Principles of Self-Cultivation

The Master said,

"If the scholar be not grave, he will not call forth any veneration, and his learning will not be solid.

"Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles.

"Have no friends not equal to yourself.

"When you have faults, do not fear to abandon them."

taken from:

The Analects of Confucius

Book 1, Chapter 8

Boring

‎Never fear being vulgar, just boring.

Diana Vreeland

Influence

My father said,

“In life, most of us are going to do ordinary things.

The most important thing about doing ordinary things is to do them extraordinarily well

and be able to go to the beach and have nobody know who you are.”

That was very powerful to me: Ego is not central.

by Glenn Murcutt

How You Made People Feel

‎I've learned that people will forget what you said,

people will forget what you did,
but people will never forget how you made them feel.

Maya Angelou

The Story of Little Sunflower-Seed

I wonder whether you have heard the story of the little Sunflower-seed. It goes something like this:

The little Sunflower-seed is innocent and ignorant, cheerful and carefree.

The little Sunflower-seed knows his destiny is to grow into the magnificent Sunflower.

He knows his destiny very well.

But the little Sunflower-seed knows not the hardships of growing before he could Blossom.

'Hey, little Sunflower-seed,' said the magnificent Sunflower.

"Yes?"

'Let me tell you the story of growing into a sunflower'

"Okay."

'First you must find a perfect ground to grow.

The ground must be moist enough to stimulate the root,

And it must contain enough nutrition for growth,

And it must be soft enough for the root to penetrate into.'

'After finding the perfect ground, the real challenge begins.

It is the very first step of growing.

You must push your root hard through your shell,

And ground you root firmly,

So that you can stand up strong in the future,

Through the stormy rain.'

'When you grow you'll need food and water,

Which do not come easily and free.

Sometimes, if you are lucky,

The rain will fall.

But most of the time, you will not have the luck.'

'When happened, you must prepare for hunger.

You must find what you need to grow independently,

Your root must dig down to the hardest crust of the earth,

Growing toward as many direction as you can,

Just to find the precious water,

Which is so dear to us.'

As the magnificent Sunflower continues,

The little Sunflower-seed listens.

The little Sunflower-seed did not know,

That to Blossom is a struggle.

'Sometimes, before you can Blossom,

You will get attacked.

The insects love your leaves and your stalk.

They will cut and chew on you.

It will be painful but it will not kill you.

As long as you have strong root grounded,

You will grow back no matter how much it hurt you.'

The magnificent Sunflower concludes,

'The process to Blossom is long and hard,

A Sunflower-seed, you may be,

Clarity, you may have for your destiny,

But know that not all sunflower-seed can Blossom.'

'But when you do Blossom,

You will be Magnificent.'

Solving Problem

We can't solve problems using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.

Albert Einstein

The Heart Sutra

(or The Heart of Prajnaparamita Sutra)

Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, meditating deeply on Perfection of Wisdom, saw clearly that the five aspects of human existence are empty*, and so released himself from suffering.

Answering the monk Sariputra, he said this:

Body is nothing more than emptiness,
emptiness is nothing more than body.
The body is exactly empty,
and emptiness is exactly body.

The other four aspects of human existence --
feeling, thought, will, and consciousness --
are likewise nothing more than emptiness,
and emptiness nothing more than they.

All things are empty:
Nothing is born, nothing dies,
nothing is pure, nothing is stained,
nothing increases and nothing decreases.

So, in emptiness, there is no body,
no feeling, no thought,
no will, no consciousness.
There are no eyes, no ears,
no nose, no tongue,
no body, no mind.
There is no seeing, no hearing,
no smelling, no tasting,
no touching, no imagining.
There is nothing seen, nor heard,
nor smelled, nor tasted,
nor touched, nor imagined.

There is no ignorance,
and no end to ignorance.
There is no old age and death,
and no end to old age and death.
There is no suffering, no cause of suffering,
no end to suffering, no path to follow.
There is no attainment of wisdom,
and no wisdom to attain.

The Bodhisattvas rely on the Perfection of Wisdom,
and so with no delusions,
they feel no fear,
and have Nirvana here and now.

All the Buddhas,
past, present, and future,
rely on the Perfection of Wisdom,
and live in full enlightenment.

The Perfection of Wisdom is the greatest mantra.
It is the clearest mantra,
the highest mantra,
the mantra that removes all suffering.

This is truth that cannot be doubted.
Say it so:

Gaté,
gaté,
paragaté,
parasamgaté.
Bodhi!
Svaha!

Which means...

Gone,
gone,
gone over,
gone fully over.
Awakened!
So be it!

* Emptiness is the usual translation for the Buddhist term Sunyata (or Shunyata). It refers to the fact that no thing -- including human existence -- has ultimate substantiality, which in turn means that no thing is permanent and no thing is totally independent of everything else. In other words, everything in this world is interconnected and in constant flux. A deep appreciation of this idea of emptiness thus saves us from the suffering caused by our egos, our attachments, and our resistance to change and loss.