Don’t Know, No Problem

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Human beings have too much understanding. Too much understanding, too much have problems. Little bit understanding, little problem. If you don’t know, no problem! That’s the point: if you don’t know, no problem. So Don’t-Know mind is very important.

Much understanding means somebody’s idea; it’s somebody’s idea that makes problems for me. Many desires, cannot get the desires, then get angry, then ignorance appears, make ignorant actions – stupid actions. So then you have problems. So Buddha is teaching us, you must attain your true self. If I ask you, “Who are you?”, what do you say? You know what I mean? Human beings have much understanding, but don’t understand anything!

Zen Master Seung Sahn

(From The Kwan Um School of Zen)

Waking Up from the Dream

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I will tell you a story. There was a guy who went to his psychotherapist claiming that he had a big problem, and that it had been bothering him for one year already.

“I go to sleep every day, and I have a dream at night. Mice are playing soccer. It’s a regular league, and each day, Warsaw mice are playing against mice on a different team, and it’s been like this for a year. I don’t want to see it anymore. What should I do?”

And the doctor says, “It’s OK. It’s out of stress. I have these pills; here is the prescription. Swallow one in the evening, and no more dreams.”

But then the guy says, “Can I please wait until tomorrow to start taking the pills? We have mice finals tonight. The World Cup!”

This is about our waking up. It’s very similar. We want to wake up. We know it’s a dream, and it’s not so cool. But we still want to see the finals. Or something in the dream continues to hold us back, and we wait. That’s why we stay in the dream.

So stay attentive. If you cannot wake up, or it goes slowly, that means you have something that is holding you back. And you have to know what that is. The teacher can help you, but the best teacher is here inside yourself.

Oleg Šuk JDPSN
(From The Kwan Um School of Zen)

New Year Poem

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From Zen Master Seung Sahn 1980

Every year, every year,
New year, new year.
Every year, every year,
Old year, old year.

Old year gone…. New year.
New year gone… Old year.

Who made that?
You? I? We? They?
No, no, no!
Then God? Buddha? Time? Space?
No, no, no!
Then the sun? The moon?, The earth? The stars?
No, no, no!
Then the mountain? The river? The tree? The flower?
No, no, no!
Then the elephant? The dog? The cat? The mouse?
No, no, no!
Then, “Three pounds of flax?”
“Dry shit on a stick?”
“Katz?”
“Mu?”
No, no, no!

Then what?

The snow sparkles in the dawn.
In the morning 1972 plus 8.

(From The Kwan Um School of Zen)