Emptiness which is conceptually liable to be mistaken for sheer nothingness is in fact the reservoir of infinite possibilities.

When you find your place where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point.

A flower falls, even though we love it; and a weed grows, even though we do not love it.

In a mind clear as still water, even the waves, breaking, are reflecting its light.

To carry yourself forward and experience myriad things is delusion. That myriad things come forth and experience themselves is awakening.

To live is enough.

The true understanding is that the practice itself is enlightenment.

Birth and death are neither two things nor one thing. Life is not an appearance, death is not a disappearance.

If you cannot find the truth right where you are, where else do you expect to find it?

The way is basically perfect. It is not a matter of practice or enlightenment.

Without darkness, there is no light. Without the path, there is no arrival.

Just as parents care for their children, you should bear in mind the whole universe.

The mind of the past is ungraspable; the mind of the future is ungraspable; the mind of the present is ungraspable.

To be in harmony with the wholeness of things is not to have anxiety over imperfection.

The Buddha and all sentient beings are nothing but expressions of the one mind. There is nothing else.

The dharma wheel turns from the beginning. There is neither excess nor deficiency. The whole universe is moistened with nectar, and the truth is ready to harvest.

When dharma fills your body and mind, you realize that something is missing.

What Zen wants us to do is to acquire an entirely new point of view whereby to look into the mysteries of life and the secrets of nature.

The most important things in our practice are our physical posture and our way of breathing.

Buddhas and ordinary beings are not two. Enlightenment and delusion are not different paths.

Where is the place that your original face has not yet emerged?

Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone.

At the bottom of great doubt lies great awakening. If you doubt fully, you will awaken fully.

The basic idea of Zen is to come in touch with the inner workings of our being, and to do this in the most direct way possible, without resorting to anything external or superadded.

The zazen I speak of is not meditation practice. It is simply the dharma gate of joyful ease.

The color of the mountains is Buddha's body; the sound of running water is his great speech.

Personal experience is everything in Zen. No ideas are intelligible to those who have no backing of experience.

The mind is like a well-forged sword - it adapts to all situations.

The ocean does not reject any water; therefore it is great. The mountain does not select its stones; therefore it is great.

Technical knowledge is not enough. One must transcend techniques so that the art becomes an artless art, growing out of the unconscious.

When you walk in the mist, you get wet.

The practice of Zen is forgetting the self in the act of uniting with something.

Enlightenment is intimacy with all things.

Wherever you are, you are one with the clouds and one with the sun and the stars you see. You are one with everything. That is more true than I can say, and more true than you can hear.

The contradiction so puzzling to the ordinary way of thinking comes from the fact that we have to use language to communicate our inner experience, which in its very nature transcends linguistics.

If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything.

Everybody has the light of Buddha within, but they don't look for it.

The basic teaching of Buddhism is the teaching of transiency, or change.

The awareness that you are here, right now, is the ultimate fact.

Even if you speak of 'understanding,' this understanding is not a matter of knowledge. It is what fills the entire body and mind.

To live – is that not enough? To love – is that not everything?

The role of Zen is neither to stand above life nor to run away from it, but to face it with a spirit of determination.

The farther you enter into truth, the deeper it is.

To study the Way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by all things.

Intrinsically all living beings are Buddhas, just as ice and water are of the same substance.

The practice of Zen is forgetting the self in the act of uniting with something.

The world is its own magic.

The state of mind that exists when you sit in the right posture is, itself, enlightenment.

Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while one is peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality is just to peel the potatoes.

Life and death are of supreme importance. Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost. Each of us should strive to awaken. Awaken! Take heed, do not squander your life.

Leave your front door and your back door open. Allow your thoughts to come and go. Just don't serve them tea.

Zen in its essence is the art of seeing into the nature of one's own being, and it points the way from bondage to freedom.

The silence between the notes is as important as the notes themselves.

The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in one dewdrop on the grass.

If you forget yourself, you become the universe.

Do not follow the ideas of others, but learn to listen to the voice within yourself.

Time passes unhindered. When we make ourselves better, we make the world better.

Zen proposes its solution by directly appealing to facts of personal experience and not to book-knowledge.

Moment after moment, completely devote yourself to listening to your inner voice.

The treasure house within you contains everything, and you are free to use it. You don't need to seek outside.