People imagine enlightenment will make them incredibly powerful. And it does. It makes you the most powerful being in all the universe- but usually no one else notices. Brad Warner More Quotes by Brad Warner More Quotes From Brad Warner Disappointment is just the action of your brain readjusting itself to reality after discovering things are not the way you thought they were. Brad Warner disappointment discovery reality We always imagine that there's got to be somewhere else better than where we are right now; this is the Great Somewhere Else we all carry around in our heads. We believe Somewhere Else is out there for us if only we could find it. But there's no Somewhere Else. Everything is right here...Make this your paradise or make this your hell. The choice is entirely yours. Really. Brad Warner choices somewhere-else believe You can always improve your situation. But you do so by facing it, not by running away. Brad Warner running-away situation running Compassion is the ability to see what needs doing right now and the willingness to do it right now. Brad Warner ability compassion needs Do what you do as well as you possibly can. That's Buddhist morality. Brad Warner buddhist morality wells There are many diamonds in the world and if you lose your favorite, you can work hard, earn a lot of money and get another one to replace it. But the moments of your life aren't like that. Once they're gone, they'll never return. Each and every one is the most precious thing in existence. You can never meaningfully compare one moment with any other. You can never meaningfully compare your life with anyone else's. No matter how rich someone else may be, no matter how happy they look, no matter how enlightened they seem, they can never be you. Never, ever, ever. Only you can live your life. Brad Warner live-your-life hard-work matter You can't function in society if you don't involve yourself in the fictions society accepts about time. But you do so with the understanding that you're playing a game. Brad Warner understanding games fiction The truth comes when you can see that your self-image is just a convenient reference point and nothing more, and that you as you had imagined yourself do not exist. Brad Warner convenient truth self If you want to believe in reincarnation, you have to believe that this life, what you're living through right now, is the afterlife. You're missing out on the afterlife you looked forward to in your last existence by worrying about your next life. This is what happens after you die. Take a look. Brad Warner afterlife worry believe The trick to not thinking is not adding energy to the equation in an effort to forcibly stop thinking from happening. It’s more a matter of subtracting energy from the equation in order not to barf the thoughts up and start chewing them over again. Brad Warner effort order thinking Your role is to do and say the things that need to be done and said from your unique perspective. Brad Warner perspective unique needs You won’t understand life and death until you’re ready to set aside any hope of understanding life and death and just live your life until you die. Brad Warner live-your-life life-and-death understanding Reality's all you've got. But here's the real secret, the real miracle: it's enough. Brad Warner miracle real secret Truly compassionate action arises spontaneously without thought and is carried out in real action with no anticipation of reward and, indeed, no concept of a doer of that action. Brad Warner doers rewards real At times, Zen does get into some Buddhist Cosmology. Nishijima Roshi, my main teacher would talk about that and almost every time immediately say that it was only one way of looking at it. Whenever addressing realms of Heaven or Hell, he'd also address that it was just a psychological state. Brad Warner buddhist teacher heaven So he [Shoko Asahara] was insane but managed to convince a couple thousand people that he was enlightened. Western culture, which Japan is now definitely a part of, doesn't have an understanding of what Enlightenment is. Brad Warner japan couple people The problem is the way we let our desires stand in the way of our enjoyment of what we already have. Brad Warner problem desire way we ourselves are not something apart from our circumstances. What we are and where we are are one and the same. Brad Warner circumstances Since then, my approach to all things spiritual is rather cynical you could say. When somebody present something to me as spiritual, my first instinct is to be cynical and think, "oh yeah, one of those again." You see so much of it see in "spiritual culture" and people get very excited about it. It's all very "hoo haw." Brad Warner spiritual people thinking Zen practice is about not getting high on anything and in so doing getting high on absolutely everything. We then find that everything we encounter - bliss or nonbliss - possesses a tremendous depth and beauty that we usually miss. Brad Warner practice missing beauty
