Quotes About Practice

Bowing helps to eliminate our self-centered ideas. This is not so easy. It is difficult to get rid of these ideas, and bowing is a very valuable practice. The result is not the point; it is the effort to improve ourselves that is valuable. There is no end to this practice.

The cause of conflict is some fixed idea or one-sided idea. When everyone knows the value of pure practice, we will have little conflict in our world.

In our practice we have no particular purpose or goal, nor any special object of worship.

and you will become friendly with others. This is the merit of Zen practice. But the way of practice is just to be concentrated on your breathing with the right posture and with great, pure effort. This is how we practice Zen.

Which is more important: to attain enlightenment, or to attain enlightenment before you attain enlightenment; to make a million dollars, or to enjoy your life in your effort, little by little, even though it is impossible to make that million; to be successful, or to find some meaning in your effort to be successful? If you do not know the answer, you will not even be able to practice zazen; if you do know, you will have found the true treasure of life.

Those who find great difficulties in practicing Zen will find more meaning in it.

Practice does not mean that whatever you do, even lying down, is zazen. When the restrictions you have do not limit you, this is what we mean by practice.

This is also the real secret of the arts: always be a beginner. Be very very careful about this point. If you start to practice zazen, you will begin to appreciate your beginner's mind. It is the secret of Zen practice.

To be aware of the meaning of your life, you practice zazen.

Zen activity is activity which is completely burned out, with nothing remaining but ashes. This is the goal of our practice. That is what Dogen meant when he said, "Ashes do not come back to firewood.

Our Soto way puts an emphasis on shikan taza , or "just sitting." Actually we do not have any particular name for our practice; when we practice zazen we just practice it, and whether we find joy in our practice or not, we just do it. Even though we are sleepy, and we are tired of practicing zazen, of repeating the same thing day after day; even so, we continue our practice. Whether or not someone encourages our practice, we just do it.

Those who can sit perfectly physically usually take more time to obtain the true way of Zen, the actual feeling of Zen, the marrow of Zen.

In other restless positions you have no power to accept your difficulties, but in the zazen posture which you have acquired by long, hard practice, your mind and body have great power to accept things as they are, whether they are agreeable or disagreeable.

It is the people who are outside of the monastery who feel its atmosphere," writes the Zen master. "Those who are practicing actually do not feel anything.

In your practice you should accept everything as it is, giving to each thing the same respect given to a Buddha.

But as long as you think you are practicing zazen for the sake of something, that is not true practice.

Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an enlightened person. There is only enlightened activity.

When we practice zazen we just practice zazen, without any gaining idea. When we talk about something we just talk about something, ...without trying to express some intellectual, one-sided idea. And we listen without trying to figure or some intellectual understanding, without trying to understand from just a one-sided view.

So try always to keep the right posture, not only when you practice zazen, but in all your activities. Take the right posture when you are driving your car, and when you are reading. If you read in a slumped position, you cannot stay awake long. Try. You will discover how important it is to keep the right posture. This is the true teaching.

So when you practice zazen, your mind should be concentrated on your breathing. This kind of activity is the fundamental activity of the universal being. Without this experience, this practice, it is impossible to attain absolute freedom.

The result is not the point; it is the effort to improve ourselves that is valuable. There is no end to this practice.

Bowing helps to eliminate our self-centered ideas... The result is not the point; it is the effort to improve ourselves that is valuable... whether or not it is possible is not the point... Before you determine to do it, you have difficulty, but once you start to do it, you have none.

The Zen way of calligraphy is to write in the most straightforward, simple way as if you were a beginner, not trying to make something skillful or beautiful, but simply writing with full attention as if you were discovering what you were writing for the first time; then your full nature will be in your writing. This is the way of practice moment after moment.

He who knoweth the precepts by heart, but faileth to practice them, Is like unto one who lighteth a lamp and then shutteth his eyes.