You are the traveler,
you are the path
and you are the destination.
Be careful never to lose the way to yourself.
Shahāb ad-Dīn Yahya ibn Habash Suhrawardī, 1154 -1191, Persian Philosopher known as The Master of Illumination
In the forest or by the sea, the learning is the same…
My hut lies in the middle of a dense forest;
Every year the green ivy grows longer.
No news of the affairs of men,
Only the occasional song of a woodcutter.
The sun is shining and I am mending my robe;
When the moon comes out I will read Buddhist poems.
I have nothing to report my friends.
If you want to find meaning,
stop chasing after so many things.
Ryokan 1758–1831, Zen Buddhist monk and hermit
A day at the sea…
We cannot enjoy life if we spend our time and energy worrying about what happened yesterday and what will happen tomorrow.
If we’re afraid all the time, we miss out on the wonderful fact that we’re alive and can be happy right now
Thich Nhat Hahn
An eye is meant to see things.
The soul is here for its own joy.
A head has one use: To love a genuine love.
The feet: To chase after it.
Love is for vanishing into the sky. The mind,
for learning what men have done and tried to do.
Mysteries are not to be solved: The eye goes blind
when it only wants to see why.
A lover is always accused of something.
But when he finds his love, whatever was lost
in the looking comes back completely changed.
Rumi, Night and Sleep
Incredibly warm, sunny weather here this last week. A world bathed in warmth and life and love.
Look at the sunlight.…
You see it is near, yet if you follow it ….you can’t catch it in your hands. Then you say it’s far away and yet you see it right before your eyes. Follow it and you see that it escapes you; Run away from it and it follows you close. You can neither hold onto it, nor be finished with it.
From this you come to see what is the true nature of all things
and then understand: There is no need to be sad or worry about things.
Huang Po, died 850, Zen Buddhist master
Got news yesterday of the sudden death of an old friend, who I had not seen in over 18 months due to pandemic restrictions. It made me think of the choices we have as to where we invest our energy and our thoughts. Life can pass us by, and we waste a lot of it rehashing our familiar litany of fears, tired old stories and self-doubts.
In Zen temples there is a small wooden board called a “han” that is struck with a mallet to signal that it is time for some part of the daily routine. It might have the words “Shoji jidai” written on it in ink. Have you ever seen this? The words mean “life is full of fortune and misfortune, but cherish being alive, every single day. Life will pass you by“
Come now, open your eyes.
What kind of day should we make today?
Shunmyo Masumo, Zen: The Art of Simple Living
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