Master Linji said to an assembly:
What I teach people just requires you not to allow yourself to be confused by others. Act when necessary, without further hesitation.
Where is the ailment of students of the present time who do not attain realization? The ailment is in their failure to trust themselves. If you cannot trust yourself enough, you will frantically pursue all sorts of objects, spun around and changed by those myriad objects, unable to be free. If you stop your mind from rushing seeking thought after thought, then you are no different from Buddhas and Chan masters.
Do you want to know what a Buddha or a Chan master is? It’s what’s right there in your presence listening to the teaching. Just don’t interrupt it anymore, at any time—whatever meets the eye is It.
In my view, nothing is not extremely profound, nothing is not liberation.
Just be able to dissolve past habits according to circumstances, going when you need to go, sitting when you need to sit, without any thought of seeking buddhahood. Why so? An ancient said, ‘If you’re going to act in contrived ways to seek buddhahood, then buddhahood is a major sign of birth and death.’
Make no mistake about it—you only have one father and mother; what more do you seek? Turn your awareness back on your self and look.
A man once saw the back of a mirror and thought he’d lost his head—only when he stopped looking for it was he relieved.
Rather liberally excerpted version of Treasury #166. There are just too many great lines.
If you agree with "whatever meets the eye is It," and you don't practice a religion, and you don't care about Buddhism, and you have read a bunch of Zen stuff... what does "seeing the back of a mirror and thinking you've lost your head" look like? Or, if you think you "trust yourself enough", can you be wrong, and how would you know?
Submitted October 19, 2020 at 06:14PM by in_dee_nile https://ift.tt/3jktm9b
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