Quotes from Brad Warner

Even if the whole world is nothing but a bunch of jerks doing all kinds of jerk-type things, there is still liberation in simply not being a jerk.

I sincerely believe that someday the world will be a place of peace and plenty because all human beings will have learned to save the world from themselves.

The truth is everywhere all around us, but if we don't practice, it doesn't show itself and we can't experience it.

I vow to save all beings ...from myself.

So Buddhism is not the worship of a guy named Buddha; it's learning to manifest your unique inner Buddha.

In zazen we practice the oneness of reality.

In some ways contemporary Zen centers resemble halfway houses for people who are seeking ways to get by in the world without falling to pieces.

Zen is the complete absence of belief. Zen is the complete lack of authority. Zen tears away every false refuge in which you might hide from the truth and forces you to sit naked before what is real. That's real refuge.

D?gen's big question when he was a young monk was this: If Buddhism teaches that we're all perfect just as we are — and it does teach that — then why do we have to undergo training? A whole lot of Sh?b?genz? is D?gen's attempt to answer that question.

According to Buddhist philosophy, nothing ever really belongs to you. Even so, you can still give stuff away.

We're very bold in our proclamations of our own moral rectitude, but then we neglect to even keep our own toilets clean.

These days we tend to put far more faith in concrete recordings, whether written or electronically preserved in audio and video, than we do in what someone remembers somebody having told them. The early Buddhists saw it differently. They thought the oral tradition was more likely to preserve the true essence and intention of what their master had said than if his exact words had been preserved on paper.

No matter how unacknowledged your act of compassion, the universe always notices it. And the universe has a very long memory.

There's no comparison between someone who has their own real experience and someone who just reads about the experiences of others.

Keeping the precepts and observing pure moral conduct is the habit of Buddhists. But even those who haven't formally received the precepts or have broken them can benefit from doing zazen.

We think we're doing our jobs for the paycheck, but Dogen says that's an illusion. The underlying, original reason we work is to give to others. The payment you receive is a kind of karmic payback for the service you give.

Once we meet a good teacher we should throw away everything else and just get on with it.

Unless you completely devote yourself to one practice, you'll never really master it.

If it doesn't sound like "don't be a jerk" it's not Buddhist teaching.

Zazen is a physical practice as much as it a mental one.

A quiet room is best for zazen. We shouldn't eat or drink too much, or too little. Put aside everything else. Don't think of good or bad. Don't judge your practice. Stop ruminating and deliberating about stuff. Don't try to become a Buddha.

Each time I get caught up in thought, I adjust my posture. I have never once found myself caught up in thought and not had my posture go subtly (or sometimes not so subtly) wrong. The body follows the mind.

People always get worried about whether they're doing zazen right. But basically if you're doing it at all, you're probably doing it right — even if your thoughts won't stop, even if you're sleepy or irritable, even if it just feels boring.

At every moment of every day, no matter how I feel about the situation, whether it is mind-blowingly thrilling or completely brain-numbing, I am the totality of the universe experiencing the fullness of itself. Even if I don't notice it.