In theology, the ancient Greek scholar, Xenophanes of Colophon, satirized traditional anthropomorphism, remarking that each race represented its gods in its own image. He concluded that, if horses could draw, they would draw their gods looking like horses. We have to imagine using our minds, but our imagination is limited by our experience.
Politeness is a poor virtue, if it is actuated only by a fear of offending good taste; whereas it should be the outward manifestation of a sympathetic regard for the feelings of others ... Confucius himself has repeatedly taught that external appurtenances are as little a part of propriety as sounds are of music.
...a human being is a vulnerable creature, who cannot possible be perfect. After he dies, he returns to the elements - to earth, to water, to fire, to wind, to air. Matter is void. All is vanity. We are like blade of grass or tree of the forest, creations of the universe, and the spirit of the universe has neither life nor death. Vanity is the only obstacle to life.
Timeless awareness entails (a) understanding that the way in which phenomena actually abide is, from the ultimate perspective, free of all limitations imposed by elaborations of origination, cessation, and so forth; (b) realization of the nonexistence of the two kinds of identity; and (c) unerring knowledge of sugatagarbha as utter lucidity, the way in which things actually abide, beyond any context of speculative value judgments. It is on this awareness that one should rely.
Ordinary consciousness entails (a) belief that what one immediately perceives constitutes something truly existent; (b) conceptualization in terms of characteristics, such as the sense of personal identity and the mind-body aggregates; and (c) mental states that are conditioned, for example, by attitudes of naively fixating on the pleasures of the senses. One should not rely on such consciousness.
Real people know how to deem the self great and the world small. They esteem self-government and disdain governing others. They do not let things disturb their harmony, and they do not let desires derange their feelings.
Enlightenment is not anything new or something we create or bring into existence. It is simply discovering within us what is already there. It is the full realization of our intrinsic nature. In Tibetan, buddha is sang gyay. Sang means that all of the faults have been cleared away, while gyay means “full realization”; just as from darkness, the moon waxes, likewise from ignorance, the qualities of the mind’s intrinsic nature emerge.
We solidify our projected reality and endlessly create a world of confusion, struggle, and limitation. Perhaps the most common experience of this occurs when we exaggerate and fantasize the qualities of something. It leads to disappointment and frustration when the object is unattainable, and disillusionment when its actual nature shows through the veneer of our fantasy.
While most bugeisha sought only to perfect their physical techniques, Yagyu Muneyoshi, while still in his teens, found swordsmanship to be a means of quieting his fears and inner doubts. Instead of practicing a cut only to achieve proficiency in it, he would remain in the dojo long after his lessons were done, repeating again and again the movement he had been taught, losing himself to it until his consciousness was consumed in the action. Then, beyond the ragged breath, under the painful muscles, he discovered a peaceful flowing quiet within the violence of the swordsmanship. ...through the efforts of his own practice, he was beginning to sense... [that] ...the way of the sword was not in physical techniques, not in victory on the battlefield, but in the realm of the spiritual.
Myths are nothing but faces of human experience. If the figure of the fighting hero has been so deeply entrenched in the imagination of our ancestors and has not stopped fascinating us even today, it is because it talks in a language that our souls understand well.
Because it is a reality that we are by nature social animals, bound to depend on each other, we need to cultivate affection and concern for other people if we really desire peace and happiness. Look at wild animals and birds. Even they travel together, flock together, and help each other. Bees do not have a particular legal system, they do not follow any spiritual practice, but for their livelihood and survival they depend on each other -- that is their natural way of existence. Even though we intelligent human beings must also depend on each other, we sometimes misuse our intelligence and try to exploit each other. That goes against human nature. For those of us who profess to believe in a particular religious practice, it is extremely important that we try to help each other and cultivate a feeling of affection for each other. That is the source of happiness in our life.
It’s important to differentiate a thought from an emotion. We say things such as, “I feel like they don’t accept me.” Actually, that is a thought. We may feel hurt or frustrated, and it’s because we’re thinking that others don’t accept us. How do we know they don’t accept us? We don’t. We haven’t asked them. Instead, on the basis of how they looked at us or a comment they made, our mind constructs a story that we believe.
As soon as you hear yourself saying, “I feel like... ,” stop and recognize that you can’t “feel like” something. You are thinking. After you have identified the thought, ask yourself, “Is that true? How do I know it’s true? What evidence do I have to prove the validity of that thought?” It’s really startling to see how often we assume our interpretation of a situation is true when in fact it is based on flimsy evidence.
Since emptiness, from between positive and negative phenomena, is a negative phenomenon and, from between affirming negatives and non-affirming negatives, is a non-affirming negative, when it appears to the mind, nothing will appear except an absence of such inherent existence—a mere elimination of the object of negation. Thus, for the mind of a person realizing emptiness there is no sense of, “I am ascertaining emptiness,” and there is no thought, “This is emptiness.” If you had such a sense, emptiness would become distant. Nevertheless, the emptiness of inherent existence is ascertained and realized.
After such realization, even though whatever phenomena appear appear to exist in their own right, you understand that they do not exist that way. You have a sense that they are like a magician’s illusions in that there is a combination of their appearing one way but actually existing another way. Though they appear to exist inherently, you understand that they are empty of inherent existence.
When phenomena are seen this way, the conceptions that superimpose a sense of goodness or badness on phenomena beyond what is actually there and serve as a basis for generating desire and hatred lessen; this is because they are based on the misconception that phenomena are established in their own right.
Power is often scorned as something to be avoided in spiritual circles, yet secretly it may be wished for.
...when we ignore or deny personal power because we are afraid, it is driven into the Shadow. Once split off from conscious acknowledgement, power is then even more destructive and abusive.
Owning our power is truly acknowledging and being responsible for our capacity to be effective.
[Aspects of Taoist philosophy are] analogous to [Peter] Kropotkin's anarchy. If each thing follows its own li (organic order) it will harmonize with all other things following theirs, not by reason of rule imposed from above but by their mutual resonance and interdependence.
