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Not red

The flower is not red,
nor is the willow green.

– Zen saying

There is nothing

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Things are entirely what they appear to be and behind them
there is nothing.

– Sartre

Everything is sufficient

Without desire everything is sufficient.
With seeking myriad things are impoverished.
Plain vegetables can soothe hunger.
A patched robe is enough to cover this bent old body.
Alone I hike with a deer.
Cheerfully I sing with village children.
The stream under the cliff cleanses my ears.
The pine on the mountain top fits my heart.

– Ryokan

Hope of a better past

Forgiveness means giving up all hope of a better past.

– Jack Kornfield

Life is a daring adventure

Security is mostly superstition.
It does not exist in nature, nor do children as a whole experience it.
Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure.
Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.

– Helen Keller

To know or not to know

The seeker says, “I do not know.”
That takes honesty.

The master says, “I do not know.”
That takes a mystic’s mind that knows things through non-knowing.

The disciple says, “I know.”
That takes ignorance, in the form of borrowed knowledge.

– Anthony de Mello

The folly is under control

A man or woman of knowledge sweats and puffs like any ordinary person.
Yet the folly of their life is under control.

Don Juan

The principal element of creation

Most people believe the mind to be a mirror, more or less accurately reflecting the world outside of them, not realizing on the contrary that the mind is itself the principal element of creation.

– Rabindranath Tagore

Unshaken by the wind

As a mountain is unshaken by the wind,
so the heart of a wise person is unmoved by all the changes on this earth.

– Buddha