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

There is no need to have a deep understanding of Zen. Even though you read much Zen literature, you must read each sentence with a fresh mind.

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

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

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

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

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

The true understanding is that the practice itself is enlightenment.

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

When you are you, Zen is Zen. Big mind is just big mind.

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

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

Whoever told you that practice and enlightenment are separate?

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

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.

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

The fundamental delusion of humanity is to suppose that I am here and you are out there.

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.

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

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 world is its own magic.

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

Do not think you will necessarily be aware of your own enlightenment.

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

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

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

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.

Just to be alive is enough.

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

Not knowing how near the truth is, we seek it far away.

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.

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

The obstacle is the path.

If you forget yourself, you become the universe.

Who would then deny that when I am sipping tea in my tearoom I am swallowing the whole universe with it and that this very moment of my lifting the bowl to my lips is eternity itself transcending time and space?

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

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.

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

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.

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.

We should find perfect existence through imperfect existence.

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