Whatever you are doing,
twenty-four hours a day, in all your
various activities, there is something that transcends
the Buddhas and Zen Masters; but as soon
as you want to understand it,
it’s not there.
As soon as you try
to gather your attention on it,
you have already turned away from it.
That is why I say you see but cannot
do anything about it.
Foyan
You
have to decide
right now to be free
once and for all. Everyone who
has found freedom in this lifetime has
had to make this decision. Now is the time
to have a direct introduction to this moment.
This moment is free of time, of mind, of any notions.
When one abides as the Self, some divine power
takes charge of one’s life. All actions then take
place spontaneously, and are performed
very efficiently, without any
mental effort or
activity.
There is freedom
from desire and sorrow
at the end of the way. The awakened
one is free from all fetters and goes beyond
life and death. Like a swan that rises
from the water she moves onward,
never looking back.
The one who understands
the unreality of all things, and who
has laid up no store, that one’s track is
as of birds in the air. Like a bird in the air,
she takes an invisible course, wanting
nothing, storing nothing, knowing
the emptiness of all things.
Arouse the mind without
placing it anywhere.
__________________________________
The day before my birthday, October 1,
I mentioned to Mom at her memory care home that the next day
was my birthday. She was upset she had nothing for me, but I assured her about this.
The following day when I arrived, that was waiting for me. My mom was a wonderful writer,
I’m a piker next to both my folks in this regard, they both wrote long letters to me in beautiful hands,
and got them from me, all our lives together. But dementia made it almost impossible for
my mom to write at all near the end, and I was told she labored over this,
with help, for over an hour. Water runs down my face
every time my eye falls on it.
