Shunryu Suzuki Quotes - Page 6

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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.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Mistake, Thinking, Expression

  "Not Always So: Practicing the True Spirit of Zen". Book by Shunryū Suzuki. Chapter: "Express Yourself Fully", p. 8, 2002.

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• When you accept everything, everything is beyond dimensions. The earth is not great nor a grain of sand small. In the realm of Great Activity picking up a grain of sand is the same as taking up the whole universe. To save one sentient being is to save all sentient beings. Your efforts of this moment to save one person is the same as the eternal merit of Buddha.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Effort, Earth, Dimensions

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• As long as we have some definite idea about or some hope in the future, we cannot really be serious with the moment that exists right now.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Ideas, Long, Serious

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.100, Shambhala Publications

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• Someone was sitting in front of a sunflower, watching the sunflower, a cup of sun, and so I tried it too. It was wonderful; I felt the whole universe in the sunflower. That was my experience. Sunflower meditation. A wonderful confidence appeared. You can see the whole universe in a flower.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Flower, Meditation, Sitting

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• There will always be war, but we must always work to oppose it.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  War

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• When we become truly ourselves, we just become a swinging door, and we are purely independent of, and at the same time, dependent upon everything.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Independent, Doors, Dependent

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.14, Shambhala Publications

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• A Master who cannot bow to a disciple cannot bow to Buddha.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Bows, Masters, Disciple

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• And we should forget, day by day, what we have done; this is true non-attachment. And we should do something new. To do something new, of course we must know our past, and this is alright. But we should not keep holding onto anything we have done; we should only reflect on it. And we must have some idea of what we should do in the future. But the future is the future, the past is the past; now we should work on something new.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Past, Attachment, Ideas

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• There are, strictly speaking, no enlightened people, there is only enlightened activity.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  People, Enlightened, Activity

  "Zen Millionaire: The Investor's Guide to the Other Side". Book by Paul Farrell, 2007.

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• We have to study with our warm heart, not just with our brain.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Heart, Brain, Study

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• In your everyday life you always have opportunities for enlightenment. If you go to the rest room, there is a chance to attain enlightenment. When you cook, there is a chance to attain enlightenment. When you clean the floor, there is a chance to attain enlightenment.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Life, Opportunity, Everyday

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• The goal of our life’s effort is to reach the other shore, Nirvana. Prajna paramita, the true wisdom of life, is that in each step of the way, the other shore is actually reached.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Goal, Effort, Way

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.51, Shambhala Publications

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• For Zen students, a weed is a treasure.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Weed, Treasure, Students

  Shunryū Suzuki, Trudy Dixon, Richard Baker (2006). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.152, Shambhala Publications

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• If you want to enjoy the movie, you should know that it is the combination of film and light and white screen, and that the most important thing is to have a plain, white screen.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  White, Light, Important

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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

  Thinking, People, Joy

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• If your practice is good, you may become proud of it. What you do is good, but something more is added to it. Pride is extra. Right effort is to get rid of something extra.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Pride, Practice, Effort

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.44, Shambhala Publications

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• The purpose of studying Buddhism is not to study Buddhism, but to study ourselves. That is why we have teaching. But the teaching is not ourselves. It is some explanation of ourselves. To study the teaching is to know yourselves. That is why we do not ever attach to the teaching, or to the teacher. The moment you meet a teacher you should leave the teacher, and you should be independent. You want a teacher so that you can be independent. So you study yourselves. You have the teacher for yourselves, not for the teacher.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Teacher, Teaching, Independent

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• Wabi means spare, impoverished; simple and functional. It connotes a transcendence of fad and fashion. The spirit of wabi imbues all the Zen arts, from calligraphy to karate, from the tea ceremony to Zen archery.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Fashion, Art, Mean

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• Instead of respecting things, we want to use them for ourselves and if it is difficult to use them, we want to conquer them.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Use, Want, Conquer

  "Not Always So: Practicing the True Spirit of Zen". Book by Shunryū Suzuki. Chapter: "Respect For Things", p. 81, 2002.

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

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Two, Secret

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• We do not exist for the sake of something else. We exist for the sake of ourselves.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Sake

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.9, Shambhala Publications

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• There should not be any particular teaching. Teaching is in each moment.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Teaching, Moments, Should

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.119, Shambhala Publications

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• Usually when someone believes in a particular religion, his attitude becomes more and more a sharp angle pointing away from himself. In our way the point of the angle is always toward ourselves.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Attitude, Believe, Way

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.62, Shambhala Publications

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• From True Emptiness The Wondrous Being Appears

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Emptiness, Wondrous

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• The Zen way of calligraphy is to write in the most straightforward, simple way as if you were a beginner, not trying to make something skillful or beautiful, but simply writing with full attention as if you were discovering what you were writing for the first time; then your full nature will be in your writing.

  Shunryu Suzuki

  Beautiful, Time, Nature

  Shunryu Suzuki (2010). “Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind”, p.14, Shambhala Publications

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