#zen

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🖋️ New Blog Post: The Four Statements of Zen

What do these four cryptic lines—often attributed to Bodhidharma—really mean?

“Directly pointing to the mind-heart.”

In this article, I explore their historical origin, textual meaning, and practical relevance in our distracted, digital age.

Includes character-by-character translation and insight from my teacher, Zen Master Chang Sik Kim.

📖 Read the full post:

👉 https://www.mindlightway.org/zen-history-blog/zen-history-4-statements-of-zen.

🙏 If this supports your practice, consider sharing or supporting the Mind Light Way School of Zen.

Chineses calligraphy of the four statements of Zen

May 27 Think of something really boring. Now try to describe it in an interesting way.

I looked down at the sink. Snow-white bubbles spilled over the frying pan lid. Rainbow slicks slid across the open water.

When I put my hands in the water, it was warm. It had cooled enough not to scorch me but hadn’t cooled too much. It was the right temperature to wash a baby in. But today there was no baby, just a grease pan.

Taking the frying pan, I scowled at the burnt crust on it. Time for Zen meditation on housework.

If I ever ran a zendo... there would be cats.

To have any level of achievement in my school, you'd have to prove that you can sit zazen without being disturbed by the cat or cats who would cuddle up next to you, drape their paws over your ankles as you sit on the cushion.

Surely, if you can't face the Reality of the Universe™️while managing a cat on your lap, you have not achieved any reasonable level of mastery. 🙏

reviewed The Miracle of Mindfulness by Thích Nhất Hạnh

Thích Nhất Hạnh: The Miracle of Mindfulness (AudiobookFormat, 2017, Penguin Audio)

In this beautifully written book, Buddhist monk and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Thích Nhất Hạnh …

Sage Guidance for Practitioners at All Experience Levels

I've read from others that they consider Thích Nhất Hạnh's The Miracle of Mindfulness to be useful only to beginning meditators, but I think it is so much more than that. Especially with the context given in translator Mobi Ho's introduction that the book was originally written as a long letter, and then having read the book myself as someone who has been meditating for years, it is clear to me that the book is equally valuable or perhaps even more valuable as an inspiring reminder to practice and how practice can be done.

Beyond the main text of the letter, I was impressed by the list of practices and the selection of suttas/sutras at the end. I have read very few manuals of meditation which left with the feeling that they were enough to cultivate a practice, but this one is written and put together in such a …

"Entanglement"

All life is entangled, connected, entwined.
No matter how different, we're all one.

Tooll3 particles - 4 million - flow through space and time, and I tried to capture the emotion with my EWI USB and Respiro.

Give your soul some space to breath. 🙏

5 thin parallel blue lines are wound around in loops, emanating 4 million particles into space, where the winds of time and change form them into beautiful organic flowing structures. They start out blue and over time become red. Where they are concentrated they glow white. Black background.