Proverbs

Eat your bowl of rice slowly enough, and you will see light coming out of it. The student who has not seen this light has not yet eaten — only swallowed.

A person who drinks water knows for themselves whether it is hot or cold.

The Great Way is not difficult for those who hold no preferences. When love and hate are both absent, everything stands forth, transparent and undisguised.

After the mosquito has bored into the iron ox, the question becomes: where is the mosquito now? Find that mosquito, and the iron ox stands up and walks.

The frog in the well knows nothing of the great ocean.

Don't side with yourself.

What is the sound of one hand clapping? Listen until the listening becomes the only sound in the room.

Sit with such concentration that even a frog is your teacher. The frog jumps when it must; you sit when you must; the koan is the same in both.

Zen is not some kind of excitement, but concentration on our usual everyday routine.

What I bring from the south of India is not a doctrine, not a name, not a robe. It is a silence that travels with the breath, and is given again whenever the breath reaches the next breath.

A day without work is a day without food. When my disciples hid my tools, I sat at the table and pushed the bowl away. They returned the tools the next morning.

A pilgrim asked me to write a single phrase of the highest wisdom. I wrote: Attention. He said: that is all? I wrote: Attention, Attention. He said: but they look the same. I wrote: Attention, Attention, Attention.