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

Meditation in the midst of activity is a thousand times superior to meditation in stillness.

The most important point is to accept yourself and stand on your two feet.

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

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

Should you desire the great tranquility, prepare to sweat white beads.

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.

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

The eye with which I see Buddha is the same eye with which Buddha sees me.

When walking, just walk. When sitting, just sit. Above all, don't wobble.

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

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

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

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

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 truth of Zen is the truth of life, and life means to live, to move, to act, not merely to reflect.

If you forget yourself, you become the universe.

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

What is the sound of one hand clapping?

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

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.

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

The idea of Zen is to catch life as it flows. There is nothing extraordinary or mysterious about Zen. I raise my hand; I take a book from the other side of the desk; I hear the boys playing ball outside my window; I see the clouds blown away beyond the neighboring wood: all these I do in Zen.

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

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

The mind has first to be attuned to the Unconscious.

The more you suffer the deeper grows your character, and with the deepening of your character you read the more penetratingly into the secrets of life.

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken.

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

The instant you speak about a thing, you miss the mark.

When both body and mind are at peace, all things appear as they are: perfect, complete, lacking nothing.

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

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

What we call "I" is just a swinging door which moves when we inhale and when we exhale.

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

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

This is the real secret of life -- to be completely engaged with what you are doing in the here and now. And instead of calling it work, realize it is play.

Just to be alive is enough.

The world is its own magic.

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

The superior person is like water, bringing benefit to all without competing.

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

Instead of having a deep understanding of the teaching, we need a strong confidence in our teaching, which says that originally we have Buddha nature.

When you realize how perfect everything is, you will tilt your head back and laugh at the sky.

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 true person is not anyone in particular. But like the deep blue color of the limitless sky, it is everyone, everywhere in the world.

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

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.

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

Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone.

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

Treat every moment as your last. It is not preparation for something else.

Your own treasure house contains everything you need; why search outside?

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

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.

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.

To live is enough.

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.