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Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind
FleaMarket
Veteran
Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind by Suzuki Roshi
Found this and I'm not finished yet but currently going through it. So far it's quite useful and wanted to share/discuss.
"Best use of a beginners mind is keeping it"
-How
"In the beginners mind there are many possibilities, in the expert's mind there are few."
-Jeroen
"I'm no beginner, I've been doing this for months!"
-Me probably
You got those from this book didn't you? Any more good ones?
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To accept some idea of truth without experiencing it is like a painting of a cake on paper which you cannot eat.
Shunryu Suzuki
I have had cake like that, reminds me of eucharist
Everything is perfect, but there is a lot of room for improvement.
Shunryu Suzuki
Ah ha … that means better cake …
Leave your front door and your back door open.
Allow your thoughts to come and go.
Just don't serve them tea.
Unless they bring cake?
https://www.azquotes.com/quote/1378828
“What we call "I" is just a swinging door which moves when we inhale and when we exhale.”
― Shunryu Suzuki
“Emotionally we have many problems, but these problems are not actual problems; they are something created; they are problems pointed out by our self-centered ideas or views.”
― Shunryu Suzuki
“The true purpose [of Zen] is to see things as they are, to observe things as they are, and to let everything go as it goes... Zen practice is to open up our small mind.”
― Shunryu Suzuki
There’s a lot of good stuff packed in that small volume. I wouldn’t get too caught up in everything about posture, what happens in the mind is more truly Zen than the perfected art of sitting.
He is quite succinct which I really enjoy. It's been an invigorating listen so far and I feel the beginners mind being fed. Though I did find myself lost in chasing perfect posture for a couple days per his instruction. I think you're right though. My contemplations have been very posture-laden after hearing his instructions which has distracted me some. I can be a bit try-hard about it.
His talk on small mind and big mind along with everything IS Buddha nature was very helpful for me in connecting the concepts as well. I keep coming back to this idea of being an organ or cell in a body. Like, I have this individual way of being among many other individuals but I am also inescapably part of this bigger connected thing. When my organ-self is healthy and works in harmony, the body benefits as well.
Beautiful
Some cultures put a lot of attention on the minutia of a meditative posture.
It is not uncommon when folks first run into these posture prescriptions of formal meditative positions to think that they all need to be right or there is a problem, but the underlying purpose is actually to have our attention on the various aspects of the body to be no less embracing than the attention that we more commonly apply to the mind.
The mind can be likened to a Primadonna, mostly occupied with commandeering most of the space on the stage that we call life.
Meditative practice can simply describe that process of returning a more collegial usage of that stage space back to the other actors that represent all that we see, hear, smell, taste, and feel of life.
To the degree that such a balance can be manifested, equanimity becomes possible.
To this degree, zen is as much or is as little of posture as it is of mind.
Body & mind are....
Body & mind are....what you think you are.
Not-mind and not-body is… what?
“For Zen you do not need a book; the sound of the rain needs no translation.”
— Alan Watts
breath and body …
going from @how excellent post
At the moment I am breathing and forcing that through mantra (Almost silent but not quite). My body in part is needing attention, which it gets through the qi ong movement
In time I hope to return to Shikantaza and waking walking meditation …
… and now back to us beginners …