Dogen Zenji says, “Don’t practice your way as if you were a blind man trying to figure out what an elephant is.” A real elephant is not a trunk or rope or fan or wall. But a blind man may think an elephant is like a wall or rope or trunk. But a real elephant is none of those. Over and over, we have to start our zazen because we are always liable to practice zazen like a blind man.
Drawing by Stan White
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the photo. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 68-10-12-B as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.
