Quotes About Enlightenment

When all that's left of us is the pure untainted consciousness without form, we'll know what it means when the last human breath expires.

After you've seen behind the facade of a stage set you can't take the play seriously any more. You can't go backwards and regain your ignorance; you have to move forward.

We are against ignorance. We feel that you have to educate yourself, no matter what the situation is. People who refuse to educate themselves - people who refuse to find out what something is about, that they're frightened of - find comfort in being ignorant." --Zeena Schreck Interview for KJTV-1990

In order to understand why one chooses to be a Tantric practitioner, there has to be an understanding of cause and effect, cyclic existence, the awareness that the reality that we think we are seeing is not reality as it really truly is. So enlightenment is seeing reality with bare awareness, non-conceptual reality.

Once a Buddha, always a Buddha.

Before enlightenment — chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment — chop wood, carry water.

The Truth is realized in an instant; the Act is practiced step by step.

Before enlightenment; chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment; chop wood, carry water.

Man stands in his own shadow and wonders why it's dark.

Learning Zen is a phenomenon of gold and dung. Before you understand it, it's like gold; after you understand it, it's like dung.

The purpose of life is to serve. To serve is to make others happier, healthier, empowered, and enlightened.

Cherish that which is within you, and shut off that which is without for much knowledge is a curse.

During our dreams we do not know we are dreaming. We may even dream of interpreting a dream. Only on waking do we know it was a dream. Only after the great awakening will we realize that this is the great dream.

Yet the stupid believe they are awake, busily and brightly assuming they understand things, calling this man ruler, that one herdsman – how dense! Confucius and you are both dreaming! And when I say you are dreaming, I am dreaming, too. Words like these will be labeled the Supreme Swindle.

Not to understand is profound; to understand is shallow. Not to understand is to be on the inside; to understand is to be on the outside.

Right is not right; so is not so. If right were really right, it would differ so clearly from not right that there would be no need for argument. If so were really so, it would differ so clearly from not so that there would be no need for argument. Forget the years; forget distinctions. Leap into the boundless and make it your home!

Understanding that rests in what it does not understand is the finest.

When men do not forget what can be forgotten but forget what cannot be forgotten - that may be called true forgetting.

In the midst of darkness, he alone sees the dawn; in the midst of the soundless, he alone hears harmony.

The man who has forgotten self may be said to have entered Heaven.

Master Dongguo asked Zhuangzi, "This thing called the Way - where does it exist?" Zhuangzi said, "There's no place it doesn't exist." "Come," said Master Dongguo, "you must be more specific!" "It is in the ant." "As low a thing as that?" "It is in the panic grass." "But that's lower still!" "It is in the tiles and shards." "How can it be so low?" "It is in the piss and shit!

Thus, the Radiance of Drift and Doubt is the sage's only map. He makes no definition of what is right but instead entrusts it to the everyday function of each thing. This is what I call the Illumination of the Obvious.

Täydellinen ihminen on vapautunut itseydestään; henkistynyt ihminen ei välitä ansioiden tavoittelusta; todellinen Viisas ei välitä maineesta.

As to what is beyond the Six Realms,15 the sage admits it exists but does not theorize.