Watts and Suzuki didn't fail.

As a member of this community, and as good friends, we gotta point out to each other, when we are veering into delusion and talking poop.

I count on my good friends and close family members to be able to give me a reality check, and sometimes that check ain't nice, but it's necessary.

Here is the reality check, that comes in the form of Watts and Suzuki, they may not have been Zen masters, but they sure as hell introduced a lot of people to the wonderful world of the Zen masters, they didn't fail at all, they achieved status as world renowned figures of academia and in Watts case, a celebrity that lives on way past his death..

Here are a couple of quotes by these two heavyweights, and if anyone out there, thinks they can outdo these two titans, your gonna need one of two things, either a masterclass in eloquence and insight, or a super unhealthily dose of delusion.

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We seldom realize, for example that our most private thoughts and emotions are not actually our own. For we think in terms of languages and images which we did not invent, but which were given to us by our society.

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The art of living... is neither careless drifting on the one hand nor fearful clinging to the past on the other. It consists in being sensitive to each moment, in regarding it as utterly new and unique, in having the mind open and wholly receptive.

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Taking it all in all, Zen is emphatically a matter of personal experience; if anything can be called radically empirical, it is Zen. No amount of reading, no amount of teaching, no amount of contemplation will ever make one a Zen master. Life itself must be grasped in the midst of its flow; to stop it for examination and analysis is to kill it, leaving its cold corpse to be embraced.

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The basic idea of Zen is to come in touch with the inner workings of our being, and to do so in the most direct way possible, without resorting to anything external or superadded.

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First two by Watts, last two by Suzuki.

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I'm expecting the mods to take down this post, as they probably think that they too, can supercede both Watts and Suzuki, if only by pure unwillingness to accept them as a valuable part of the continuing story of Zen, but when all is said and done, both Watts and Suzuki will endure, and will always hold a greater sway amongst the true seekers of Zen, than any of the wannabes who want to denounce them.

Watts especially had charisma and personality by the bucketload, and combined with his eloquent manner and insights, this all added up to him being one of the greatest spiritual commentators of our modern era, and for any person here to think that they could somehow surpass Watts achievements, haha.. I mean seriously?

Submitted June 14, 2022 at 12:15PM by transmission_of_mind https://ift.tt/oKGOWEA