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Monday, February 9, 2026

Shadows of the Mind

If you firmly believe in scientific truth, and are caught by the scientific way of life, you have no idea what true mind is. You are always chasing after a shadow of the mind. A philosophical interpretation or psychological interpretation of your mind is just a shadow of the mind, but you firmly believe in it. So, you mistake LSD for enlightenment [laughs]. If the Sixth Patriarch were here, he might say, “With such people I cannot talk.”

cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the image. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 65-07-30-B as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. These posts are also on Bluesky, Facebook and Instagram. We are continually working on improving the quality of transcriptions of Suzuki's lectures. After a new "verbatim transcript" is made, we create a minimally edited version which is more readable. See the most recently completed transcripts at shunryusuzuki.com/n.