Why Bodhidharma Came from the West

According to all the Zen Masters, only thinking obstructs the natural enlightened state (Bodhi) and the instantaneous functioning of transcendental wisdom (Prajna). Therefore, if you can cut off your thinking at will, you experience satori, sudden awakening to your true self, the brilliantly clear and pervasive Buddha nature, the "inconceivable state of the Tathagatas."

This is called "attaining the mysterious principle," and "passing the barrier of the Patriarchs." It happens like a flash of lightning, a horse galloping past an open window, the blow of a sharp cleaver.

Eventually, by making this "suchness" your normal state of being, you arrive at Daigo-Tettei, Great Enlightenment. In this condition, your mind remains empty and quiescent, no matter what sensation or image appears in and by it, like a still pond that can vividly reflect the images of flying geese. You are free of the bondage of compulsive thinking; which does not mean that thoughts do not sometimes occur, only that you do not identify with them, so they die out one after another like rootless grasses.

Whereas other people go around with furrowed brows and an absent look studying their "internal maps," or arguing about what is or is not Zen, you are perpetually alert to reality without grasping at it or trying to fix it into a defined form. You are always absorbed merely in what you are doing and what is in front of you, no concern for past or future, living playfully in a perpetual childlike state of joy and amazement. Even when you "teach" or "write" or speak to others you are just being playful, direct, forceful and serene.

At this stage there is no effort, no need to choose this over that. Everything that happens is fine. You know exactly why Bodhidharma came from the West. Your eyebrows are entangled with Lin Chi's. "The blue mountain does not obstruct the white cloud." "Bamboo of the South, wood of the North." "A blind girl on a bench in the sauna, rocking back and forth." "The red blossoms of the wild quince, the sharp trills of an oriole in the big pine."