The issue is not what you're doing with your body; it's what you're doing with your mind.
The anti-pleasure movement in self-discovery is very strong. I have big news for them, if they ever get to enlightenment, which is unlikely the way they're approaching it, they're going to find that enlightenment is very pleasurable.
In Tantric Buddhism our feeling is that there is no problem with the sensual world unless you have a tremendous attraction or aversion to it.
Sex is like any other transaction, except that it is not like any other transaction.
The most important thing is sensitivity. Many people have sex and don't feel anything, and that seems kind of sad to me. The answer is not necessarily the avoidance of sex, but learning to be sensitive and to love and to care.
Some people, of course, say they're practicing tantra. There are a lot of books on tantric sexual practice in local bookstores. These are usually pretty silly books.
Celibacy doesn't make you enlightened, otherwise every nun or priest in Buddhism or Christianity would be enlightened. People who don't date and can't get any action would be enlightened.
The sensual experiences in life are not to be avoided. This is the philosophy of Tantric Buddhism - nor are they particularly to be sought after.
To look for truth in all the wrong and all the right places is the only excuse for living.
There is no ultimate objective reality within the ten thousand states of mind. Most people don't like to hear this. But there are ten thousand realities, and each is definitely unifying.
Eternity is everywhere, it stretches endlessly in all directions, never beginning and never ending. Merge with it. Embrace it. Be free and disciplined.
When your Japanese lifetime is coming out, drink all the sake you want. Have a little bash.
Thousands and thousands of incarnations and nothing to show for it. You must choose whether to follow the path of love or the path of attachment.
There is competition in Zen. Let's not be ridiculous. There is competition in everything in life; being a winner in Zen means, competing and winning in the world of enlightenment.
Zen students see themselves as athletes. Their competitive sport is enlightenment; only with enlightenment do we compete.
The world that you see is like a motion picture. We are engrossed in a film and we have forgotten that we're sitting in a movie theatre.
Discriminate between the transient and the eternal. Learn to move from complete control to complete abandon.
When you realize your own emptiness, that will be something, won't it?
What is perfect? From the Zen mind, perfection is not being there.
The reason you see yourself as a creep is because you have an appreciation of what perfection is, whereas no one else conceives of themselves in that way, since they don't even strive.
Perfection is not a final state. It is a state of mind. There are ten thousand states of mind.
Stop trying to figure it all. Why worry about it all so much? Why not just live? And then you die. And then you live again, unless, of course, you follow me.
I'm not exactly sure where we are, but I'm confident of where we're not.
You're not the doer. What's to do? You can't undo what's not done. It's all one anyway, why think about it? But you need to discriminate, so you'd better think about it.
A person trying to meditate is doing something that's impossible since meditation is not an action.
