or, in Ireland’s case these days, a lot of rain….
Today is a day like any other: twenty-four hours, a
little sunshine, a little rain.
Listen, says ambition, nervously shifting her weight from
one boot to another — why don’t you get going?
For there I am, in the mossy shadows, under the trees.
And to tell the truth I don’t want to let go of the wrists
of idleness, I don’t want to sell my life for money,
I don’t even want to come in out of the rain.
Mary Oliver, Black Oaks
It is imperative to cut off the mind road.
If you do not cut off the mind road, you will be a ghost, clinging to the grass.
Wu Men Hui-k’ai,, 1183–1260, Chinese Chán master
I think of the past twenty years,
when I used to walk home quietly
from Kuo-ch’ing,
All the people in the Kuo-ch’ing monastery –
would say, “Hanshan is an idiot.”
“Am I really an idiot:” I reflected.
But my reflections failed to solve the question:
for I myself do not know who the self is,
So how can others know who I am?
Hanshan, 9th century, Chinese Buddhist/Taoist poet
No striving, no grasping at this or that, no entertaining any self-involved stories whatsoever.
Instead, attention pivots toward a light in the heart in which the ‘field of boundless emptiness’ is revealed.
All questions and doubts are put to rest.
Hongzhi Zhengjue, 1091–1157, Chinese Chan Buddhist monk
False views make up the world
true views are from the world beyond,
when true and false are both dismissed
your buddha nature will manifest
this is simply the straightforward teaching…
delusion lasts countless kalpas
awareness takes but an instant.
Huineng, 638 – 713, the Sixth Patriarch of Chan Buddhism, founder of the “Sudden Enlightenment” school of Buddhism
[a kalpa is a long period of time in Hindu and Buddhist thinking]
Can you remember who you were,
before the world told you who you should be?
Charles Bukowski, 1920 – 1994, American poet, novelist, and short story writer.
Mindfulbalance 