Eat Sleep Sit Quotes

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Eat Sleep Sit Quotes
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“The business of living is not in the least special. In a sense it all comes down to two things: eating and excreting. These activities are common to all life forms. Every creature on earth is born, through eating and excreting helps maintain the balance of the great chain of being, and dies. In the realm of nature, these activities are essential to the continuity of life, and they give value to each being's life. People are no different. If human life has meaning, it lies above all in the essential fact of our physical existence in this world. This is what I strongly believe.”
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
“Among all the thinking that human beings do, the question "Why?" has always been predominant. Undoubtedly it has played an enormous role in helping to bring about what we call progress. But in the course of each day's round of activities at Eiheiji, the question "Why?" is virtually meaningless. Delving into the rationale for every single action would mean that nothing ever got done smoothly. What is essential is to accept without question what you are taught to do, and throw yourself into it entirely. There is no room for subjectivity.”
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
“Soon after arriving, I realized that the life of an Eiheiji trainee was a never-ending succession of loud, angry tongue-lashings and beatings鈥攁 world away from my fond imaginings.”
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
“Every time I was pummeled, kicked, or otherwise done over, I felt a sense of relief, like an artificial pearl whose false exterior was being scraped away鈥攁n exterior that previously I had struggled fiercely to protect, determined not to let it be damaged or broken. Now that it was gone and I had nothing left to cover up or gloss over, I knew that whatever remained, exposed for all to see, was nothing less than my true self. The discovery of my own insignificance brought instant, indescribable relief.”
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
“Without going into the history of Zen, let it be said that the relationship between master and disciple has always been fraught with peril. The hapless disciple is beaten with a stick, kicked, slapped on the head with his teacher's sandal. But to revile all such actions as violence is too hasty a conclusion. Before an act can be labeled violent, its underlying purpose must be ascertained. A little thought will show that in the context of Zen discipline, the fundamental purpose of a beating or thrashing is not to inflict injury or pain. Such acts are rather a means of conveying living truth from body to body and mind to mind, a form of spiritual training and cultivation.”
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
“Those bound up in the self are broken down unrelentingly at Eiheiji through name-calling and thrashing. All the baggage people bring with them鈥攁cademic achievement, status, honor, possessions, even character鈥攊s slashed to bits, leaving them to sink to rock bottom and thus cast everything aside.”
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
“From the beginning, self-annihilation has been an important task imposed on Zen monks in everyday discipline. To cast aside the ego means to cast aside your selfhood, determinedly reducing yourself to nothing, all the while revering and obeying your seniors and carrying out your daily chores in perfect silence.”
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple
― Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple