sharvil
Forum Senior
Topics: 23
Posts: 122
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The first task I was given was to sweep the garden with a bamboo broom…So I grasped my broom and swept mightily and soon had a mountain of leaves. I asked “Roshi, where should I put all this rubbish?” hoping he would see how good I had been. He immediately roared, “Leaves are not rubbish!...Go to the shed and bring any empty charcoal sacks you find there.” Coming back, I found the Roshi vigorously raking through the pile of leaves so that any stones or gravel fell to the bottom. He then took the sacks and filled them to the very last leaf, packing them tightly with his fee. “Now go put these back in the shed,” he said. “They are kindling for the bath fire.”
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When I …came back I saw the Roshi squatting on the ground picking out the small stones from what remained. When he had carefully gathered them together to the last tiny pebble, he said, “Now put these beneath the eaves.”…I was still quite sure that the remaining lumps of earth and scraps of moss could serve no useful purpose. Yet the Roshi just collected them together without fuss and placed them on the palm of his hand. Searching patiently, he put the lumps of earth into depressions in the ground, and then firmed them in with his foot until nothing remained. He said, “Now do you understand a little? Originally, there is no rubbish in either men or things.” This was the first teaching I received form zuigan Roshi.
The Roshi’s words that originally there is no rubbish either in men or in things actually comprise the basic truth of Buddhism.
-Morinaga Soko, in Zen: Tradition and Transition.
When we are driving, we tend to think of arriving, and we sacrifice the journey for the sake of the arrival. But life is to be found in the present moment, not in the future. In fact, we may suffer more after we arrive at our destination. If we have to talk of a destination, what about our final destination, the graveyard? We do not want to go in the direction of death; we want to go in the direction of life. But where is life? Life can be found only in the present moment. Therefore, each mil we drive, each step we take, has to bring us into the present moment. This is the practice of mindfulness.
When we see a red light or a stop sign, we can smile at it and thank it, because it is a bodhisattva helping us return to the present moment. The red light is a bell of mindfulness. We may have thought of it as an enemy, preventing us from achieving our goal. But now we know the red light is our friend, helping us resist rushing and calling us to return to the present moment where we can meet with life, joy and peace.
-Thich Nhat Hanh, Present moment, Wonderful moment.
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Be POSITVE, thats my blood group
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| vanshita
Forum Guru
Topics: 23
Posts: 824
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its right life is found in present moment not in the future
enjoy each & every moment of life
forget past live in present think about future
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