You should forget all about any misunderstanding at the place where you are right now. Do you understand? You should forget this moment, and you should grow to the next—you should extend yourself to the next one. That is the only way. I think you must have understood our practice.
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.
You can’t stop at the top of the pole, and you can’t jump off. That is the problem. That is why you should practice, and you should forget all about the top of the pole. If so, where we should forget or throw our misunderstanding is right here. Not this way or that way or past or future. Right here.
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.
Don't Worry (Excessively) - DC riffs on not worrying excessively about undocumented immigrants and the ongoing election. Listen to the podcast here.
When you have some experience of enlightenment or something, you think we can rest here observing various sights at the top of a pole, forgetting all about continuing climbing. Usually, we think in that way, but actually, there is no top for anything. Things are continuously growing or changing to something else. Nothing exists in its own form or color. So actually, there is no top. When we think, “Here is a top,” that is already misunderstanding.
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.
by Lucien Samms
Paperback and ebook available exclusively at Barnes and Noble
Epictetus’ Stoicism (particularly The Discourses) and Shunryu Suzuki’s Zen Buddhism (especially Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind) have been my guides to living for the last 35 years.
The attached text is my attempt to show the inescapable and profound compatibility of the tenors of these two ways of living, a compatibility so often hidden by their distinct vehicles of presentation. Western students/practitioners of each (or both) of these ways of life will benefit, I believe, from better understanding my approach to Epictetus’ and Suzuki’s compatibility.
Though the immediate audience for the book is persons interested in Stoicism and Zen Buddhism, my hope is that the book will eventually appeal to a much wider audience, one interested in bearing and forbearing as a path to peace of mind and to living peacefully.
If time or inclination prevents you from providing feedback or from otherwise responding, I understand, and I wish you all the best.
Lucien Samms
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There is a very famous koan. A man climbed up to the top of a pole. If he stays there, he is not enlightened. When he jumps off from the top of the pole, he may be an enlightened one. How we understand this koan is how we understand our practice. Why we have something which should be taken out from us is because we stay here. Because you stay at the top of a pole, you have problems. But actually, there is no top for a pole—for actual pole continues endlessly forever. So, you cannot stop here, actually. —cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version. |
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You may feel as if you are fooled by me, but it is not so [laughs, laughter]. It is not a laughing matter. You know, we are seriously confronting our selfish desires, and we are always observing things in a wrong way. When we come to this point, it is necessary for us to understand our practice of shikantaza.
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.
Whatever you call it, that is another name of one reality. Even if you call it mountain or river, that is another name of one reality. So, we should not be fooled by words like “nature” or “result” or “buddhahood.” We should see things itself with a clear mind. In this way, we understand buddha-nature.
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.
We say, “evil desires,” [laughs], but it is another name of buddha-nature. For Buddha that is buddha-nature. There is of course, layman and priest [laughs]. Usually you understand in that way, but actually there is no particular person to be a priest, you know. Each one of you can be a priest, and I could be a layman. Just because I wear a robe I am a priest. Maybe because I behave like a priest, I am a priest. That’s all. There is no special person for priest or layman.
Tim Ford with Shunryu Suzuki at City Center Buddha Hall, maybe lay ordination ceremony 1970
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.
So “nature” or “outlook of things” are two names of one thing, one reality. Sometimes we say buddha-nature. Sometimes we say enlightenment or bodhi or buddha or attainment. But those are two sides of one reality. So, not only do we call it from those two sides, but also we call it, sometimes, “evil desire.”
Art by Paul Reps
—cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 69-04-20 as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.