Quote

To accept some idea of truth without experiencing it is like a painting of a cake on paper which you cannot eat.

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
Accepting
Idea
Cannot
Truth
Experiencing
Ideas
Cake
Without
Accept
Like
Paper
Painting

More quotes by Shunryu Suzuki

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It is a big mistake to think that the best way to express yourself is to do whatever you want, acting as you please. This is not expressing yourself. If you know what to do exactly, and you do it, then you can express yourself fully.
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The world is its own magic.
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In the mind of the beginner, there are many possibilities. In the mind of the expert there are few.
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Our way is to practice one step at a time, one breath at a time, with no gaining idea.
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Nothing we see or hear is perfect. But right there in the imperfection is perfect reality.
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Each one of us must make his own true way, and when we do, that way will express the universal way.
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Because all existence is founded upon the ever-present state of union, everything already exists in a state of tranquility. However, this state of tranquility is masked from us by our assumption that there is a separation, that there is a problem.
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For Zen students a weed is a treasure. With this attitude, whatever you do, life becomes an art.
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Concentration comes not from trying hard to focus on something, but from keeping your mind open and directing it at nothing.
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No matter what god or doctrine you believe in, if you become attached to it, your belief will be based more or less on a self-centered idea.
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When you try to understand everything, you will not understand anything. The best way is to understand yourself, and then you will understand everything.
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It is easy to have calmness in inactivity, it is hard to have calmness in activity, but calmness in activity is true calmness.
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When he bowed to all those buddhas, the buddhas he bowed to were beyond his own understanding. Again and again he did it.
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To give your sheep or cow a large, spacious meadow is the way to control him.
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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.
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When you do something, if you fix your mind on the activity with some confidence, the quality of your state of mind is the activity itself. When you are concentrated on the quality of your being, you are prepared for the activity.
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People say that practicing Zen is difficult, but there is a misunderstanding as to why. It is not difficult because it is hard to sit in the cross- legged position, or to attain enlightenment. It is difficult because it is hard to keep our mind pure and our practice pure in its fundamental sense.
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There is no connection between I myself yesterday and I myself in this moment
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You will always exist in the universe in one form or another.
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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.
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