D. T. Suzuki Quotes
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When the identity is realized, I as swordsman see no opponent confronting me and threatening to strike me. I seem to transform myself into the opponent, and every movement he makes as well as every thought he conceives are felt as if they were my own and I intuitively...know when and how to strike him.
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Zen, in its essence is the art of seeing into the nature of one's own being, and it points the way from bondage to freedom. By making us drink right from the fountain of life it liberates us from all the yokes under which we finite beings are usually suffering in this world.
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We have two eyes to see two sides of things, but there must be a third eye which will see everything at the same time and yet not see anything. That is to understand Zen.
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Among the most remarkable features characterizing Zen we find these: spirituality, directness of expression, disregard of form or conventionalism, and frequently an almost wanton delight in going astray from respectability.
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Unless we agree to suffer we cannot be free from suffering.
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Zen professes itself to be the spirit of Buddhism, but in fact it is the spirit of all religions and philosophies.
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Let the intellect alone, it has its usefulness in its proper sphere, but let it not interfere with the flowing of the life-stream.
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When we start to feel anxious or depressed, instead of asking, "What do I need to get to be happy?" The question becomes, "What am I doing to disturb the inner peace that I already have?"
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Zen teaches nothing; it merely enables us to wake up and become aware. It does not teach, it points.
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To point at the moon a finger is needed, but woe to those who take the finger for the moon.
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To be a good Zen Buddhist it is not enough to follow the teaching of its founder; we have to experience the Buddha's experience.
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Because since the beginningless past we are running after objects, not knowing where our Self is, we lose track of the Original Mind and are tormented all the time by the threatening objective world, regarding it as good or bad, true or false, agreeable or disagreeable. We are thus slaves of things and circumstances.
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You ought to know how to rise above the trivialities of life, in which most people are found drowning themselves.
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When mountain-climbing is made too easy, the spiritual effect the mountain exercises vanishes into the air.
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Until we recognize the SELF that exists apart from who we think we are - we cannot know the Ch'an ( ZEN ) MIND
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Zen Makes use, to a great extent, of poetical expressions; Zen is wedded to poetry.
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Not to be bound by rules, but to be creating one's own rules-this is the kind of life which Zen is trying to have us live.
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Zen is the spirit of a man. Zen believes in his inner purity and goodness. Whatever is superadded or violently torn away, injures the wholesomeness of the spirit. Zen, therefore, is emphatically against all religious conventionalism.
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The waters are in motion, but the moon retains its serenity.
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Facts of experience are valued in Zen more than representations, symbols, and concepts-that is to say, substance is everything in Zen and form nothing.
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The mind has first to be attuned to the Unconscious.
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The meaning of service is to do the work assigned ungrudgingly and without thought of personal reward material or moral.
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Zen has no business with ideas.
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That's why I love philosophy: no one wins.