it’s gonna be okay honey bunny
All the myriad things
are neither opposed to nor contrary
to your true self. Directly pass through to
freedom and they make one whole.
It has been this way from time
without beginning.
The only problem
is when people put themselves
in opposition to it and spurn it and impose
orientations of grasping or rejecting, creating a
concern where there is none. This is
precisely why they are not
joyfully alive.
The
great truth of zen
is possessed by everybody.
Look into your own being and seek
it not through others. Your own mind is
above all forms; it is free and quiet and sufficient;
it eternally stamps itself in your six senses and four elements.
In its light all is absorbed. Hush the dualism of subject and object,
forget both, transcend the intellect, sever yourself from
the understanding, and directly penetrate deep
into the identity of the buddha-mind;
outside of this there are
no realities.
…Put your
simple faith in this,
discipline yourself accordingly;
let your body and mind be turned into
an inanimate object of nature like a stone or
a piece of wood; when a state of perfect motionlessness
and unawareness is obtained all the signs of life will depart and
also every trace of limitation will vanish. Not a single idea will disturb
your consciousness, when lo! All of a sudden you will come to realize
the light abounding in full gladness. It is like coming across the
light in thick darkness; it is like receiving treasure in poverty.
The four elements and the five aggregates are no more
felt as burdens; so light, so easy, so free you are.
Your very existence has been delivered
from all limitations; you have
become open, light, and
transparent.
The things of the world
and the buddhadharma are fused
into one whole. Everywhere in everything
you have a way out — you do not fall
into objects and states or get
turned around by
anything.
At a bustling
crossroads in the marketplace,
amid the endless waves of life — this
is exactly the right place
to exert effort.
You must keep this
mind balanced and equanimous,
without deluded ideas of self and others,
without arbitrary loves and hates, without grasping
or rejecting, without notions of gain and loss.
Go on gradually nurturing this for
a long time, perhaps twenty
or thirty years.
Whether you encounter
favorable or adverse conditions,
do not retreat or regress — then when you
come to the juncture between life and death,
you will naturally be set free and be not afraid.
As the saying goes, “Truth requires sudden
awakening, but the phenomenal
level calls for gradual
cultivation.”
