Zen Quotes

Collection of famous quotes and sayings about Zen.

Quotes About Zen

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The ultimate purpose of Zen,' I remembered the roshi telling me, 'is not in the going away from the world but in the coming back. Zen is not just a matter of gaining enlightenment; it's a matter of acting in a world of love and compassion. ~ Pico Iyer
Zen quotes by Pico Iyer
Zen students see themselves as athletes. Their competitive sport is enlightenment; only with enlightenment do we compete. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
Learning to let go should be learned before learning to get. Life should be touched, not strangled. You've got to relax, let it happen at times, and at others move forward with it. ~ Ray Bradbury
Zen quotes by Ray Bradbury
When you break something, is your first impulse to throw it away? Or do you repair it but feel a sadness because it is no longer "perfect"? Whatever the case, you might want to consider the way the Japanese treated the items used in their tea ceremony. Even though they were made from the simplest materials... these teacups and bowls were revered for their plain lines and spiritual qualities. There were treated with the utmost care, integrity and respect.

For this reason, a cup from the tea ceremony was almost never broken. When an accident did occur and a cup was broken, there were certain instances in which the cup was repaired with gold.

Rather than trying to restore it in a what they would cover the gace that it ahad been broken, the cracks were celebrated in a bold and spirited way. The thin paths of shining gold completely encircled the ceramic cup, announcing to the world that the cup was broken and repaired and vulnerable to change.

And in this way, its value was even further enhanced. ~ Gary Thorp
Zen quotes by Gary Thorp
Buddha is said to have given a "silent sermon" once during which he held up a flower and gazed at it. After a while, one of those present, a monk called Mahakasyapa, began to smile. He is said to have been the only one who had understood the sermon. According to legend, that smile (that is to say, realization) was handed down by twenty-eight successive masters and much later became the origin of Zen. ~ Eckhart Tolle
Zen quotes by Eckhart Tolle
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
Zen quotes by Francis Harold Cook
What attracted me to Zen was my first teacher, Tim McCarthy. He was extremely genuine. It wasn't even really a Zen thing, that sort of came along later. ~ Brad Warner
Zen quotes by Brad Warner
What writing practice, like Zen practice does is bring you back to the natural state of mind ... The mind is raw, full of energy, alive and hungry. It does not think in the way we were brought up to think-well-mannered, congenial. ~ Natalie Goldberg
Zen quotes by Natalie Goldberg
In the classic Zen in the Art of Archery, Eugen Herrigel's teacher urged him always to take his next shot unburdened by previous failures to hit the target; as he improved, his teacher urged him not to be influenced by his successes either, to stay in the present moment. ~ Alex Soojung-Kim Pang
Zen quotes by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang
Letting go is the lesson. Letting go is always the lesson. Have you ever noticed how much of our agony is all tied up with craving and loss? ~ Susan Gordon Lydon
Zen quotes by Susan Gordon Lydon
A student asked to his master: "You teach me fighting but you talk about peace. How do you reconcile the two?"

The master replied: " It's better to be warrior in garden than to be a gardener in war. ~ Zen Master
Zen quotes by Zen Master
To follow the path look to the master follow the master walk with the master see through the master become the master. ~ Sengcan
Zen quotes by Sengcan
If you have the sense of participation in sports or athletics, of being a player, then you are not really into the Zen mind. In Zen mind there is no sense of self in the play. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
Man suffers only because he takes seriously what the gods made for fun. ~ Alan W. Watts
Zen quotes by Alan W. Watts
Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu, Buddhist, sufi, or zen. Not any religion or cultural system. I am not from the East or the West, not out of the ocean or up from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not composed of elements at all. I do not exist, am not an entity in this world or the next, did not descend from Adam or Eve or any origin story. My place is placeless, a trace of the traceless. Neither body or soul. I belong to the beloved, have seen the two worlds as one and that one call to and know, first, last, outer, inner, only that breath breathing human being. ~ Rumi
Zen quotes by Rumi
The aim of Zen training is to attain the state of consciousness which occurs when the individual ego is emptied of itself and becomes identified with the infinite reality of all things. ~ Anne Bancroft
Zen quotes by Anne Bancroft
More important than any stage which you will attain is your sincerity, your right effort. ~ Shunryu Suzuki
Zen quotes by 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
Zen quotes by Shunryu Suzuki
In the stillness, everything happens. In the silence, everything is said. ~ Drew Gerald
Zen quotes by Drew Gerald
A boddhisattva is someone who is on the way to becoming a buddha. All of us become boddhisattvas as soon as we start to take our Zen work seriously and the work we do contributes to creating a world in which all good actions become more efficacious. ~ David Brazier
Zen quotes by David Brazier
One Zen master said, The whole universe is my true personality. This is a very wonderful saying ... If you want to see what you truly are, open the window, and everything you see is in fact the expression of your inner reality. Can you embrace all of it? ~ Adyashanti
Zen quotes by Adyashanti
My comic sense, although deliberately Americanized, is, in its intent, much closer related to the crazy wisdom of Zen monks and the goofy genius of Taoist masters than it is to, say, the satirical gibes on Saturday Night Live. It has both a literary and a metaphysical function. ~ Tom Robbins
Zen quotes by Tom Robbins
The true tragedy in most people's lives is that they are far better than they imagine themselves to be and, as a result, end up being much less than they might be. ~ Earl R. Smith II
Zen quotes by Earl R. Smith II
We have two eyes to see two sides of things, but there must be a third eye which will see everything at the same time and yet not see anything. That is to understand Zen. ~ D.T. Suzuki
Zen quotes by D.T. Suzuki
No one is ever more him/herself than when they really laugh. Their defenses are down. It's very Zen-like, that moment. They are completely open. ~ George Carlin
Zen quotes by George Carlin
I'm not here to disagree with people or try to change anyone's mind. I'm just here to accept and love others right where they are – no matter their belief systems or backgrounds. ~ Alaric Hutchinson
Zen quotes by Alaric Hutchinson
The ten thousand states of mind that we talk about in Zen are all levels of perception. You can think of each of the ten thousand states of mind as a dimensional plane. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
In this way, our life may appear as a series of mistakes. One could call them "problems" or "challenges," but in some ways "mistakes" is better. One famous Zen master actually described spiritual practice as "one mistake after another," which is to say, one opportunity after another to learn. It is from "difficulties, mistakes, and errors" that we actually learn. To live life is to make a succession of errors. Understanding this can bring us great ease and forgiveness for ourselves and others - we are at ease with the difficulties of life. But ~ Jack Kornfield
Zen quotes by Jack Kornfield
When we are active, we become stronger and more energetic. This, in turn, makes us more positive and self-confident. It's a powerful cycle. ~ Ernest Cadorin
Zen quotes by Ernest Cadorin
Pardon all runners,
All speechless, alien winds,
All mad waters.
Pardon their impulses,
Their wild attitudes,
Their young flights, their reticence.
When a message has no clothes on
How can it be spoken. ~ Thomas Merton
Zen quotes by Thomas Merton
Zen is to have the heart and soul of a little child. ~ Takuan Soho
Zen quotes by Takuan Soho
We live in a supermarket of ideas, faiths, practices, theories, ideologies, and much else besides. Never in human history have there been so many movements and ideas struggling to attract our attention. Added to this, the Western world is swamped by material goods and the Western mind is dominated by the goal of material success. In all this confusion, Zen stands out as a voice of sanity. It represents a different way of seeing the world, one based upon the rediscovery of who we really are and have always been, through revealing to us our true nature. ~ David Fontana
Zen quotes by David Fontana
The word zen itself is a Japanese mispronunciation of the Chinese word ch'an, which, in turn, is a Chinese mispronunciation of the Sanskrit dhyana, meaning "contemplation, meditation." Contemplation, however, of what?

Let us imagine ourselves for a moment in the lecture hall where I originally presented the material for this chapter. Above, we see the many lights. Each bulb is separate from the others, and we may think of them, accordingly, as separate from each other. Regarded that way, they are so many empirical facts; and the whole universe seen that way is called in Japanese ji hokkai, "the universe of things."

But now, let us consider further. Each of those separate bulbs is a vehicle of light, and the light is not many but one. The one light, that is to say, is being displayed through all those bulbs; and we may think, therefore, either of the many bulbs or of the one light. Moreover, if this or that bulb went out, it would be replaced by another and we should again have the same light. The light, which is one, appears thus through many bulbs.

Analogously, I would be looking out from the lecture platform, seeing before me all the people of my audience, and just as each bulb seen aloft is a vehicle of light, so each of us below is a vehicle of consciousness. But the important thing about a bulb is the quality of its light. Likewise, the important thing about each of us is the quality of his consciousness. And although each may tend to ide ~ Joseph Campbell
Zen quotes by Joseph Campbell
The real Zen of the old Chinese masters was wu-shih, or "no fuss." ~ Alan Watts
Zen quotes by Alan Watts
Abundant choice doesn't force us to look for the absolute best of everything. It allows us to find the extremes in those things we really care about, whether that means great coffee, jeans cut wide across the hips, or a spouse who shares your zeal for mountaineering, Zen meditation, and science fiction. ~ Virginia Postrel
Zen quotes by Virginia Postrel
When you find nothing, Morris said, it means you're eliminating what surrounds the something.
Is that a Zen thing? Eve questioned.
If not, it should be. ~ J.D. Robb
Zen quotes by J.D. Robb
As the grounding effect of breath awareness disengages you from the often-overwhelming chatter of the mind, the level at which you think will seem to transcend the noise. ~ Benjamin W. Decker
Zen quotes by Benjamin W. Decker
1/ Serene
2/ In a world full of troubles
3/ i.e. Doing nothing about it. ~ Iain Banks
Zen quotes by Iain Banks
I see a vision of a great rucksack revolution thousands or even millions of young Americans wandering around with rucksacks, going up to mountains to pray, making children laugh and old men glad, making young girls happy and old girls happier, all of 'em Zen Lunatics who go about writing poems that happen to appear in their heads for no reason and also by being kind and also by strange unexpected acts keep giving visions of eternal freedom to everybody and to all living creatures. ~ Gary Snyder
Zen quotes by Gary Snyder
The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When love and hate are both absent everything becomes clear and undisguised. Make the smallest distinction, however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart. If you wish to see the truth then hold no opinion for or against. The struggle of what one likes and what one dislikes is the disease of the mind. ~ Sengcan
Zen quotes by Sengcan
To think, or not to think...This is the true question. ~ Bert McCoy
Zen quotes by Bert McCoy
Essentially Satori is a sudden experience, and it is often described as a "turning over" of the mind, just as a pair of scales will suddenly turn over when a sufficient amount of material has been poured into one pan to overbalance the weight in the other. Hence it is an experience which generally occurs after a long and concentrated effort to discover the meaning of Zen. ~ Alan Watts
Zen quotes by Alan Watts
The principle of avoiding conflict and never opposing an aggressor's strength head-on is the essence of aikido. We apply the same principle to problems that arise in life. The skilled aikidoist is as elusive as the truth of Zen; he makes himself into a koan - a puzzle which slips away the more one tries to solve it. He is like water in that he falls through the fingers of those who try to clutch him. Water does not hesitate before it yields, for the moment the fingers begin to close it moves away, not of its own strength, but by using the pressure applied to it. It is for this reason, perhaps, that one of the symbols for aikido is water. ~ Joe Hyams
Zen quotes by Joe Hyams
I might go anywhere and do any magic I pleased if I were Peter, not Prunella. ~ Zen Cho
Zen quotes by Zen Cho
I steeled myself for the next response. I knew it was going to be one of the Zen life lessons. [ ... ]
Instead he kissed me. ~ Richelle Mead
Zen quotes by Richelle Mead
Left alone, I am overtaken by the northern void-no wind, no cloud, no track, no bird, only the crystal crescents between peaks, the ringing monuments of rock that, freed from the talons of ice and snow, thrust an implacable being into the blue. In the early light, the rock shadows on the snow are sharp; in the tension between light and dark is the power of the universe. This stillness to which all returns, this is reality, and soul and sanity have no more meaning than a gust of snow; such transience and insignificance are exalting, terrifying, all at once ... Snow mountains, more than sea or sky, serve as a mirror to one's own true being, utterly still, utterly clear, a void, an Emptiness without life or sound that carries in Itself all life, all sound. ~ Peter Matthiessen
Zen quotes by Peter Matthiessen
In your big mind, everything has the same value ... In your practice you should accept everything as it is, giving to each thing the same respect given to a Buddha. Here there is Buddhahood ~ Shunryu Suzuki
Zen quotes by Shunryu Suzuki
Western science has made nature intelligible in terms of its symmetries and regularities, analyzing its most wayward forms into components of a regular and measurable shape. As a result we tend to see nature and to deal with it as an "order" from which the element of spontaneity has been "screened out." But this order is maya, and the "true suchness" of things has nothing in common with the purely conceptual aridities of perfect squares, circles, or triangles - except by spontaneous accident. Yet this is why the Western mind is dismayed when ordered conceptions of of the universe break down. and when the basic behavior of the physical world is found to be a "principle of uncertainty. ~ Alan W. Watts
Zen quotes by Alan W. Watts
Almost everything that I've ever worried about has never happened .. ~ Ian Tucker
Zen quotes by Ian Tucker
Sometimes it takes a miracle to remind us that the only permanent condition is that of impermanence. ~ Eric Micha'el Leventhal
Zen quotes by Eric Micha'el Leventhal
Zen is not "attained" by mirror-wiping mediation, but by "self-forgetfulness in the existential 'present' of life here and now." We do not "come", we "are." Don't strive to become, but be. ~ Bruce Lee
Zen quotes by Bruce Lee
Every homeowner deserves a Zen-like area to revitalize, rejuvenate and read. ~ Geralin Thomas
Zen quotes by Geralin Thomas
We weren't trying to be kind. We've brought you these things because you absolutely need them. That's all.' -- Ágota Kristóf. The Notebook ~ Agota Kristf
Zen quotes by Agota Kristf
One view of photography is that it is a zen-like act which captures reality with its pants down - so that the vital click shows the anatomy bare. In this, the photographer is invisible but essential. A computer releasing the shutter would always miss the special moment that the human sensibility can register. For this work, the photographer's instinct is his aid, his personality a hindrance. ~ Peter Brook
Zen quotes by Peter Brook
Many coping strategies have a Zen simplicity. Instead of resolving chaos, find beauty and happiness amid chaos. I am reminded of a friend who said that when she found out her husband couldn't fill her needs, she changed her needs; ~ Andrew Solomon
Zen quotes by Andrew Solomon
This place of stuck - "I have to" and "I can't" - feels familiar from my spiritual work. We're told to simply "let go" - but when we try to do this, we often seem to get more deeply tangled in the willful web of resistance. In spite of injunctions to the contrary, "letting go" doesn't appear to be something we have conscious control over. Why can't we just let go into the loving arms of the universe? What is this holding back that seems so essential - so imperative? ~ David Rynick
Zen quotes by David Rynick
He reached into his jacket pocket. Over the years, people had often commented on his ability to produce exactly the right item from his pockets at exactly the right time. Some had speculated that his pockets were extensions of the TARDIS, others had guessed he was just lucky. But then, they'd never read Yeltstrom's Karma and Flares: The Importance of Fashion Sense to the Modern Zen Master.
They didn't appreciate the things a sentient life-form could achieve, if he was totally at one with the lining of his jacket. ~ Lawrence Miles
Zen quotes by Lawrence Miles
A famous Japanese Zen master, Hakuun Yasutani Roshi, said that unless you can explain Zen in words that a fisherman will comprehend, you don't know what you're talking about. Some fifty years ago a UCLA professor told me the same thing about applied mathematics. We like to hide from the truth behind foreign-sounding words or mathematical lingo. There's a saying: The truth is always encountered but rarely perceived. If we don't perceive it, we can't help ourselves and we can't much help anyone else. ~ Jeff Bridges
Zen quotes by Jeff Bridges
In a certain sense, Zen is feeling life instead of feeling something about life. ~ Alan Watts
Zen quotes by Alan Watts
The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in one dewdrop on the grass. ~ Dogen
Zen quotes by Dogen
If you're very, very conservative and you like that sort of practice, go find a very conservative Zen master and just do traditional Japanese practice, which is not that traditional actually. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
Tantric Zen is for someone who is really broad-minded. It is Bodhidharma's Zen, your Zen, my Zen. Which doesn't mean I have a problem with Japanese Zen. Most Japanese Zen is minding your p's and q's. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
I make sure I have the best: I figure you could spend $800 on an outfit you wear three times, but with your hair it's there all the time. I also think it is really important to look after your colour once it's been done. I try and give my hair a really nourishing mask every so often to combat against all the styling. I also love to have beauty treatments that really benefit, like massages. t's divine to get up and feel all zen and relaxed. ~ Cat Deeley
Zen quotes by Cat Deeley
Suffering builds character and impels you to penetrate life's secrets. It's the path of great artists, great religious leaders, great social reformers. The problem is not suffering per se, but rather our identification with our own ego: our divided, dualistic, cramped view of things. 'We are too ego-centered,' Suzuki tells Cage.' The ego-shell in which we live is the hardest thing to outgrow. We seem to carry it all the time from childhood up to the time we finally pass away. ~ Kay Larson
Zen quotes by Kay Larson
We're constantly waking up to what we're about, what we're really doing in our lives. And the fact is, that's painful. But there's no possibility of freedom without this pain. ~ Charlotte Joko Beck
Zen quotes by Charlotte Joko Beck
The path of Tao is not that of sudden enlightenment. It is not like Zen. Zen is sudden enlightenment, Tao is gradual growth. ~ Osho
Zen quotes by Osho
Is the sunrise of Mount Fuji more beautiful from the one you see in the countryside a bit closer to home? Are the beaches of Indonesia really that much more serene than those we have in our own countries? The point I make is not to downplay the marvels of the world, but to highlight the notion of the human tendency in our failure to see the beauty in our daily lives when we take off the travel goggles when we are home. It is the preconceived notion of a place that creates the difference in perception of environments rather than the actual geological location. ~ Forrest Curran
Zen quotes by Forrest Curran
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
Zen quotes by Shunryu Suzuki
I raise my hand; I take a book from the other side of this desk; I hear the boys playing ball outside my window; I see the clouds blown away beyond the neighboring woods:-in all these I am practicing Zen, I am living Zen. No worldly discussion is necessary, or any explanation. ~ D.T. Suzuki
Zen quotes by D.T. Suzuki
Zen is discipline - the discipline of living life, the discipline of taking a breath, the discipline of not knowing and not trying to know. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
Instead of Gnostics, we have Existentialists and God-is-dead theologians, instead of Neo-Platonists, devotees of Zen, instead of desert hermits, heroin addicts and Beats (who also, oddly enough, seem averse to washing), instead of mortification of the flesh, sado-masochistic pornography; as for our public entertainments, the fare offered by television is still a shade less brutal than that provided by the Amphitheatre, but only a shade and may not be so for long. ~ W. H. Auden
Zen quotes by W. H. Auden
To practice Zen or the Martial Arts, you must live intensely, wholeheartedly, without reserve - as if you might die in the next instant ~ Taisen Deshimaru
Zen quotes by Taisen Deshimaru
Zen is a liberation from time. For if we open our eyes and see clearly, it becomes obvious that there is no other time than this instant, and that the past and the future are abstractions without any concrete reality. ~ Alan W. Watts
Zen quotes by Alan W. Watts
Illusions can and do create PHYSICAL Dis-Ease within our bodies. So it's most important to master our thoughts, to become cognizant of what we are spending our precious mental energy on each moment of every day. ~ Alaric Hutchinson
Zen quotes by Alaric Hutchinson
When you visit the Zen Monasteries, one of the first things required is that you bring a donation. They have to pay for those monasteries. The upkeep is fantastic. The monks have to be fed, and so on. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
Neither to heaven nor to hell, my journey is towards my home. ~ ~Sw. Chidananda Tirtha
Zen quotes by ~Sw. Chidananda Tirtha
The universe and the law of attraction speak a language that knows no words, only discerning your intent through sacrifice and what you are willing to give up. ~ Forrest Curran
Zen quotes by Forrest Curran
I guess Zen is a day like this when you are part of the air and remember things ~ Stephen Chbosky
Zen quotes by Stephen Chbosky
Acceptance is a deceptive word. It suggests compliance, a consenting to my condition and to who I have become. This form of acceptance is often seen as weakness, submission. We say I accept my punishment. Or I accept your decision. But such assent, while passive in essence, does provide the stable, rocklike foundation for coping with a condition that will not go away. It is a powerful passivity, the Zen of Illness, that allows for endurance. ~ Floyd Skloot
Zen quotes by Floyd Skloot
Sometimes it's just a zen thing and it means shutting the noise out and forming a plan and realizing that as long as it's not going to kill you then you just need to breathe and move past it, ~ Chuck Wendig
Zen quotes by Chuck Wendig
Some of the gardeners, Nanao said, worked according to the precepts of Muso Soseki, others according to other Japanese Zen masters; others still to Fu Hsi, the legendary inventor of the Chinese system of geomancy called feng shui; others to Persian gardening gurus, including Omar Khayyam; or to Leopold or Jackson, or other early American ecologists, like the nearly forgotten biologist Oskar Schnelling; and so on. These ~ Kim Stanley Robinson
Zen quotes by Kim Stanley Robinson
We do not want to deny existence. Yet we also do not want to limit existence. Thus, we observe and honor without forming opinion, labeling, or adding a story to the object of our observation. ~ Alaric Hutchinson
Zen quotes by Alaric Hutchinson
Zen is a very quick path. Zen is the path of meditation. The word Zen means emptiness or fullness, meditation. Meditation is the quickest path to enlightenment. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
if my memory serves me right, here is my genealogical line: Boccaccio, Petronius, Rabelais, Whitman, Emerson, Thoreau, Maeterlinck, Romain Rolland, Plotinus, Heraclitus, Nietzsche, Dostoievsky (and other Russian writers of the Nineteenth Century), the ancient Greek dramatists, theElizabethan dramatists (excluding Shakespeare), Theodore Dreiser, Knut Hamsun, D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, Thomas Mann, Elie Faure, Oswald Spengler, Marcel Proust, Van Gogh, the Dadaists and Surrealists, Balzac, Lewis Carroll, Nijinsky, Rimbaud, Blaise Cendrars, Jean Giono, Celine, everything I read on Zen Buddhism, everything I read about China, India, Tibet, Arabia, Africa, and of course the Bible, the men who wrote it and especially the men who made the King James version, for it was the language of the Bible rather than its "message" which I got first and which I will never shake off. ~ Henry Miller
Zen quotes by Henry Miller
A pity it is evening, yet
I do love the water of this spring
seeing how clear it is, how clean;
rays of sunset gleam on it,
lighting up its ripples, making it
one with those who travel
the roads; I turn and face
the moon; sing it a song, then
listen to the sound of the wind
amongst the pines. ~ Li Bai
Zen quotes by Li Bai
I just had to stay cool. Zen. No punching in the face. Punching would not be Zen. ~ Ilona Andrews
Zen quotes by Ilona Andrews
To say I woke up one day and reached a point where I no longer cared about the pains to befall me would be a lie. Nor can I say that I have ever fully forgiven those who willfully did me harm. On a deep, internal battlefield, I wrestle with the thought that I have been robbed of any chance of normalcy by the losses suffered. Therapists and gurus alike tell us to, "Let go or be dragged," as Zen proverb urges - to forgive for our own sake. But, in my experience, there is no letting go and forgiveness is transient. My inability to be free of it all isn't for lack of an evolved consciousness on my part. I've "done the work" to process it all; rather, it is my irreconcilable, inescapable humanity that causes to clutch the pain close to me. ~ L.M. Browning
Zen quotes by L.M. Browning
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
Zen quotes by Shunryu Suzuki
MY BOSS SENDS me home because of all the dried blood on my pants, and I am overjoyed.
The hole punched through my cheek doesn't ever heal. I'm going to work, and my punched-out eye sockets are two swollen-up black bagels around the little piss holes I have left to see through. Until today, it really pissed me off that I'd become this totally centered Zen Master and nobody had noticed. Still, I'm doing the little FAX thing. I write little HAIKU things and FAX them around to everyone. When I pass people in the hall at work, I get totally ZEN right in everyone's hostile little FACE.
Worker bees can leave
Even drones can fly away
The queen is their slave

You give up all your worldly possessions and your car and go live in a rented house in the toxic waste part of town where late at night, you can hear Marla and Tyler in his room, calling each other hum; butt wipe.
Take it, human butt wipe.
Do it, butt wipe.
Choke it down. Keep it down, baby.
Just by contrast, this makes me the calm little center of the world.
Me, with my punched-out eyes and dried blood in big black crusty stains on my pants, I'm saying HELLO to everybody at work. HELLO! Look at me. HELLO! I am so ZEN. This is BLOOD. This is NOTHING. Hello. Everything is nothing, and it's so cool to be ENLIGHTENED. Like me.
Sigh.
Look. Outside the window. A bird.
My boss asked if the blood was my blood.
The bird flies downwind. I'm writing a ~ Chuck Palahniuk
Zen quotes by Chuck Palahniuk
Zen doesn't believe in the reconciliation of opposites because from the point of view of Zen, there is no point of view. ~ Frederick Lenz
Zen quotes by Frederick Lenz
We are evolutionarily hard-wired to prioritize negative stimuli because of the survival advantages this gives us. Evolution is blind, and it doesn't necessarily care about our happiness. That's up to us. ~ Ernest Cadorin
Zen quotes by Ernest Cadorin
Life was the gift that you were given the day you were born, and in turn you are the gift to life. Only in the moments of being alone in the darkness on the raft, will you have the space to speak, listen, and to act from the heart. ~ Forrest Curran
Zen quotes by Forrest Curran
When you get high on something - including "spiritual bliss" - there is always going to be a low. The comedown is your body / mind returning to balance, or the closest thing to balance that it knows. If you desperately crave bliss while your body / mind needs balance, you are bound to label the changeover as "feeling bad," when in fact it's the best thing that can happen.
Zen practice is not about getting high on anything and in so doing, getting high on absolutely everything. We then find that everything we encounter - bliss and nonbliss - possesses a tremendous depth and beauty that we usually miss. ~ Brad Warner
Zen quotes by Brad Warner
I brought seaweed snacks from home,' chimed in another kid. "Seaweed got iron, right?"
'I don't think the teachers meant that kind of iron,' said Hui Ann. ~ Zen Cho
Zen quotes by Zen Cho
Enlightenment isn't about reaching a destination of "knowing", it is about developing consistent vibrational harmony within one's self and with the surrounding world. ~ Alaric Hutchinson
Zen quotes by Alaric Hutchinson
Keep your opinion to yourself unless it's asked for. ~ Alaric Hutchinson
Zen quotes by Alaric Hutchinson
How many Zen masters does it take to screw in a light bulb? The plum tree in the garden! ~ Brad Warner
Zen quotes by Brad Warner
Your body is like a dew-drop on the morning grass, your life is as brief as a flash of lightning. Momentary and vain, it is lost in a moment. (From 'Fukan zazengi') ~ Dogen
Zen quotes by Dogen
True wisdom
is not borrowed knowledge
it must be based
on my own experience.

That which I learn from others
is memory, not wisdom ~ Beopjeong
Zen quotes by Beopjeong
Zen culture invites us to experience reality without the intervening distractions of intellect, categories, analysis. ~ Tom Hoover
Zen quotes by Tom Hoover
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