Zazen Quotes

Activities such as chanting, bowing, and sitting in zazen are not at all wasted, even when done merely formally, for even this superficial encounter with the Dharma will have some wholesome outcome at a later time. However, it must be said in the most unambiguous terms that this is not real Zen. To follow the Dharma involves a complete reorientation of one's life in such a way that one's activities are manifestations of, and are filled with, a deeper meaning. If it were not otherwise, and merely sitting in zazen were enough, every frog in the pond would be enlightened, as one Zen master said. Dōgen Zenji himself said that one must practice Zen with the attitude of a person trying to extinguish a fire in his hair. That is, Zen must be practiced with an attitude of single-minded urgency. ~ Francis Harold Cook

When you are practicing zazen, do not try to stop your thinking. Let it stop by itself. If something comes into your mind, let it come in, and let it go out. It will not stay long. When you try to stop your thinking, it means you are bothered by it. Do not be bothered by anything ... if you are not bothered by the waves, gradually they will become calmer and calmer. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Even though you read much Zen literature, you must read each sentence with a fresh mind. You should not say, "I know what Zen is," or "I have attained enlightenment." This is also the real secret of the arts: always be a beginner."
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"When you are sitting in the middle of your own problem, which is more real to you: your problem or you yourself? The awareness that you are here, right now, is the ultimate fact. "
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"Knowing that your life is short, to enjoy it day after day, moment after moment, is the life of "form is form and emptiness is emptiness."
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"You may feel as if you are doing something special, but actually it is only the expression of your true nature; it is the activity which appeases your inmost desire. But as long as you think you are practicing zazen for the sake of something, that is not true practice."
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"The most important thing is to forget all gaining ideas, all dualistic ideas. In other words, just practice zazen in a certain posture. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

No matter how many years you sit doing zazen, you will never become anything special. ~ Kodo Sawaki

In the zazen posture, your mind and body have, great power to accept things as they are, whether agreeable or disagreeable.
In our scriptures (Samyuktagama Sutra, volume 33), it is said that there are four kinds of horses: excellent ones, good ones, poor ones, and bad ones. The best horse will run slow and fast, right and left, at the driver's will, before it sees the shadow of the whip; the second best will run as well as the first one does, just before the whip reaches its skin; the third one will run when it feels pain on its body; the fourth will run after the pain penetrates to the marrow of its bones. You can imagine how difficult it is for the fourth one to learn how to run! ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Think not-thinking. How do you think not-thinking? Nonthinking. This is the essential art of zazen. ~ Ruth Ozeki

Although Buddhism is unattainable, we vow to attain it.If it is unattainable, how can we attain it? But we should! That is Buddhism. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

The more you practice zazen, the more you will be able to accept something as your own, whatever it is. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Zazen is the ultimate practice. This is indeed the True Self. The Buddhadharma is not to be sought outside of this. ~ Dogen

Even in zazen you will lose yourself. When you become sleepy, or when your mind starts to wander about, you lose yourself. When your legs become painful - "Why are my legs so painful?" - you lose yourself. "
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"You just sit in the midst of the problem; when you are a part of the problem, or when the problem is a part of you, there is no problem, because you are the problem itself. The problem is you yourself. If this is so, there is no problem."
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"When you start to wander about in some delusion which is something apart from you yourself, then your surroundings are not real anymore, and your mind is not real anymore. If you yourself are deluded, then your surroundings are also a misty, foggy delusion. Once you are in the midst of delusion, there is no end to delusion. You will be involved in deluded ideas one after another. Most people live in delusion, involved in their problem, trying to solve their problem. But just to live is actually to live in problems. And to solve the problem is to be a part of it, to be one with it. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Whenever a thought occurs, be aware of it, as soon as you are aware of it, it will vanish. If you remain for a long period forgetful of objects, you will naturally become unified. This is the essential art of zazen.32 ~ Yi Wu Taigen Leighton

We say, "To hear the sound of one hand clapping." Usually the sound of clapping is made with two hands, and we think that clapping with one hand makes no sound at all. But actually, one hand is sound. Even though you do not hear it, there is sound. If you clap with two hands, you can hear the sound. But if sound did not already exist before you clapped, you could not make the sound. Before you make it there is sound. Because there is sound, you can make it, and you can hear it. Sound is everywhere. If you just practice it, there is sound. Do not try to listen to it. If you do not listen to it, the sound is all over. Because you try to hear it, sometimes there is sound, and sometimes there is no sound. Do you understand? Even though you do not do anything, you have the quality of zazen always. But if you try to find it, if you try to see the quality, you have no quality. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

In zazen, one is one's present self, what one was, and what one will be, all at once. ~ Peter Matthiessen

INSTRUCTIONS FOR ZAZEN First of all, you have to sit down, which you're probably already doing. The traditional way is to sit on a zafu cushion on the floor with your legs crossed, but you can sit on a chair if you want to. The important thing is just to have good posture and not to slouch or lean on anything. Now you can put your hands in your lap and kind of stack them up, so that the back of your left hand is on the palm of your right hand, and your thumb tips come around and meet on top, making a little round circle. The place where your thumbs touch should line up with your bellybutton. Jiko says this way of holding your hands is called hokkai jo-in,113 and it symbolizes the whole cosmic universe, which you are holding on your lap like a great big beautiful egg. ~ Ruth Ozeki

Zazen is seated meditation-the opposite of contemplation-the emptying of the mind of all thoughts in order simply to be. In the midst of all evil, not a thought is aroused in the mind-this is called za. Seeing into one's Self-nature, not being moved at all-this is called Zen. ~ Huineng

When I'm writing a novel, which is what I like to write, I get up early, sit zazen, make a pot of green tea. I wear wrist cuffs to keep my wrists warm and minimize irritation from extended contact with the surface of my desk. I sit down and write. ~ Ruth Ozeki

In zazen, leave your front door and your back door open. Let thoughts come and go. Just don't serve them tea. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Zazen is an activity that is an extension of the universe. Zazen is not the life of an individual, it's the universe that's breathing. ~ Dogen

Zazen practice and everyday activity are one thing. We call zazen everyday life, and everyday life zazen. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

In short, zazen is seeing this world from the casket, without me. ~ Kosho Uchiyama

Put on the music, and listen. Zazen means to sit, to listen. You're listening to enlightenment, to the universes, to the planes of mind. ~ Frederick Lenz

The mind we have when we practice zazen is the great mind: we don't try to see anything; we stop conceptual thinking; we stop emotional activity; we just sit. Whatever happens to us, we are not bothered. We just sit. It is like something happening in the great sky. Whatever kind of bird flies through it, the sky doesn't care. That is the mind transmitted from Buddha to us. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Tantric Zen is all about the practice of zazen meditation. If you meditate well, you'll be in very powerful states of mind and then it really doesn't matter what you do. ~ Frederick Lenz

Enlightenment is not some good feeling or some particular state of mind. The state of mind that exists when you sit in the right posture is, itself, enlightenment. If you cannot be satisfied with the state of mind you have in zazen, it means your mind is still wandering about. Our body and mind should not be wobbling or wandering about. In this posture there is no need to talk about the right state of mind. You already have it. This is the conclusion of Buddhism. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Sports and athletics can be a path in Zen, in concordance with daily practice of zazen meditation. You need to move with your spirit, not just with your body. ~ Frederick Lenz

When your consciousness has become ripe in true zazen-pure like clear water, like a serene mountain lake, not moved by any wind-then anything may serve as a medium for realization. ~ Matsuo Basho

If he hadn't become a Buddhist monk, Sawaki Roshi would have been successful in a worldly sense in business, politics, or the military. Instead, he devoted his life to wholeheartedly practicing Dogen Zenji's just sitting, or shikantaza, which according to him was good for nothing. For him, social climbing in pursuit of fame and profit was meaningless. The Japanese expression for "waste" is bonifuru, which means "sacrifice," "lose all," or "ruin." So when we say he wasted his life, we use the expression in a paradoxical way - like saying that zazen is good for nothing. ~ Kosho Uchiyama

Usually when you practice zazen, you become very idealistic, and you set up an ideal or goal which you strive to attain and fulfill. But as I have often said, this is absurd. When you are idealistic, you have some gaining idea within yourself; by the time you attain your ideal or goal, your gaining idea will create another ideal. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

So it is not a matter of whether it is possible to attain Buddhahood, or if it is possible to make a tile a jewel. But just to work, just to live in this world with this understanding is the most important point, and that is our practice. That is true zazen. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

The balanced state of body and mind that occurs through zazen practice can also occur spontaneously in other situations. As a musician I used to find it when playing onstage. All consciousness of myself and the outside world would vanish, to be replaced by a fluid state of action alone, in which thought and feeling ceased to be important and in which sense of self and other utterly dissolved. Athletes often experience moments like this. So do artists of various kinds. So do many people involved in a whole range of activities to which they have fully devoted themselves. And so, quite often, do lovers engaged in sex. ~ Brad Warner

Think of Zen as the bow and Zazen as the arrow. The bow is the guiding theory behind the practice, while Zazen is the arrow which puts that practice into action. The better you understand the bow and the better you control the arrow, the better you'll be at hitting your target. ~ Bino Schree

By perfecting the practices of zazen and mindfulness, by learning patience and love and by realizing the essential emptiness of all phenomena, you will discover nirvana. ~ Frederick Lenz

If you want to discover the true meaning of Zen in your everyday life, you have to understand the meaning of keeping your mind on your breathing and your body in the right posture in zazen. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

The lack of fulfillment we feel is natural and normal. That's true enlightenment. It's when we feel fulfilled that we're deluded.
By doing zazen practice, we gradually begin to loosen our grip on the idea that we ought to be fulfilled. We begin to see that our normal condition of feeling that something is missing in our lives is not really such a terrible thing. It's just a feeling. No more and no less. We no longer desperately seek to shove something into that void. We can just let it be just as it is and accept that it's all right ...
If we can accept this lack of fulfillment as our natural condition, we can be totally free. We can accept good and bad equally. We can accept loneliness, and we can accept love. We no longer feel that things ought to be different from how they actually are. At the same time we do not complacently accept things that actually do need to be changed. We can understand that it is often our duty to change a situation. ~ Brad Warner

By purity we just mean things as they are. When something is added, that is impure. When something becomes dualistic, that is not pure. If you think you will get something from practicing zazen, already you are involved in impure practice. It is all right to say there is practice, and there is enlightenment, but we should not be caught by the statement. You should not be tainted by it. When you practice zazen, just practice zazen. If enlightenment comes, it just comes. We should not attach to the attainment. The true quality of zazen is always there, even if you are not aware of it, so forget all about what you think you may have gained from it. Just do it. The quality of zazen will express itself; then you will have it. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

As we said, Zen masters talk about Emptiness all the time! But they have a practice and a methodology (zazen) which allows them to discover the transcendental referent via their own developmental signified, and thus their words (the signifiers) remain grounded in experiential, reproducible, fallibilist criteria. ~ Ken Wilber

Actually the best way to relieve your mental suffering is to sit in zazen, even in such a confused state of mind and bad posture. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

We stop the one who can't cease from seeking things outside, and practice with our bodies with a posture that seeks absolutely nothing. This is zazen. ~ Kodo Sawaki

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

Since beginners can only remain in contact with the object of observation for short periods, initially one should meditate in brief sessions even eighteen times a day; in due course stability will be achieved of its own accord, at which time the session can be lengthened. It is important not to try at first to meditate for long periods; otherwise, upon sight of the meditation cushion, one will feel nausea and laziness. The session should be left while it is going well, when one still feels that it would go well if continued. ~ Jeffrey Hopkins

True zazen is surrendering every moment. But surrendering to what? It really does not matter what we call it: God or the Tao or the Dharma or the Buddha or our true nature ... It is the act of letting go, of surrendering, that matters. The very act of letting go opens us up completely. ~ Dennis Merzel

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. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

Zazen is better than a home. Zazen is a home that you can't ever lose. ~ Ruth Ozeki

[W]hen you practise right meditation, you 'cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following speech, and learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate your self. ~ Steve Hagen

Zazen practice is the direct expression of our true nature. Strictly speaking, for a human being, there is no other practice than this practice; there is no other way of life than this way of life. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

In doing zazen it is desirable to have a quiet room. You should be temperate in eating and drinking, forsaking all delusive relationships. Setting everything aside, think of neither good nor evil, right nor wrong. Thus having stopped the various functions of your mind, five up even the idea of becoming a Buddha. ~ Dogen

If you think you will get something from practicing zazen, already you are involved in impure practice. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

During zazen, brain and consciousness become pure. It's exactly like muddy water left to stand in a glass. Little by little, the sediment sinks to the bottom and the water becomes pure. ~ Taisen Deshimaru

Zazen doesn't give you something - it's the complete opposite! ~ Dainin Katagiri

The zazen I speak of is not learning meditation. It is simply the Dharma gate of repose and bliss, the practice-realization of totally culminated enlightenment. It is the manifestation of ultimate reality. Traps and snares can never reach it. Once its heart is grasped, you are like the dragon when he gains the water, like the tiger when she enters the mountain. For you must know that just there (in zazen) the right Dharma is manifesting itself and that, from the first, dullness and distraction are struck aside. ~ Dogen

Set aside all involvements and let the myriad things rest. Zazen is not thinking of good, not thinking of bad. It is not conscious endeavour. It is not introspection. Do not desire to become a buddha; let sitting or lying down drop away. Be moderate in eating and drinking. Be mindful of the passing of time, and engage yourself in zazen as though you are saving your head from fire. ~ Dogen

The other day, someone visited me and asked, 'I wish to practice zazen under your guidance. But because I live far away, I can't come to Antaiji very often. I'd like to practice zazen at home. What should I keep in mind to avoid doing zazen in a mistaken way?' I responded, 'If your wife and children say, "Daddy has become nicer since he began to do zazen," then your practice is on the right track.'

Roshi, Kosho Uchiyama. Zen Teaching of Homeless Kodo (Kindle Locations 2519-2523). Wisdom Publications. Kindle Edition. ~ Kosho Uchiyama

Even when you practice zazen alone, without a teacher, I think you will find some way to tell whether your practice is adequate or not. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

For the ordinary man, whose mind is a checkerboard of crisscrossing reflections, opinions, and prejudices, bare attention is virtually impossible; his life is thus centered not in reality itself but in his ideas of it. By focusing the mind wholly on each objects and every action, zazen strips it of extraneous thoughts and allows us to enter into a full rapport with life. ~ Philip Kapleau

Zazen is indeed the posture of "God, be merciful to me, a sinner!" (Luke 18:13). In our zazen we realize the illusory nature of thoughts, and no matter how powerful they might be, we don't chase after them, try to get rid of them, or act on them. So zazen is the posture of "We know that our old self was crucified with him" (Romans 6:6) or "I have been crucified with Christ" (Galatians 2:19). In the end, zazen is the purest expression of "Be still, and know that I am God!" (Psalms 46:10). ~ Kosho Uchiyama

Life without zazen is like winding your clock without setting it. It runs perfectly well, but it dosen't tell time. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

You must realize that no matter how intently you count your breaths you will still perceive what is in your line of vision, since your eyes are open, and you will hear the normal sounds about you, as your ears are not plugged. And since your brain likewise is not asleep, various thought forms will dart about your mind. Now, they will not hamper or diminish the effectiveness of zazen unless, evaluating them as "good", you cling to them or, deciding they are "bad", you try to check or eliminate them. ~ Philip Kapleau

It may look like we're doing nothing when we sit zazen. But actually we are exposing ourselves to ourselves. ~ Brad Warner

you prefer to practice zazen at home, then there are not as much rules to follow. You have the freedom to choose from the different techniques that were mentioned, from to face the wall while sitting to the walking meditation. ~ Anong Sasithorn

The uniqueness of zazen lies in this: that the mind is freed from bondage to all thought forms, visions, objects, and imaginings, however sacred or elevating, and brought to a state of absolute emptiness, from which alone it may one day perceive its own true nature, or the nature of the universe. ~ Philip Kapleau