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The secret of zen is just two words: not... always... so.

Shunryu Suzuki

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Shunryu Suzuki
Age: 67 †
Born: 1904
Born: May 18
Died: 1971
Died: December 4
Bhikkhu
Leader
Missionary
Philosopher
Writer
Atlanta
Georgia
Secret
Words
Two
Always

More quotes by Shunryu Suzuki

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Instead of criticizing, find out how to help.
Shunryu Suzuki
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If you want to read a letter from the Buddha's world, it is necessary to understand Buddha's world.
Shunryu Suzuki
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If you continue this simple practice every day, you will obtain some wonderful power. Before you attain it, it is something wonderful, but after you attain it, it is nothing special.
Shunryu Suzuki
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After you have practiced for a while, you will realize that it is not possible to make rapid, extraordinary progress. Even though you try very hard, the progress you make is always little by little.
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Enlightenment is not a complete remedy.
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We ourselves cannot put any magic spells on this world. The world is its own magic.
Shunryu Suzuki
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You see something or hear a sound, and there you have everything just as it is. [...] Whatever you do, it should be an expression of the same deep activity. We should appreciate what we are doing. There is no preparation for something else.
Shunryu Suzuki
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If you were not born in this world, there would be no need to die. To be born in this world is to die, to disappear [laughing].
Shunryu Suzuki
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To cook is not just to prepare food for someone or to cook for yourself it is to express your sincerity. So when you cook you should express yourself in your activity in the kitchen. You should allow yourself plenty of time.
Shunryu Suzuki
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When you are fooled by something else, the damage will not be so big. But when you are fooled by yourself, it is fatal. No more medicine.
Shunryu Suzuki
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Christopher McCandless:I will miss you too, but you are wrong if you think that the joy of life comes principally from the joy of human relationships. God's place is all around us, it is in everything and in anything we can experience. People just need to change the way they look at things.
Shunryu Suzuki
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Meditation opens the mind to the greatest mystery that takes place daily and hourly it widens the heart so that it may feel the eternity of time and infinity of space in every throb it gives us a life within the world as if we were moving about in paradise.
Shunryu Suzuki
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Let your ears hear without trying to hear. Let the mind think without trying to think and without trying to stop it. That is practice.
Shunryu Suzuki
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Bowing is a very serious practice. You should be prepared to bow, even in your last moment. even though it is impossible to get rid of our self-centered desires, we have to do it. Our true nature wants us to.
Shunryu Suzuki
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If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything it is open to everything.
Shunryu Suzuki
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We must exist right here, right now!
Shunryu Suzuki
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Nothing we see or hear is perfect. But right there in the imperfection is perfect reality.
Shunryu Suzuki
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Although we have no actual written communications from the world of emptiness, we have some hints or suggestions about what is going on in that world, and that is, you might say, enlightenment. When you see plum blossoms or hear the sound of a small stone hitting bamboo, that is a letter from the world of emptiness.
Shunryu Suzuki
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From True Emptiness The Wondrous Being Appears
Shunryu Suzuki
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In the zazen posture, your mind and body have, great power to accept things as they are, whether agreeable or disagreeable.
Shunryu Suzuki