Category: Mind

Buddhism, desire, Enlightenment, Happiness, illusion, Meditation, Mind, poisons, Practice, true self, Truth, Zen

Q122. What are the antidotes for the three poisons against happiness?

Zen Fools

A. The antidote for the poison of ignorance is wisdom, which means the ability to see everything as it is. That enables us to see a piece of broken rope as a piece of broken rope and rotten food as rotten food.

The antidote for the poison of greed is the precepts, which aim to control greed. We should suppress greed artificially before getting enlightened. To obey the precepts in the strictest sense, however, is not to suppress greed artificially but to have no greed to control through realising that everything is an illusion. Only then can we be said to obey the precepts. For example, when we have the wisdom to see everything as it is, we don’t have any desire to run away from the piece of broken rope, or to chase after rotten food because we can see rope as rope and rotten food as rotten food.

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The antidote for the poison of anger is stillness, which naturally comes about when we obey the precepts. That is, when we obey the precepts, we have no greed. Then we need not struggle to fulfill our greed. When we don’t have to strive to satisfy our greed, there is no anger or disappointment that comes from the failure to meet our greed. Then our life becomes still.

In fact, the core of the three poisons is ignorance, and that of the three antidotes is the wisdom to see things as they are.
©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Enlightenment, Meditation, Mind, mindful, mindfulness, Zen

Q119. Does my mind use me or do I use my mind?

Zen Fools

A. Does the air move the wind or does the wind move the air? The air is to the wind what your mind is to you. You and your mind are not two but one just like the air and the wind are. As the action of the air is the wind, so the action of your mind is you.

What matters here is that you think that you are separate from your mind and that you should cultivate your mind, just like taming a wild animal. Trying to cultivate your mind can make matters worse because it implies that you and your mind are separate from each other and the former tries to tame the latter. This is a very common mistake that people make because they don’t know what their mind is.

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You should try to know what your mind is before trying to control it. How can you do that while not knowing what it is? The moment you realise your mind, you will feel oneness with your mind just as the wind is with the air.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Enlightenment, illusion, Meditation, Mind, mindful, mindfulness, self, true self, Truth, Zen

Q118. Where is the true-self when my mind is full of illusions?

Zen Fools

A. Your mind is no other than the true-self and all the illusions are the actions of your mind. What matters here is that, while saying that your mind is full of illusions, you, in fact, don’t know what your mind is. If you knew it clearly, you could be said to be enlightened.

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In order to know your mind clearly, try to trace illusions back to their root and know it clearly instead of trying to avoid or remove them in vain. Their root is your mind, which is the true-self. So you, it is said, can realise your true-self through illusions.
©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Enlightenment, final goal, illusion, meditaion, Meditation, Mind, Practice, true self, Truth, Zen

Q107. Can we realise the true-self through logic? If not, why not?

Zen Fools

A. Your logic, however perfect it may be, might enable you to explain that everything is empty, but it prevents you from reaching the final goal.
To see your true-self means to remove all illusions, but trying to build a perfect logic means strengthening your established illusions and adding to your illusions by creating new ones, or adopting the ones created by others. That is to go against your original intention of eliminating illusions, which is like fuelling a fire by pouring oil onto it, thereby making it more ferocious while intending to extinguish it. That is going in the opposite direction of your goal, against your intention.

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©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Meditation, Mind, Truth, Zen

Q89. How should we see things in order to remove our discriminating mind in everyday life?

Zen Fools

A. Supposing you see a vase and think it is very nice. Let’s take the phrase ‘the nice vase’ into account to see whether it is true or not.
Firstly, why is the object a vase? Is it the truth? The truth can’t be denied by anyone at any time. However, as you know, it can be anything else other than a vase according to when, where, how and by whom it is seen. It can be even a weapon in some situations. It is a vase not because the fact that it is a vase is an unchangeable and undeniable truth but because you labelled it as ‘vase’.

Now let’s consider, why is it nice? It might not be nice to others at all however nice you may think it is. It means it is nice not because its being nice is the truth but because you put a label ‘nice’ on it, which was created by your imagination.

In fact, it is not a vase, nor is it very nice unless you label it as a ‘nice vase’.
A nice vase is an illusion produced by your imagination.

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When you see or hear something good or bad, you should realise that ‘good or bad’ is not produced by the thing itself but by your discriminating mind.
©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway.

illusion, Koan, Meditation, Mind, Zen

Q74. What does ‘escape from the trap of birth and death’ mean?

Zen Fools

A. Birth and death are like the right and the left. There is no fixed right side and no fixed left side. The right can be the left anytime and the other way around. Besides, when we are not conscious of right and left, there is neither the right nor the left.

Nobody can deny the fact that we are part of the whole universe. Then is the universe dead or alive? It’s neither alive nor dead. Then are we, part of it, alive or dead? Though we define a given part of universe as birth or death, actually there is no birth and no death unless we divide the universe into many with the imaginary lines we produce.

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There is no birth and no death unless we are conscious of them. To conclude, to experience in person the fact that birth and death are nothing but an illusion, like the right and the left, is to escape from the trap of birth and death.

©Boo Ahm

illusion, Koan, Meditation, Mind, Zen

Q. 68 Life

Zen Fools

Life is sometimes sunny.
Life is sometimes moonlit.
Life is sometimes rainy.
Life is sometimes windy.
Life is sometimes snowy.
Life is sometimes cloudy.
Life is sometimes blooming.
Life is sometimes autumn-tinted.

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What is your life like at this moment?

Whatever your life is like,
All of these are from the same root, your mind.

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway.

illusion, Meditation, Mind, Zen

Q61. Masters say that we should eliminate discriminating mind. How can we live without discriminating mind?

Zen Fools

A. It seems to leave room for misunderstanding. It is impossible to live without discriminating mind in our everyday life. Our life is a series of discrimination every moment: crossing the street, buying things, meeting people and so forth. In a word we are living in the world created by a discriminating mind, which is also referred to as the world of illusion. The happiness and the success of our life can be said to depend on how good the decisions and choices that we make are, which rests on how well we discriminate things in our life. Our education is to provide us with the methods by which we can make good discrimination.

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When masters advise us to eliminate discriminating mind, they mean not that we should not discriminate at all but that we should see both the world of illusion and the world out of illusion at the same time. In order to see the world out of illusion, we should be able to stop discriminating, when we can see the essence of things which is covered with an illusion. When we can see not just the illusion of a thing but also the essence of it, we can make better decisions and choices in our life. That’s why masters are encouraging people to eliminate discriminating mind.

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway.

Buddhism, Mind, mindful, mindfulness, Practice, Truth, Zen

Q57. Do we have to do away with all illusions in order to see the truth?

Zen Fools

A. Absolutely not. You should know that escaping from illusions means not removing or destroying them but realising that all illusions are also the truth. We are apt to judge what seems, or sounds nice or holy, to be the truth and what seems bad or ugly to be an illusion. In fact everything we can see, hear, feel and imagine, whether good or bad and right or wrong, is the truth. There is nothing but the truth, which we can’t escape from even a moment. Not seeing it is much more difficult than seeing it.

Why can’t we see it? It is because our eyes are covered with the truth and not because it is too far away. In other words it is so near us that we don’t recognise it.

Don’t look away from illusions for the truth. That is to go after illusions turning your back on the truth. The truth is not separate from illusions. What you regard as illusions is the truth and what you look upon as the truth is illusions. Don’t try to do away with illusions. You can’t make it because they are not illusions but the truth. People who strive to eliminate illusions are those who don’t know what they are. How can you remove them when you don’t know what they are? Faced with what you think is an illusion, trace back to the root which the idea of the illusion stems from instead of making efforts to get rid of it. That is the very Zen practice.

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Never avoid illusions.
Never go after the truth.
If you stop avoiding and going after,
You will be motionless.
That is the way the truth is.

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway.