How
amazing it is
that all people have this but
cannot polish it into bright clarity.
In darkness unawakened, they
make foolishness cover
their wisdom.
Posts Tagged → kindle
light inside and dark outside
People’s intellect and knowledge are like the light of a lamp. If that light is mistakenly used outside, in a contentious and aggressive manner, aiming for name and gain, scheming and conniving day and night, thinking a thousand thoughts, imagining ten thousand imaginings, chasing artificial objects and losing the original source, light on the outside but dark inside, this will go on until the body is injured and life is lost.
If people give up artificiality and return to the real, dismiss intellectuality and cleverness, consider essential life the one matter of importance, practice inner awareness, refine the self and master the mind, observe all things with detachment so all that exists is empty of absoluteness, are not moved by external things and are not influenced by sensory experiences, being light inside and dark outside, they can thereby aspire to wisdom and become enlightened.
Light that does not dazzle progresses to lofty illumination; therefore a classic says, “The great sage appears ignorant, the great adept seems inept.”
you are already realized
it is not handed on by written words
You are
already realized.
It is critical to understand this.
Enlightenment is less a matter of charging
forward to achieve something, and more
one of doing non-doing — of leaning
slightly back and silently
accepting its constant
presence.
Once you have
done this, go on practicing.
Without straining, continually pour the
emptiness of your being into the
emptiness of existence, and
drink what comes back:
emptiness.
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their breath came from deep inside
The ancient Masters slept
without dreams and woke up without worries.
Their breath came from deep inside them. They didn’t cling
to life, weren’t anxious about death. They emerged without desire
and reentered without resistance. They came easily; they went easily.
They didn’t ask where they were from; they didn’t ask where
they were going. They took everything as it came,
gladly, and walked into death without fear.
They accepted life as a gift, and
they handed it back
gratefully.
if you rely on others
You eat to satisfy your hunger
and drink to quench your thirst. You wear clothes
to keep warm and go home to be with your families. You cultivate
the tao to reach the place even the buddhas can’t describe.
And you practice zen to find the place even
the patriarchs can’t enter.
But if you rely on the
doors and walls of others and you listen
to their instruction and accept their drivel,
you’ll never stand on your own. I put it like
this: Good medicine tastes bitter.
True words sound harsh.
Red Pine’s “The Zen Works of Stonehouse”