If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music he hears, however measured or far away.

Here is a calm so deep, grasses cease waving… the sun shines not on us but in us. The rivers flow not past, but through us, thrilling, tingling, vibrating every fiber and cell of our bodies, making them glide and sing. Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares drop off like autumn leaves.

With our thoughts, we make the world.

There’s no need to go outside.
Be melting snow.
Wash yourself of yourself.
A white flower grows in the quietness,
Let your tongue become that flower.
Lay down your head.
Then one by one let go of all distractions.
Embrace the light and let it guide you
beyond the winds of desire.
There you will find a spring and nourished by its sea waters
like a tree you will bear fruit forever.

External changes don’t matter if there are no internal changes.

We have nothing to fear, but fear itself

An individual’s harmony with his or her own deep self requires not merely a journey to the interior but a harmonizing with the environmental world

Let the beauty of what you love be what you do

I beg you . . . . to have patience with
everything unresolved in your heart
and try to love the questions themselves
as if they were locked rooms or books
written in a foreign language. Don’t search
for the answers, which could not be given you
now, because you would not be able
to live them. And the point is, to live
everything. Live the questions now.
Perhaps then, some day far in the future,
you will gradually without ever knowing it,
live your way into the answers.

I hope that my work will encourage self expression in others
and stimulate the search for beauty and creative excitement in the great world around us

You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing which you think you cannot do.

Your grief for what you’ve lost lifts a mirror
Up to where you’re bravely working.
Expecting the worst, you look, and instead,
Here’s the joyful face you’ve been wanting to see.
Your hand opens and closes and opens and closes.
If it were always a fist or always stretched open,
You would be paralyzed.
Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding.
The two as beautifully balanced and coordinated
As bird wings.

When I look inside and see that I am empty, that is wisdom.
When I look outside and see that I am everything, that is love.
Between those two, my life turns.

Many persons have a wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.

When one tugs at a single thing in nature,
he finds it attached to the rest of the world.

We will be known forever by the tracks we leave.

In the wilderness is the preservation of the world.

You must give birth to your images.
They are the future waiting be born.
Fear not the strangeness you feel.
The future must enter you
long before it happens
Just wait for the birth,
For the hour of new clarity.

Beyond Hope
Don’t wish for perfect health. In perfect health, there is greed and wanting. So an ancient said, Make good medicine from the suffering of sickness. Don’t hope for life without problems. An easy life results in a judgmental and lazy mind. So an ancient once said, Accept the anxieties and difficulties of this life. Don’t expect your practice to be clear of obstacles. Without hindrances the mind that seeks enlightenment may be burnt out. So an ancient once said, Attain deliverance in disturbances.
Zen Master Kyong Ho [ 1849-1912], in Thousand Peaks

The purpose of life, after all, is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experiences.

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you did’nt do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.

Wanderer, your footsteps are the road,
and nothing more; wanderer, there is not road,
the road is made by walking.
By walking one makes the road,
and upon glancing behind
one sees the path
that never will be trod again.
Wanderer, there is no road–
Only wakes upon the sea.

Our practice should be like a flowing river.
constant, always fluid.
Not like a bubble-
It is fleeting, and pops…

Thus strangely are our souls constructed,
and by such slight ligaments are we bound
to prosperity or ruin.

Direct your eye right inward and you will
find a thousand regions in your mind
yet undiscovered. Travel them and be
expert in home-cosmography.

“There is a river flowing now very fast. It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore. They will feel they are being torn apart, and they will suffer greatly.

Know the river has its destination. The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river, keep our eyes open, and our heads above the water. See who is in there with you and celebrate.

At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally. Least of all, ourselves. For the moment that we do, our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.

The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves!

Banish the word struggle from your attitude and your vocabulary.

All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration.
We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”

A person’s life purpose is nothing more than to rediscover, through the detours of art, or love, or passionate work, those one or two images in the presence of which his heart first opened.

“Until he extends his circle of compassion to include all living things,
man will not himself find peace”

The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another.