not afraid to forget who you are

morten brekkevold

 

When you are not

afraid to forget who you are,

life in the kitchen, or life in the office,

might contain huge and overwhelming happiness.

Everything you look at, the door, the walls meeting in the

corner of the room, the light shining on the cell phone, might be

so alive that it looks back. Other people might not be who you

thought they were. Family members might be as fresh

and surprising as strangers. And you, whom you

have only apparently known all your life,

might be fresh and surprising

to yourself too.

 

John Tarrant

bring me the rhinoceros

🦏

 

those who follow tao

always at peace

 

Those who follow

Tao strive for perfection,

but they are wary about being called

prophets. That is a limited role. Being a prophet

represents a great trap baited with the temptation of

self-importance. The ultimate aim of following

Tao is to transcend identity. Those who call

themselves prophets or even masters

maximize their identities.

 

It is far better

not to be a prophet, and to

eschew the responsibilities, limitations,

and temptations. It is far better to be obscure

and to be thought stupid. Having someone call you

by a title is an interference that you don’t need.

When you are seeing the greatest wonder

of your life, the last thing you want

is to have someone blocking

the light. 

 

Deng Ming-Dao

 

grasping at objects

all be gone tomorrow

 

Repeatedly undergoing

birth and death is just due to grasping

at objects. When we reflect back on the mind that

grasps at objects, we see that the real identity of mind

is originally pure. Within this purity, grasping mind

does not exist. Within nirvana, fundamentally

there are no thoughts moving; the

movement is ever still. Being

still, there is no

seeking.

 

Records of the Teachers and Students of the Lanka

full text here