Shunryu Suzuki
Shunryu Suzuki
Shunryu Suzukiwas a Sōtō Zen monk and teacher who helped popularize Zen Buddhism in the United States, and is renowned for founding the first Buddhist monastery outside Asia. Suzuki founded San Francisco Zen Center, which along with its affiliate temples, comprises one of the most influential Zen organizations in the United States. A book of his teachings, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, is one of the most popular books on Zen and Buddhism in the West...
NationalityJapanese
ProfessionLeader
Date of Birth18 May 1904
CountryJapan
If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything.
So for a period of time each day, try to sit, without moving, without expecting anything, as if you were in your last moment. Moment after moment you feel your last instant. In each inhalation and each exhalation there are countless instants of time. Your intention is to live in each instant.
What we call "I" is just a swinging door which moves when we inhale and when we exhale.
When you do something, you should burn yourself up completely, like a good bonfire, leaving no trace of yourself.
Everything you do is right, nothing you do is wrong, yet you must still make ceaseless effort.
Zen is not some kind of excitement, but concentration on our usual everyday routine.
Zazen practice and everyday activity are one thing. We call zazen everyday life, and everyday life zazen.
Our way is to practice one step at a time, one breath at a time, with no gaining idea.
To accept some idea of truth without experiencing it is like a painting of a cake on paper which you cannot eat.
Usually when someone believes in a particular religion, his attitude becomes more and more a sharp angle pointing away from himself. In our way the point of the angle is always toward ourselves.
Even though you have pain in your legs, you can do it. Even though your practice is not good enough, you can do it.
While you are continuing this practice, week after week, year after year, your experience will become deeper and deeper, and your experience will cover everything you do in your everyday life. The most important thing is to forget all gain ing ideas, all dualistic ideas. In other words, just practice zazen in a certain posture. Do not think about anything. Just remain on your cushion without expecting anything. Then eventually you will resume your own true nature. That is to say, your own true nature resumes itself.
Take care of things, and they will take care of you.
Our tendency is to be interested in something that is growing in the garden, not in the bare soil itself. But if you want to have a good harvest, the most important thing is to make the soil rich and cultivate it well.