That state of mind which is no longer capable of striving is the true religious mind, and in that state of mind you may come upon this thing called truth or reality or bliss or God or beauty of love. This thing cannot be invited, please understand that very simple fact.

It cannot be invited, it cannot be sought after, because the mind is too silly, too small, your emotions too shoddy, your way of life too confused for that enormity, that immense something, to be invited into your little house, your little corner of living, which has been trampled and spat upon. You cannot invite it. To invite it you must know it. It doesn't matter who says it, the moment he says "I know", he does not know. The moment you say you have found it, you have not found it. If you say you have experienced it, you have never experienced it. They are all ways of exploiting another man- your friend or your enemy.

One asks oneself then whether it is possible to come upon this thing without inviting, without waiting, without seeking or exploring - just for it to happen like a cool breeze that comes when you leave the window open? You cannot invite the wind but you must leave the window open, which doesn't mean that you are in a state of waiting; that is another form of deception. It doesn't mean that you must open yourself to receive; that is another kind of thought.

Freedom from the known

Jiddu Krishnamurti

"Meditation will bring you sensitivity, a great sense of belonging to the world. It is our world - the stars are ours, and we are not foreigners here. We are part of it, we are the heart of it. And this sensitivity will create new friendships for you - friendships with trees, with birds, with animals, with mountains, with rivers, with oceans, with stars. Life becomes richer as love grows."

OSHO

Through difficult experiences, life sometimes becomes more meaningul.
Dalai Lama

“How can I be still? By flowing with the stream.”

Lao-tzu

Hildegard von Bingen, O aeterne Deus

Hildegard of Bingen, Spiritus Sanctus

Be strong and put on the armor of light.
Hildegard of Bingen

Sometimes the photographers would pose me in a low-necked nightgown and tell me to bend down and pick up the pails. They were not shooting the pails.
Jane Russell

Lion or Lamb?

Which of the Two shall be victor at last,
After this desperate battle is done?
Temper the wind, for the shorn strength fails fast.
Look how the yellow Life shakes with the sun
It has fed on afar in wastes of its own!
Then the cruel wild glitter of sand
Looks hot in its eye! Shall I stand,
And watch them, and leave them alone?

Let them fight on, as they will and they must-
Yet somehow the one is so pretty and white!
Say, dainty wool, must the blood and the dust
Hide your soft snowiness all from my sight?
A timida bleat goes to the skies:
The Lamb of the Two is the strong!

Sarah M.B. Piatt

Is it raining - Alden Nowlan

I come in from a walk

With you

And they ask me

If it is raining.

I didn’t notice

But I’ll have to give them

The right answer

Or they’ll think I’m crazy.

En amour, il est plus facile de renoncer à un sentiment que de perdre une habitude.

The term of death

Between the falling leaf and rosebud's breath;
the bird's forsaken nest and her song
(And this is all the time there is for Death);
The worm and butterfly- it is not long!

Sarah Morgan Bryan Piatt

Kakua was the first Japanese to study Zen in

China, and while he was there he accepted the

true teaching.

When he was in China he did not travel. He lived

in a remote part of a mountain and meditated

constantly.

Whenever people found him and asked him to

preach, he would say a few words and then move

to another part of the mountain where he could be

found less easily.

When Kakua returned to Japan, the emperor

heard about him and asked him to come to court

to preach Zen for the edification of himself and his

subjects.

Kakua stood before the emperor in silence.

He then produced a flute from the folds of his

robes, blew one short note, bowed politely, and

disappeared.

No one ever knew what became of him.

The real teaching cannot be taught but still it is

called a teaching. It cannot be taught but it can be

shown, indicated. There is no way to say it

directly, but there are millions of ways to indicate it

indirectly.

Lao Tzu says that the truth cannot be said, and

the moment you say it you have already falsified it.

The words, the language, the mind, are utterly

incapable. It defies reason, it defies the

head-oriented personality, it defies the ego. It

cannot be manipulated. It is utterly impossible for

reason to encounter it...

OSHO

"The woman who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd. The woman who walks alone is likely to find herself in places no one has ever been before."

Albert Einstein

A prayer - Sara Teasdale

When I am dying, let me know

That I loved the blowing snow

Although it stung like whips;

That I loved all lovely things

And I tried to take their stings

With gay unembittered lips;

That I loved with all my strength,

To my soul's full depth and length,

Careless if my heart must break,

That I sang as children sing

Fitting tunes to everything,

Loving life for its own sake.

"A heretic is a man who sees with his own eyes."

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

The Practice of Compassion

Some mistakenly think that zen soars high above any need for compassion. Don't be one of them. Since I have compassion for you, I'll try to set you straight on this point right now! Open your minds:

Universally in Buddhism, and Zen as well, we find the ideal of Compassion firmly entrenched. Compassion is personified in Buddhism by the bodhisattva Kannon, who is the "Hearer of Cries" of all the suffering in the world. When we too decide to listen and become receptive to the ubiquitous suffering, we become another ear of the Hearer. When we are further moved to compassion via this receptivity, we then become as an arm of the bodhisattva, ready to turn compassion into action, utter the compassionate word, or simply send our loving kindness radiating toward all beings.

Compassion provides us with a concrete way to make the world a better place, and this alone is entirely worth its development. Everyone recognizes the innate value of kindness. This is not news. After death, a compassionate person is lauded: "Her kindness touched all who met her" "His compassion healed many wounds." Very seldom do we read on a tombstone how clever someone was, or how rich or successful! Kindness, however, seems to touch a universal chord in us all. It's hard to imagine a world devoid of the simple, powerful trait of compassion.

In Zen, wisdom (prajna) is often made out to be king. But if that is true, then it is compassion that is the sole queen of zen, and no less important at all. Perhaps that is why Avalokiteshvara morphed from male to female over the course of centuries, in order to express this steady, unwavering compassion akin to a mother's love for her child. Strength and wisdom are completed by the addition of compassion and are not necessarily positive traits by themselves.

The pure act of compassion provides us with a powerful, twofold means of practice. It is both a means of turning emptiness into form by giving (dana) toward all sentient beings while realizing at the same time the Buddhist principle that there is no set rigid identity; and it is also a means of turning form into emptiness by overcoming the "form" of the ego (ours!), when we ourselves forget that very same principle (anatta)!

When we suffer due to our own deluded view of "self" it does no good at all to tell us that there is really no one there to suffer. I hurt, therefore I am! Conversely, when we are able to turn form into emptiness by leaping over ourselves and our petty sense of "me and mine," then we are truly practicing a tangible form of zen compassion. Jumping over ourselves, we save all sentient beings; jumping over our pride, we save all sentient beings; jumping over our own difficult situations, we save all sentient beings! Only to the extent that we're able to jump over our limited sense of self for the sake of others do we gain in the tangible power of the Way; the power of virtue.

To whatever extent that we discover this innate, universal compassion, our own troubles proportionately shrink. And to the extent that we share in this power, shrinking our estimation of our own troubles, we can remain serene in the face of life's inevitable hardships. And of course, becoming compassionate, powerful and serene we then have more to give to others. We become benefactors whose fortune is in the currency of kindness. Thus, the cycle of compassion turns and becomes exceedingly deep and strong. And so incidentally, without greed for our own growth, our practice becomes just as deep and strong!

So, within the Bodhisattva ideal of compassion lies a two fold path for deepening our practice while helping others bear the unavoidable burdens of life on this plane. Thus the world becomes a concretely better place, by just that much more compassion. In a world where might becomes justification, this balm of kindness is more necessary than ever before. Then, over and over, day in and day out, the continuity of this powerful practice of compassion unfolds, drawing us deeper into actually seeing the essential emptiness of our own ego while leading others still clinging to that illusory view to a newfound place of buoyancy and strength. Exponentially, candles light other candles, endlessly supplying light and care to all.

I vow to save all sentient beings, even though there are no separate individualities!

Make sense? No, not really… except through the heart of compassion — then it does! There we surpass the definition and discover Being in the bargain. The value of compassion in today's world is obvious; and the value of the practice of compassion is a two way street of depth without which zen practice might become merely a selfish charade.

May all beings be happy and may they then share that happiness with others via the twofold action of compassion!

Ji Aoi Isshi

For Attractive lips, speak words of kindness. For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people.

Audrey Hepburn

Numbers - Mary Cornish

I like the generosity of numbers.

The way, for example,

they are willing to count

anything or anyone:

two pickles, one door to the room,

eight dancers dressed as swans.

I like the domesticity of addition--

add two cups of milk and stir--

the sense of plenty: six plums

on the ground, three more

falling from the tree.

And multiplication's school

of fish times fish,

whose silver bodies breed

beneath the shadow

of a boat.

Remember - Christina Rossetti

La Torre dell' Orologio - Venezia

Remember me when I am gone away,

gone far away into the silent land,

when you can no more hold me by the hand,

nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more, day by day,

you tell me of our future that you planed:

Only remember me; you understand

it will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while

and afterwards remember, do not grieve:

For if the darkness and corruption leave

a vestige of the thoughts that once I had,

better by far you should forget and smile

than you should remember and be sad.