Shunryu Suzuki
Shunryu Suzuki
Shunryu Suzukiwas a Sōtō Zen monk and teacher who helped popularize Zen Buddhism in the United States, and is renowned for founding the first Buddhist monastery outside Asia. Suzuki founded San Francisco Zen Center, which along with its affiliate temples, comprises one of the most influential Zen organizations in the United States. A book of his teachings, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, is one of the most popular books on Zen and Buddhism in the West...
NationalityJapanese
ProfessionLeader
Date of Birth18 May 1904
CountryJapan
To be different is to have value. In this sense all things have equal, absolute value. Each thing has absolute value and thus is equal to everything else.
The more you practice zazen, the more you will be able to accept something as your own, whatever it is.
If you want to read a letter from the Buddha's world, it is necessary to understand Buddha's world.
To have some deep feeling about Buddhism is not the point; we just do what we should do, like eating supper and going to bed. This is Buddhism.
Without ignoring the objective side of the truth, it has to be subjective as well, Buddha's whole teaching just for you, something you can taste. Not something to believe in but to discover, to experience.
We should not be just a fan of dragons; we should always be the dragon himself. Then we will not be afraid of any dragon.
When he bowed to all those buddhas, the buddhas he bowed to were beyond his own understanding. Again and again he did it.
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
The mind of the beginner is empty, free of the habits of the experts, ready to accept, to doubt, and open to all possibilities.
From True Emptiness The Wondrous Being Appears
So the secret is just to say 'Yes!' and jump off from here. Then there is no problem. It means to be yourself, always yourself, without sticking to an old self.
If your practice is good, you may become proud of it. What you do is good, but something more is added to it. Pride is extra. Right effort is to get rid of something extra.
You want to eliminate your evil desires in order to reveal your Buddha nature, but where will you throw them away?
We must exist right here, right now!