cliff
The weeds I don’t mow flourish in the yard
New vines hang down all twisted together
Old rocks rise up straight in precipitous shapes
Monkeys pick the mountain fruit
Egrets catch the pond fish
With one or two of the immortals’ books
Beneath the trees I mumble, reading aloud.

– Han Shan (c 730)

Do not remain in the dualistic state;
Avoid such pursuits carefully.
If there is even a trace
Of this and that, right and wrong,
The Mind-essence will be lost in confusion.
Although all dualities come from the One,
Do not be attached even to this One.
When the mind exists undisturbed in the Way,
Nothing in the world can offend,
And when a thing can no longer offend,
It ceases to exist in the old way.

– Seng Ts’an (d. 606)

Particles, the building blocks of the universe, remain possibility waves until they’re observed. Energy and matter are potentials within consciousness. Consciousness translates electromagnetic vibrations into sound, texture, taste, smell, and form. We call our internal experience from our five senses the external world.

– Deepak Chopra, via Twitter

Don’t go by reports, by legends, by traditions, by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought, “This contemplative is our teacher.”

When you know for yourselves that “these mental qualities are skillful; these mental qualities are blameless; these mental qualities are praised by the wise; these mental qualities, when adopted and carried out, lead to welfare and to happiness” — then you should enter and remain in them.

– Thanissaro Bhikkhu, from Faith in Awakening

Because Zen and Doctrine
Have the same origin and taste,
Don’t judge them bitter or sweet
According to your own lights.
If you chase after heaving waves,
You’ll probably have to ask
Directions to the ferry.

– Soyo Taeneung (1562-1649)

When we question ego-mind directly, it is exposed for what it is: the absence of everything we believe it to be.

We can actually see through this seemingly solid ego-mind, or self. But what are we left with then? We are left with an open, intelligent awareness, unfettered by a self to cherish or protect.

This is the primordial wisdom mind of all beings. Relaxing into this discovery is true meditation—and true meditation brings ultimate realization and freedom from suffering.

– Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, from “Searching for Self”

Simply by turning on the light, you can instantly destroy the darkness. Likewise, even a rather simple analysis of ego-clinging and afflictive emotions can make them collapse. By suppression we may temporarily subdue our afflictive emotions, but only an investigation of their true nature will completely eradicate them.

– Dilgo Kyentse Rinpoche, from “An Investigation of the Mind”