Zazen practice and everyday activity are one thing. We call zazen everyday life, and everyday life zazen.
Meditation is not the construction of something foreign, it is not an effort to attain and then hold on to a particular experience. We may have a secret desire that through meditation we will accumulate a stockpile of magical experiences, or at least...
If you're impatient while waiting for the bus, tell yourself you're doing 'Bus waiting meditation.' If you're standing in a slow line at the drugstore, you're doing 'Waiting in line meditation.' Just saying these words makes me feel very spiritual an...
Sit still with me in the shade of these green trees, which have no weightier thought than the withering of their leaves when autumn arrives, or the stretching of their many stiff fingers into the cold sky of the passing winter. Sit still with me and ...
What is the real origin of my own anger? Is it the ego defending its territory, or is it something that has its source in the desire for the well-being of all? (73)
It is important never to separate love and knowledge, compassion and wisdom. A wisdom without compassion is closed upon itself and does not bear fruit. A compassion without wisdom is a madness and a cause of suffering.
Quoting Father Seraphim: Our life hangs only by a breath. It is the thread that links you to the Father, the Source, which brought you into being. Be conscious of this thread, and go where you will. (27)
When I was a child I read books for entertainment and information; I now think of books as lifeboats.
Prayer is the open admission that without Christ we can do nothing. And prayer is the turning away from ourselves to God in the confidence that He will provide the help we need. Prayer humbles us as needy and exalts God as wealthy
All relaxation does is allow the truth to be felt. The mind is cleared, like a dirty window wiped clean, and the magnitude of what we might ordinarily take for granted inspires tears.
Part of why I love these angry, straight, white punks is that they are stripping the dharma of its bullshit, and applying it to contexts and styles that, even if they aren’t mine, are at least different from the norm.
Too often we look back on our lives with regret. What is done, is done. We learned lessons from those mistakes. Every day is a new beginning.
In spite of what most assume, it is surprisingly tough to make the mind and body work together as a unit.
Achieving the state of SABLE is not, as many people who live with these knitters believe, a reason to stop buying yarn, but for the knitter it is an indication to write a will, bequeathing the stash to an appropriate heir.
Once I was running and there was someone on the treadmill next to me who stopped running to answer a question I asked and flew of the back of the treadmill. Being fully engaged has many benefits.
The Lord chose to give me back my life, not because I deserved it, but because he had work for me to do.
The devil sought to destroy me and discredit my testimony. But God wanted me where I would testify to others about his saving power.
Hope is sweet. Hope is illumining. Hope is fulfilling. Hope can be everlasting. Therefore, do not give up hope, Even in the sunset of your life.
I honestly don’t know whether I am describing something essential about the way we know God or merely my own weakness of mind.
When you can quiet the fluctuations of your mind and drift into stillness & silence, you can finally hear the whispers of your heart… the whispers of god.
I believe that reading and writing are the most nourishing forms of meditation anyone has so far found. By reading the writings of the most interesting minds in history, we meditate with our own minds and theirs as well. This to me is a miracle.
