In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few.

The true path is not difficult; just avoid picking and choosing.

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

Zen is a way of life, not a theory or a piece of knowledge to be stored away in our minds.

In the spring, hundreds of flowers; in autumn, a harvest moon; in the summer, a refreshing breeze; in winter, snow will accompany you. If useless things do not hang in your mind, any season is a good season for you.

If you want to climb a mountain, begin at the top.

The purpose of studying Buddhism is not to study Buddhism, but to study ourselves.

Where there is great doubt, there is great awakening; small doubt, small awakening; no doubt, no awakening.

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

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

Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone.

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

Nothing we see or hear is perfect. But right there in the imperfection is perfect reality.

The mind has first to be attuned to the Unconscious.

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

Enlightenment is intimacy with all things.

When the mind is ready to understand, the truth will come to meet it.

When you do something, you should burn yourself completely, like a good bonfire, leaving no trace of yourself.

In Zen there must be satori; there must be a general mental upheaval which destroys the old accumulations of intellection and lays down the foundation for a new life.

As long as you seek for something, you will get the shadow of reality and not reality itself.

Life is an art, and like perfect art it should be self-forgetting.

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

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

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

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

Each of you is perfect the way you are... and you can use a little improvement.

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

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

The archer ceases to be conscious of himself as the one who is engaged in hitting the bull's-eye which confronts him. This state of unconsciousness is realized only when, completely empty and rid of the self, he becomes one with the perfecting of his technical skill.

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

This very body is the Buddha. And this very earth the lotus paradise.

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

The mind is the root from which all things grow. If you can understand the mind, everything else is included.

Study how water flows in a valley stream, smoothly and freely between the rocks.

The best way to control people is to encourage them to be mischievous. Then they will be in control in a wider sense.

We should find perfect existence through imperfect existence.

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

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

Zen is not necessarily against words, but it is well aware of their limitations.

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

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

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

Only when you can be extremely pliable and soft can you be extremely hard and strong.

Whoever told you that practice and enlightenment are separate?

The practice of Zen mind is beginner's mind. In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities; in the expert's mind there are few.

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

The mind of the beginner is empty, free of the habits of the expert, ready to accept, to doubt, and open to all the possibilities.

To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things.

When you walk in the mist, you get wet.

Zazen is not step-by-step meditation. Rather it is simply the easy and pleasant practice of a Buddha, the realization of the Buddha's Wisdom.

When you listen to someone, you should give up all your preconceived ideas and your subjective opinions.

The true purpose of Zen is to see things as they are, to observe things as they are, and to let everything go as it goes.

The obstacle is the path.

In the spiritual world there are no time divisions such as the past, present and future; for they have contracted themselves into a single moment of the present where life quivers in its true sense.

When you practice zazen you should not try to attain anything. You should just sit in the complete calmness of your mind and not rely on anything.

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

The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.

Zen teaches nothing; it merely enables us to wake up and become aware. It does not teach, it points.

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

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